The collected works and ramblings of Faeriemage
"Blow out the candles, Robby, and make a wish!"
His mother's over enthusiasm was infectious and so Robby scrunched his eyes closed and blew out the seven candles on his cake. He held the thought in his mind for a long moment as people laughed and his mom cut the cake. When he opened his eyes, nothing had changed.
His cake was still a transformers cake, and the boys at his party had not magically transformed into girls.
"Blow out the candles, Rob, and make a wish!"
The divorce had taken a lot out of his mother this year, but he still had hope for the future. Eight candles to be blown out, and a bigger name to make him feel special. He still liked to be called Robby, but his dad went by Bobby. It reminded his mother too much of all she'd lost to keep calling him Robby.
He closed his eyes as tightly as he could, hoping that he could have his one true wish. The wish he'd told his father a year ago. He also wished his father would come back. Somewhere deep inside he thought that his father leaving might be his fault, but he tried to put it away.
He blew out the candles and was again disappointed to find himself unchanged.
"Make a wish, Rob!"
Mom's new boyfriend Mike stood behind her and they both smiled at Rob as he again closed his eyes and blew out the candles. There were fewer friends this year because his mom was tired of him hanging with the girls in the neighborhood and Mike thought this would help him man up.
Mike scared him sometimes.
Nine candles blown out with a wish made in desperation. Dad come home, I didn't mean it. I need you here.
"Blow out the candles, Rob!"
Mom wore heavy makeup this year to cover the black eye. Rob's arm was in a cast. Mike was in jail.
Rob closed his eyes tightly and made a wish. It was the only wish he could remember now. The first wish. Dad died trying to protect them. That's why Mike was in jail. No friends were at the house this year.
Ten candles for little Robby on this day when his father had died.
The cake was all in black with black wax candles.
"Blow out the candles, Rob, and make a wish!"
"The name is Sorrow, mom. Get it right."
Mom hid a smile behind her black lace-gloved hand. "Ok, Sorrow, make a wish."
Rob scrunched his eyes tight like he did as a child, trying to recapture that simple innocence that he missed. It was the anniversary of his father's death and they had a deathday/birthday this year.
He blows out the eleven candles and the wish remains unfulfilled.
"Robert? Robert!? Are you home?"
The cake sat in a bakery box on the counter. Twelve candles lay in a box next to it on the counter.
Robert was at Julie's house. He'd been there often this week and his mom thought that this was his budding hormones at work. She tossed the cake in the trash and goes to lie down. She feelt so tired after a day of work on her feet at the hospital.
Robert and Julie sat on the couch wondering what they are going to do. They haven't done anything yet, but they really want to tell his mom. They fell asleep next to each other on the couch as they waited for his mom to get home. She smiled thinking of young love and got a blanket out of the closet for them.
She threw thirteen candles in the trash and put the cake in the fridge for later.
Robbie looked out through the window. His mother wasn't understanding at all. She moved him to across town with her. He locked the door when he came in like usual.
None of this was fair. His mother had seemed so sympathetic about it all, but she was just so mad when she'd found out the truth. Robbie looked out the window at the evening star and made a wish. It was the same wish, but he wanted also to be Julie's sister. They got along so well, and he knew that they could convince her parents that his wish was the only right course for him to take.
There wouldn't be a cake this year even if he wanted it.
He cried himself to sleep.
Robbie lay in the hospital bed. His mother was working so she took care of him when she could, but mostly he just felt trapped by the cast immobilizing his hips. An aluminum baseball bat can do a lot of damage when it is swung in anger. The diary had been private, but Suzanne had spread its contents to the entire school.
His crush on Scott had gotten him attacked by the rest of the baseball team.
Scott had come by a couple of times to apologize, and Robbie tried not to let him know how much it improved the day.
There were no candles on the cake his mother had brought in, but he closed his eyes tightly and made a wish.
It was still painful to walk, but his physical therapist told him that would get better with time. Julie had driven across town to visit him and they baked a cake and lit the candles.
"Well, Make a wish, Kieley."
The boy scrunched up his nose and shook his head.
"Lulu?"
"No."
"Laura?"
"How about Laney?"
"I like it. Make a wish, Laney."
The newly named Laney scrunched up his nose as he smiled. The makeup he wore didn't quite match his coloring, but he didn't care. His mother wouldn't be home for another couple of hours and he had time to clean it all off.
He blew out sixteen candles and smiled as he wished.
Laney spent time in the mall on his seventeenth birthday. He was trying to muster up the courage to get his ears pierced with some of the money that he had earned this year at this job. People already thought him strange at school, but that was fine by him.
The damage to his genitals two years ago meant that he was supposed to be taking testosterone. He didn't tell anyone that Julie had provided him with some of those birth control patches. He wore it on his hip and it made him smile every time he saw it in the mirror.
He finally decided to go with a pair of skulls with heart shaped eyes. That would really give them something to talk about.
Laney tugged at her skirt, feeling like it was too short. She no longer cared what her mother said. The cake had two large wax numbers on it. 18. She blew it out, wishing again her same wish. For ten years she'd been hoping that there would be a magical change. That she would open her eyes and everything would be different. But she opened them and the world was the same as it had been. There were no changes and she began to cry.
She was alone in her apartment and alone in her heart. Julie was already off at school and Laney expected to meet her there in the fall.
She went to bed without cutting the cake.
Julie and her boyfriend, Adam, looked across the table at Laney.
"Come on, Make a wish birthday girl."
Laney wrinkled up her nose and stuck out her tongue. She took a deep breath and blew. Apparently it had done some fine work to her chest as Adam was staring when Laney looked up.
Laney blushed and Julie elbowed him.
It wasn't her wish, the same wish she'd been making for years, but it was pleasant none the less.
Laney could hardly sit without discomfort. She was happy with the changes that this last year had brought, but she was still in a lot of pain.
"Make a wish, Laney?"
Laney smiled at Scott, and Adam and Julie laughed.
She closed her eyes tightly and wished with all her heart that the world would change her into what she had always wanted to be. She opened them and the pain remained. A tear dropped from her eye.
"Are you okay, Laney?"
"I'm happy, Scott. It's just the pain of the surgery."
"Ok, cut the cake and let's eat then."
Twenty-one candles graced the cake. Laney felt the weight of the ring on her finger, a simple band, as she sat there looking at the cake. The fire light danced in her eyes as she smiled at her friends.
She closed her eyes tightly and blew out the candles.
"So, what did you wish for?" Scott asked, fingering the matching band on his finger.
For once, finally, she was glad that nothing had changed when she opened her eyes. "I have nothing left to wish for."
"Oh come on," Julie said. She was very pregnant and Laney couldn't be happier for her.
"Well, I could wish for one thing..."
"Oh really?"
"Yes, I wish all of you would go home so I could spend some time with my husband."
There was general laughter at this and they bid their friends good night.
Scott carried her to their bed.
As she lay there in his arms quite a bit later, listening to him snore, she realized something.
Her wish had been granted. The wish she made all those years ago before her father left had been granted. She cried tears of happiness as she lay there wrapped in love.
Rejection is never an easy thing:
"I'm sorry, but we have no use for a male singer with your voice range."
"You're just not what we're looking for at this time. If you would like, we could keep your band in mind to play for another singer."
"You sound too much like a girl for you to be popular as a male performer."
Those aren't the only ones, but let's just say they're the highlights. It's times like these that I curse my genetics. Sure, when I was thirteen, it was cool to be able to sing soprano in church. I got to stand there with my mom, and I just belted it out there. I even got a couple of solos.
At sixteen, though, it's just not cool to be a countertenor, which is just a fancy way to say that I still sing soprano. Yep, that's me: Keith, the boy with the girl's voice.
When things get rough, I walk in the desert. This time, my friends decided to join me. The sun had just gone down and it was starting to cool off, but I didn't mind.
"That one guy seemed to think we could run instrumentals for other groups, Keith."
"You really want to do that, Bobby? I doubt they would let you use the Behemoth."
"It would be an in, Keith. I could sacrifice the Behemoth for that."
"Bobby's right, Keith. We would be in the industry."
"Jake, we'd be playing other people's songs for the rest of our career. Up in Flames would be up in smoke."
"Be reasonable, Keith."
"Guys! Can't we just walk in silence for a bit?"
The stars were already coming out when we got back to Jake's garage. Jack turned on the TV and flipped over to the Tween Awards. It had already started and they were giving out the awards.
"Why are we watching this crap?" I asked. I didn't want to know the answer, but I felt compelled to take that step too far.
"We need to keep abreast of our competition. Eventually you might be up for the Best Male Artist."
"Whatever Jake, you're such a girl sometimes."
Bobby and I laughed at this. Jake got a thoughtful expression on his face. We all went back to watching the show. Bobby and I joked about the acceptance speeches, mocking them. Of course, I got to mimic the girls. After a couple of minutes, we noticed that Jake hadn't said anything for a while.
"Jake, what's up?" Bobby asked.
Jake turned to me. "What if you were?"
"What if I was what?"
"Sorry, what if you were a girl?"
"But I'm not."
"But what if you were. . .now hear me out. The main reason we are getting blown off is that they expect a female face to match your female voice."
I glared at him.
"You remember how Spotlight reacted when they called us in to record a demo. They couldn't get us out of there fast enough when they found out the singer was male."
That episode had been a particularly ugly one. They'd thought that Bobby was the singer's name just with a masculine spelling. When they'd discovered their mistake, they'd asked us to leave. We refused and they had security escort us out.
I turned away from the other two and stared at the TV. As I was watching, stewing about the limited options before me, Josh Holliday was announced as the winner of Best Male Artist. The stunning blonde next to him gave him a kiss before he went up to accept his award. Right there everything struck me. I wanted to be there in that moment so badly. I wanted everyone to know my name, and to see me for who I was.
How would that be possible if I performed as a female.
"Come on, Keith, you know that 'My Life with You is Hell' is a girl's song."
I'd written the song about my next-door neighbor Gretchen's life.
"Look, can you give me some time to think about this?"
We watched the rest of the show, but I wasn't paying attention anymore. I needed to talk to someone who, I hoped, would understand. The two friends I was sitting with were more interested in the opportunity this choice presented. They would do anything to get into the business, but would I?
***
I slept in on Sunday. I'd tried to get in touch with Gretchen, but she had gone camping with her dad for the weekend.
I stewed during church about it. I waffled from being all for it to worried about how something like that could actually work. I mean, I was male, right? People wouldn't take me for a girl.
I went out into the desert again after church, not even taking the time to change. God didn't answer me even though I poured my heart out to Him.
I wondered why He had given me a gift that society would not understand.
That night I had a very strange dream. We had been preparing backstage for our first concert and the stadium was sold out. There was a storm going on outside and I could hear the thunder through the walls. Half the time the impatient roar of the crowd drowned out the noise of the storm. I walked out on stage and yelled into my microphone, "are you all ready to ROCK!?"
There was a laugh from the audience and I realized I wasn't wearing any clothing. When I went to cover myself with my hands it wasn't my body, but a woman' s body. "Look at the girl!" came shouts from the crowd. I turned to run off the stage.
I woke up with a scream in my throat. I looked at the clock. It said 3:00am. I turned over to go back to sleep, but the dream stuck with me the rest of the night. By the time I got up the next morning, I had decided that I wouldn't go through with it.
I got up and threw together an outfit for the day. I gathered my books and got outside just in time to hop into Gretchen's car. I was glad that it was the end of the school year. During any of the sports seasons there was about a one in four chance that she would be wearing her cheerleading outfit. It was really distracting watching her drive in that short skirt.
Today I could have done with the distraction.
"I got the message on my phone when my dad and I got back, Keith. What did you want to talk about?"
"Well, I was trying to make a decision about something, and I thought you could help. I ended up coming to a decision on my own."
"What was the problem?"
"Nothing."
"Come on, Keith. You and I have known each other for years. I know when you're avoiding something."
"No, it's really nothing. The band can do without me. . .never mind."
"Keith?"
I sighed. "Fine. If you promise not to laugh?"
"Ok, now you have to tell me." I love it when she gets that grin on her face. Ok, so I love everything about her.
"TheguysthinkIshoulddresslikeagirl" I said it as fast as I could, hoping she would not understand, but accept it.
"Wait, what?"
Ok, it was worth a shot. "Jake suggested I dress like a girl for the band."
"So, you decided to do it then?"
"What?"
"I think it's a great idea. You know it is too. You almost signed with Spotlight Studios when they thought you were a girl."
"But, I'm not a girl. No one would actually think I was. I'm too tall."
"5'9" isn't all that tall for a girl" She had a point. I knew a couple of girls in the jazz band that were taller than me.
"I'm as flat as a boy, literally."
"So are some girls in our school."
"Yeah, they're all younger than me."
"Not Heather McIntyre."
She had a point there. Heather was eighteen and looked like a boy, except for the long hair and makeup.
"But. . ."
"Keith, do you remember the first thing you said to me when we moved in three years ago?"
I blushed. I did remember. I'd thought she was beautiful, and wanted to impress her.
"Well?"
"I'm Keith Robison and I'm going to be famous."
"Exactly. So, you're going to tell me that you can't pull off a Ziggy Stardust?"
I looked at her blankly for a moment before I clued in to what she was saying.
"Bowie wasn't pretending to be a girl."
"It was still an act. You won't be Desdemona, she will be you."
"Desdemona?"
"Yeah, I thought it would fit with most of the songs you have played for me. Especially the one you wrote about me."
"The one. . .about that. . ." I panicked a bit. I didn't tell her before I played it, and never remember telling her about it at all.
"It's fine, Keith. I'm flattered actually. And besides. It's my life. You didn't think I would recognize it? Am I a blonde bimbo in your mind?"
"What, no, I don't think you're stupid."
"Then give me some credit," she said with a half smile.
"So, why Desdemona?"
"It was my Goth name."
I couldn't decide which was a bigger shock: the all-American girl, head cheerleader, was a Goth; or that she had gone by the name Desdemona.
We were stopped at a light, so she pulled out her digital frame from her purse. It contained the most important images from her life. I'm not sure if any of her 'friends' from school had ever seen it. She flipped through a few images until she came the one she wanted.
The girl in the image was wearing a corset in black and a dark red. Her makeup was alternating shapes of black and red as well. She was wearing a gauzy knee length skirt in black, and had leggings in the red color. The only parts of the outfit that weren't black or red were the combat boots and her hair. Both of those were pink.
"That's Desdemona."
I was starting to see how this would work, but that hair. . .
"I can't cut and die my hair like that, Etch."
"It's a wig, silly." She was grinning at me now. She knew she'd won. "We'll talk more after school."
I looked up. We'd arrived at the school while I was mesmerized by Desdemona. I couldn't tell who it was in the makeup, and it looked nothing like Gretchen now. I walked into the school building in a daze, and that's about how the rest of the day went.
I finished my math homework long before the teacher finished explaining the subject to my slower classmates, and I spent a lot of time wondering what exactly I was getting myself into.
I looked at my right hand. It was already a little feminine. I chuckled at the thought.
I played the 12 string guitar. Anyone who has seen one will know what I'm talking about, but there are a lot of people who haven't. A 12 string guitar has 12 strings in the same space that a 6 string guitar does. They are arranged into six pairs of strings, and depending on personal preference are either tuned in synch (meaning both strings of the pair are tuned to the same note) or in octaves (meaning the strings are tuned an octave apart from each other) or, more commonly, a mixture of the two.
I run a full set of octaves.
I know you don't need to know any of this.
What's important is that each pair is close together, making most finger plucking techniques about impossible.
Enter my right hand. I had lacquered the nails on that hand. Top and bottom. I shaped them carefully. They weren't all that long, but they came to a rounded point, just like a guitar pick. I had five guitar picks permanently attached to my right hand, made out of human nail. Call me Edward-Pick-hands.
And they were the color of lapis lazuli.
I know, I'm weird. Band geeks are allowed to be weird.
See, that's the reason that Gretchen had said we would talk after school. Each of us had our world at school. Hers was the popular populars. You know the types. Football players and Cheerleaders.
Mine was outcasts. You could sort of say I was king of the outcasts. I ruled in benevolence, though.
Well, not that it would matter soon. School was out in three weeks. We would be done in two, normally, but there had been a few too many snow days this year and they just added the difference to the end of the year. I loved snow days, but really hated more days of school.
I always found it amusing that I had no classes with any of the people I usually hung out with. I played with the jazz band, Jake did orchestra (bass fiddle if you can believe it), and Bobby felt that the organization imposed upon him by the musical effete crushed his free musical spirit. This means that Mr. Fergusen wouldn't allow him to assemble the Behemoth in the school and use it as the entire percussion section.
The rest of my classes were bottom of the heap, not because I was stupid, just because I didn't care. The reason I could do my math homework while waiting for the teacher to explain it to the others? It was the second time I'd taken the course. I was so bored, I decided it was time to get on to the next one.
Bobby was taking AP classes, as a Sophomore. And Jake was basically normal.
I know, I ramble a bit, but I am making a point.
Or I will.
The Behemoth is what Bobby calls the instrument that he spent the last 3 years constructing. He has used just about anything that he could find that will hold a beat, and provide a unique sound. It has pipes: galvanized, copper, and pvc. It has barrels and trashcans. It has lids and pots. It even has a couple of mufflers. It basically looks like a set from Stomp out Loud.
That is nothing to the way it sounds.
He took the time to "tune" the thing so that he could play music with it. The sounds might not be standard, but they harmonize with our other instruments.
We did a three man arrangement of Four Seasons: Winter using it. And that only used 'standard' notes. The Behemoth can play just about anything Bobby takes it into his mind to try, including thunderstorms and bird song.
Assembly is the problem. Right now put up and take down takes about three hours. He's trying to figure out how to make it more portable.
Back to school. I played a 6-string electric in band. We had a mini concert at lunch and so I got to show off a bit. Mr. Fergusen likes to "drum up business" before concerts and we would have the last concert of the year on Friday.
I made it through the rest of the day as a complete non-entity. I met Gretchen outside at her car and we drove home. Sometimes I really wish Gretchen weren't two years older than me. I might have a chance then.
"How was your Monday, Etch?"
"I think you're trying to avoid something, Keith."
"Ok, yes, I'll do Desdemona onstage."
She squealed at this. "Ok, you have to come over to my house and try on the clothing so we can see what needs to be replaced."
At least someone was happy about all of this. I tried to smile and get into it the way that Gretchen was, but it just wasn't in me. She was talking about her clothing, and the different options we had, and all of the color choices.
Don't get me wrong. I am a bit Goth. I didn't usually go in for the makeup (cake is a pain to clean off every night) but I wore shades of black for all my clothing, and my hair was currently dyed black.
Yes, there are different shades of black.
I swear everyone in the audience would be happier if I were discussing pink or purple.
See, I like your classic easy basic Goth.
Desdemona was a Glam Goth.
Color is allowable for a Glam Goth. Weird hair colors. Strange makeup. Rainbow attire. Glam Goth is more about attitude that conforming to a specific style.
It really clashed with the persona that Gretchen currently pulled off. The follow the crowd, subjugate yourself mentality. Course, that is where the emotion for 'My Life with You is Hell' came from.
We pulled into our driveway, and I was about to try to make a retreat over to my house, but Gretchen gave me the look and I couldn't resist.
You know the one. All big eyes and pouty lips.
I really love this girl.
I sighed and she beamed a smile at me.
We went up to her room.
"Ok, strip down for me so we can get started."
"Um."
"Don't be like that. I've seen you naked before."
"Yeah, once, in your pool, in the dark."
"Fine, I'll turn around long enough for you to put these on."
She handed me the leggings from the picture, and turned around. I quickly stripped to my underwear, and pulled up the leggings. She turned around and looked at them.
"Not gonna work, Keith."
"What?"
"You're either going to have to go without your underwear, or wear a pair of my panties."
"What!?!"
"You can see the seams. Look in the mirror."
I looked, and sure enough I could see the seams from my underwear. The leggings were really tight. That's not all I could see. "Um, this isn't going to work. Anyone can see I'm a boy in these."
"Well, you could always tuck yourself up between your legs."
"What?"
She explained what she meant while she looked through her drawer for a pair of panties. I pulled everything off and pulled up her panties, black of course. I situated myself and looked up. . .to meet Gretchen's eyes in the mirror.
"Gretchen!"
"It's not ladylike to whine." She gave me a little smile.
"You said you wouldn't look."
"I said I'd turn around."
She had me there, again. I don't really understand it. I do great in school, but this one woman had me twisted around her little finger.
I pulled up the leggings again, and looked at myself in the mirror. I didn't look much like a boy down there anymore. The combination of the tight panties and the tight leggings had smoothed everything out.
"Is that how you. . .?"
"Yes." She blushed crimson.
I smiled at this, "Really. . .Well, I have to say I never noticed anything and your skirt will occasionally ride up when you are shifting gears."
"Don't go getting any ideas, Keith. You're still too young for me."
I smiled some more, but said nothing. She punched me lightly in the arm.
"What's next?"
Next was the corset. I put it on and did up the eyelets on the front. She tightened it up for me. I had a bit of a waist when she was done. It had also given me a touch of cleavage. Sure, not a lot, but I didn't quite look like a boy any more. Sure, I wasn't exactly a girl, but it was something.
"What size shoe do you wear?"
I blushed. I had small feet and it bothered me. "I wear a size 7."
"That's men's, right?"
"Yeah."
She got the pink boots out of the closet. "They are a 9 women's. They were a little bit big for me, but should be exactly right for you."
She was right. They fit perfectly. She sat me in the chair in front of her makeup table and turned me away from the mirror. She put the wig on, and pinned it down. Then she started to work on my face. She was quick and efficient and before I knew it, she was done. I'd never had much facial hair to speak of, and only had to shave once a week. It was all basically peach fuzz. I'd shaved that morning. The cake makeup covered anything that my razor missed. There was a girl in stylized half and half harlequin makeup and pink hair looking back at me.
"Wow. . ."
I stood up and looked at myself in the full length mirror.
"Almost forgot, Keith."
She handed me the gauzy skirt and a pair of fingerless lace gloves. I slipped them on, and pulled up the skirt. I twirled a bit holding out my arms. Gretchen snickered.
"What?"
"You're going to have to shave your under arms." I blushed, but the makeup made it invisible.
"You can use my razor."
I went into the bathroom and shaved in the sink. I only nicked myself once. I went back out to Gretchen.
"Much better," she said.
On impulse I kissed her on the lips, "Thank you,"
She was a little stunned, and had a little smile. She shook herself after a moment or two and looked at me, "You're welcome, but you shouldn't have kissed me." She was trying to look cross. I grinned at her.
"You mean like this?" I lunged for her with my lips puckered. I didn't expect for her to let me catch her.
"Um, Etch?" I was holding her after our second kiss, which had been more than the peck I'd given her the first time. She was a little shorter than I was, but that was probably all the boots.
"Hmm?" She was a little dazed, and then she looked at me and pulled away. She blushed red hot.
"Let's call the boys from your band over."
"They'd have no reason to come to your house. Let's go over to mine and call them there."
"Ok, and we can show your Mom at the same time."
I felt the blood drain from my face. "Crap. Mom."
"What's wrong, Keith."
"I have no idea how she'll take this."
"Well, no other way to find out, but to try."
We went over to our house and went in. "Mom?"
"In the kitchen, Keith."
Gretchen grabbed my hand for support and we went into the kitchen. "Hello Gretchen, are you over for dinner? Who's your friend?"
"Hi Mom."
"Keith? What in the world are you wearing?"
"Um."
"Mrs. Robison, We thought that if Keith looked like a girl on stage that the labels would be more likely to accept his voice."
Mom looked really upset. "I can't deal with this now, Keith. I know you really want to perform, but is it worth it? What will the neighbors think?"
"I will only be doing it on stage, Mom. No one will worry about it. Desdemona will be the weird Goth rocker chick and no one will associate her with me."
"Desdemona? What would your father think?"
"Dad left us Mom. I don't really care what he thinks."
"I'm not having this argument with you right now, Keith. I want you clean faced and in boy clothes when I get back."
"Where are you going?"
"I have choir practice tonight. I would invite you again to come with me, but if you went into the church looking like that I'm sure it would fall around your ears."
"Mom. . ."
"Mrs. Robison. . ."
We spoke at the same time, but Mom cut us both off. "No arguments, and Gretchen, I expected better from you. How could you have let Keith do this."
Neither of us wanted to tell her it had been Gretchen's idea. She stormed out of the house and I heard her car drive away. I felt like crying.
"Well, there went a perfectly wonderful plan." I was ready to go change now, and forget the whole idea.
"No, it will still work. We just don't tell her."
"She'll find out eventually."
"And by then we will have evidence that her fears are groundless."
"Fine. Let's get the band together."
I tried calling Bobby first, but his mom said he was at Jake's house. It's a pain tracking down people who refuse to carry cell phones because they are a symbol of the dominance of corporate American mentality on the impressionable minds of the youth. . .
Yeah, Jake is a bit of an activist sometimes. He got Bobby to go along with him somehow.
"Hey, Jake, could you and Bobby come over to my house. I wanted to discuss your idea."
"Yeah, Bobby and I have been talking as well. We need to discuss things."
"See you soon."
We went and sat in the living room. Gretchen hadn't let go of my hand since we'd entered the kitchen. I picked it up and looked at it, "Gretchen. . ."
She looked at her hand and made to pull it away, but I held on. "We need to talk about this."
She jerked her hand out of my grasp. "No, we don't."
"Etch, I know how you feel about me, which is to say you don't." She opened her mouth to speak, and I put a finger on her lips. "I know we are friends, but that is all we've been. Yet you held my hand tonight, and you let me kiss you."
"You kissed me when I wasn't paying attention."
"Sure, the first time, but the second?"
I had seen her heartbroken and happy. I had seen her in pain and sick as a dog. I had seen her enjoyment of life and her fear of tomorrow. I had never seen her like this before. She seemed to want to say something, and yet at the same time was afraid to say anything.
"I can't right now, Keith. Maybe some other time. I just can't."
She began to cry, so I just held her. She stopped just as the doorbell rang. "I'm sure I look a mess." She ran upstairs into the bathroom.
I went to answer the door.
"Is Keith here?" Jake and Bobby were here finally.
"Come in, guys."
"Keith?!" They both said at the same time.
I grabbed them each by the shirt and pulled them in. I closed the door behind them. We went to the living room, and I waited for them to figure out what they wanted to say.
"You guys had something you wanted to discuss?"
"Well, you kinda blew us out of the water."
"You said it, Bobby. We were going to give you an ultimatum, but like usual, you one-upped us."
"Remember that time that we were having a water balloon fight, so I filled a cheap beach ball with water. I didn't know that Keith had the water key for the sprinkler system."
"Your mom gave it to me, Jake."
The three of them laughed at this. Having touched up her makeup, Gretchen came back down and sat next to me. I put my arm around her and just held her. She leaned into me.
"Wait, you guys aren't. . ." began Jake, why Bobby did a fish impression.
"No. . ." I began, but Gretchen had different ideas. She kissed me. On the Cheek, but it was a kiss, and I grinned.
"Keith has been helping me through some difficult stuff that not even he knows all about."
"Guys, she's my best friend."
"I thought we were your best friends."
"You guys are my friends, and the most talented people I know period. Gretchen is just special."
"Yeah, we don't look as good as either of you two do in a skirt."
Cake makeup has it's uses. Hiding a blush is one of them. . .at least until it rises to the tips of your ears.
"I think we embarrassed him, Jake. His ears went the same shade as the left side of his face."
"Seriously, though, Keith. When we came to the door, my first thought was 'Who's the Goth babe'."
"No joke."
"He does look good in a skirt, doesn't he?" added Gretchen. I pinched her side and she jumped. She elbowed me back.
"Guys, I need to get changed. My Mom threw a complete fit when she saw me like this. I'll do it for the our band, but I have to get changed somewhere other than home to do it."
"You could always keep changing at my house." Gretchen blushed and looked at the floor while she said this.
"Etch, I would love to keep doing that, but my Mom would find out sooner than later. I think changing at the venue is going to be the best bet."
Jake looked at Bobby, who shrugged, and then they both looked back at me. "That's not going to work, Keith old bean," Bobby began in his bad snooty English accent.
"I say, why not, Bobby, my good man?" Jake continued in the same bad accent.
"Because you are both going to be dead, and there won't be a band to play anymore?"
They both snorted at this, and Bobby continued, "because, Keith, the place we're going, one week from Friday, has no dressing rooms, and two, very dirty, public restrooms."
"Oh, no. We're not playing that. No way are you going to get me up there dressed like this."
"What are you talking about?" Gretchen asked me. I think my scared expression worried her.
"Well, um, you see. . ." Jake started.
"Yeah, we kinda. . ." Bobby continued.
"Spit it out," I barked.
"We entered 'Up in Flames' as a band for Gothplosion."
"Gothplosion is a sham, guys. It is the corporate tools trying to show how 'hip' they are by 'signing' the pseudo Goth band that they signed already and are just using the contest as free publicity with the local Goth crowd." Jake rubs off on me sometimes. Or I might have just been quoting an earlier rant he made about the same subject.
"Of course we won't win!" they both said together.
"Ok, so now I'm confused. Why are we entering a contest we can't win?"
"For the free publicity. MTV is covering Gothplosion this year."
Ok, that's new.
"What?!"
I'm not sure if Gretchen or I was more shocked by this.
I recovered faster, "how much did the label have to pay them?"
"No one knows for sure, but I checked the press releases on the MTV website, and it's there." Bobby was like a kid in a candy store over this. He was literally bouncing.
Jake wasn't much better, "if we prove ourselves in this thing, it will not only show the sham this contest is, but we might even get some MTV airtime. How's that for a band with no agent and no label."
"I think you guys need an agent before you do this contest. I know someone who might be willing to help."
That was the first time that Gretchen had mentioned that she knew anyone in 'The Biz'.
"Think you could call him tonight, Etch?"
She was a little worried when she first looked at me, but then she grabbed my hand and squeezed it, "I'll call him, Keith. Go get changed."
I went up to my makeup table and started cleaning my face. From long experience, baby wipes are a great way to get the first few layers off. I used to use alcohol wipes, but they dried my face out. Soap and water are the best for cake, but you tend to get your clothing drenched when you are in a hurry.
There was a little makeup left in the creases, and in my eyebrows of course, but my face was now mostly presentable. I changed out of Desdemona's clothing, folded it, and put it into a plastic bag to give to Jake or Bobby.
I decided to go with my halfway dressy Goth look. I put on a button shirt and a pair of ripped faded black denim jeans. Better than my school clothes, and as masculine as I could really go with my wardrobe. I considered wearing my boots, but mom always hated them. I went barefoot.
Gretchen was just getting off the phone when I got downstairs. "He said he could meet with you guys tomorrow. Are you up for that?"
I looked at the smiles on their faces, and I spoke for all of us, "we're up for it."
I gave the bag full of Desdemona to Bobby. "Keep her safe until the concert, Bobby."
"Yes, my Liege, our Queen will be safe."
We all laughed at this, and Bobby and Jake left to go home.
I sat there in the front room with Gretchen, she simply leaned against me, and I held her in my arms. Neither of us wanted to move, and both gained support from the other.
I don't know how long we sat there before I felt her breathing change. It felt good to know that she trusted me enough to fall asleep in my arms, but I knew that she didn't love me.
I wasn't sure of what I felt for her either, of course. Most of the time. There were moments when she stopped my heart. In those moments I would do anything in this world or the next for her.
I've had a crush on her since the moment that we met three years ago when her family moved in next door. She was fifteen at the time, and I was a scrawny thirteen year old. It wasn't that she was beautiful, and she was even then. There was just something there that screamed at me. That she needed my help and mine alone.
Ok, so that sounds a little stalkerish, but that's the closest I can get to expressing what I felt in that moment. I'm the best friend.
I have been there for a nasty breakup, and two not so nasty ones. I was there for a broken leg, and studying for exams.
I've been there as Sherpa and Mule for shopping expeditions to the mall. I was there when she almost died from pneumonia.
I began to rub her back a bit, and she snuggled into me. I wanted this moment to last forever, but like all such it never lasted long enough.
I heard the garage door open and close and the sound of keys hitting the counter. "Are you here, Keith?"
"In here, Mom." I said this as quietly as I could, but I felt Gretchen stir. She looked into my eyes, a lazy smile playing at her lips. She put her arms around me and fell asleep again. I guess I have been demoted from friend to teddy-bear. Oh well, at least I get to sleep with her.
My Mom came in the room. "Keith Michael Robison what do you have to say for yourself?"
"I have to say, first, that Gretchen has had a rough day, so could you keep it down a bit? Second, I have nothing to say about how I was dressed. It was a costume. I've worn them before."
"Yes, when you were in plays. And never girl's clothing."
"Performing in a band is a lot like a play, Mom. And so what if it was girl's clothing?"
"The bible says that you shouldn't wear girls clothing."
"Mom, seriously? It also suggests that people caught in adultery should be stoned, an eye for an eye, that people should sleep with their brothers wives after their brothers die, that you shouldn't travel on the Sabbath, and a lot of other things."
"Well, I don't agree with those things. . ."
"It's all or nothing, Mom. God either knows what he is talking about, or he doesn't. Besides, Christ said he fulfilled the law of Moses and gave us a higher law: Love one another."
"Isn't that a simplification, Keith?"
"Look, Mom. Everyone has a line they will not cross, morally speaking. I know where your line is, and I love you for it. Mine is somewhere else. This is not an issue of faith for me. I will not do this in your presence, or expect you to accept my doing it. However, we're going to pretend."
"I don't think. . ."
I have to admit I got a little angry. I also had a hard time lying to my mom. The rest sort of slipped out, "hear me out for a moment, Mom. You will pretend that I am not doing this. I will pretend I'm not doing this. While I'm at home, I will be your dutiful and loving son. I will keep helping out here and doing my chores and going with you to church on Sunday. I won't tell you about my concerts, and you won't ask."
"What about honor thy Father and thy Mother?"
"That only applies when they ask you to do things in righteousness, Mom."
"What I am asking is right!"
"Shh." I felt Gretchen stir, and hoped she would go back to sleep.
"I love you Mom. I will Honor your wishes in all things but this. If this lessens me in your eyes, I will live with it. The same way I lived with it when I quit the choir."
I felt a wetness on my chest, and realized that Gretchen was silently crying. I put my hand on her back and rubbed it a little.
My mother looked at her with contempt in her eyes, "this is all his fault isn't it? I knew he might be trouble one day. Filthy. . ."
"Get out." I was quiet, but my fury burned in my eyes. "Get out of this room until you calm down. I am tired of being the adult in this relationship, Mother. So Dad left you, great, that doesn't mean that all relationships are doomed to failure."
"Your father left me for a MAN, KEITH!!!"
I felt Gretchen jerk in my arms. She got up and ran from the room. She was trying to open the front door, but her tear filled eyes and wracking sobs blinded her to this simple task. I grabbed her from behind and just held her. She turned around and cried into my shoulder. "I'm sorry for this, Keith. I'm so sorry. I never meant to hurt you. I'm sorry."
"It's not your fault, Etch. Don't ever let my Mom make you feel that way." I kissed her on the forehead, and then opened the door to walk her home. "I'm walking Gretchen home, Mother."
I walked into her house with her sobbing and holding onto me for support. Her dad ran into the room. "What happened, Keith?"
"My mother happened. I'm sorry for this. I really am."
"Stay with me Keith. Don't leave me tonight."
I looked at her dad. He had a grim look on his face, but he nodded his assent. "No funny business you two."
I took her up to her room, and we flopped down on her bed. I propped myself against the wall so she could lean against me. We were both asleep within minutes.
***
Have you ever fallen asleep wedged against a wall underneath a beautiful woman? Good idea when you fall asleep. Bad idea when you wake up.
I extracted myself from the bad positioning and went downstairs to find Gretchen's dad already up and about.
"I trust that you two just went to sleep?"
"Nothing happened. I respect your daughter too much for that."
"I know that, Keith. I was mostly teasing you."
"Yeah, well she doesn't think of me in that way."
I felt some arms come around me from behind, and a kiss on the cheek. "Give me some time. I might be persuaded to come around."
I had a smile that just wouldn't go away, until I went outside to head back over to my own house. There was glass and clothing and furniture all over my lawn. I don't know how she'd done it, but my makeup table was among the debris. All of my possessions in this world were on that lawn. And here I was barefoot and unable to even get to any of my boots or shoes. The curtains from my room blew in the slight breeze like a jolly roger. It was strange the emotions that this sight gave me. It was hopeful at the same time that it tore out my heart.
I needed a pen and paper. Now. I turned and almost ran into Gretchen. "I need a song. I mean I need to write a song down."
The words were flowing through my mind. Someone handed me a blank piece of paper and a pen and I went to town. I had the words and music written within thirty minutes and I could finally consider what I was going to do about my stuff all over my front yard. I went outside to see Mr. Anderson cleaning up the last of the glass and wood.
"You didn't have to do that. . ." I began, but he interrupted me.
"You are welcome to stay with us until your Mom cools off, Keith. In the spare room, of course."
"Sir, I. . ."
He interrupted me and intentionally misunderstood what I was going to say. "Gretchen, make sure to lock your door tonight. I'm not altogether sure we can trust his beady eyes."
We needed this release of tension as we all laughed and went inside.
About half my clothing was ruined. The rest of my clothing was torn to one degree or another. Not all of it was caused by the glass. Ok, so I had a specific style I was going for.
I didn't find any of my makeup in the pile of clothing so I went back outside. Apparently the sprinklers had been set to go off last night. That explained my clothing being soaked. My makeup had run into the green grass in an abstract painting of red and white and black. I felt the urge again to poetry, and I had to get it out of me before I needed to write it down.
"Light and darkness mix with the blood of ages past, while life marches on." Sometimes speaking the shorter ones got rid of them before the compulsion really set in. You see, I write poetry compulsively. I know. It's weird. It's a lot worse when I'm emotional. And even the smallest things can set me off into a world of emotive words and imagery.
I took a final look at my house. Everything of mine had been thrown out that window. My room had been my only sanctuary. The rest of the house was devoted to my mother's twin gods: Vanity and Envy.
I went back in to figure out what I was going to wear today. That was quickly remedied as I was wearing the only clothing I now owned that was dry. I looked through my footwear, but came to the same conclusion. I only had one pair boots that weren't soaking wet. They were my favorite pair of boots, but I hadn't worn them to school. Ever. They were knee high boots and they had buckles instead of laces. Black of course. Real Italian leather. They were the last present my dad had given me. I should have known he was going to run at that point.
I needed to do something to augment this outfit. I couldn't just go like I was. I sorted through my clothing, putting what was still salvageable in the washer, and the rest in the trash. I found most of my jewelry, which I never wore to school either. and decided to just go for broke today. I had a silver cross on a heavy chain for my left wrist. I wore a small dragon holding a crystal on my left middle finger. I had 4 silver rings for my right hand, one for each finger. I always thought it went well with the blue of my fingers. My makeup was all over the lawn, so I snuck into Gretchen's room while she was out taking a shower.
I checked my face, and cleaned up the remaining traces I had missed from last night. I should have taken care of that before, but a guy forgets sometimes. I looked at my face for traces of hair, glad of my genetic heritage for once. I was one quarter Cherokee or Sioux or something. I never knew my grandfather for a couple of reasons. The first being that he died before I was born. The other was that my Dad had run away from home when he was sixteen. He hadn't even gone home for the funeral. That was about the only thing that Dad had ever been good at: Leaving and never looking back.
I'm not bitter or anything.
Seeing that I didn't need to shave, I considered the makeup again. I put a light covering of white cake mixed with just a titch of Gretchen's base, just enough to lighten the tone of my skin from its normal olive. What to do with my eyes? I noticed a small bag that had Kohl written on it. I opened it, and sure enough it was a loose black powder. I wetted a sponge and dipped a bit of the powder out of the bag. I carefully painted an Eye of Horus around my left eye, and then used a brush to paint a single red drop at the corner of my right. I used a deep ruby red lipstick and pronounced myself done.
"I like the way you look in makeup." Gretchen had slipped up behind me while I was busy, and put her arms around my neck when I finished with my lipstick. She leaned over my shoulder to look at me in the mirror so I turned quickly and gave her a peck on the lips.
"Keith!"
"It's not ladylike to whine."
She giggled and pushed me out of the chair so she could do her own makeup. I had finally gotten back my own in an exchange with her. Maybe the makeup made all the difference. . .Nah. I was the same person inside. It's just that the events of the past twenty-four hours seemed to have broken down a wall between Gretchen and I allowing me to really relax around her for the first time in three years. She was my friend, and always would be, regardless of what happened between us.
She used slightly different tones than usual, and topped it off with the same ruby lipstick I had used.
"Now, our lipstick won't clash when we kiss." She planted a firework inducing kiss on me without warning. I was stunned to say the least. Ok, she wins. Damn you kisses!
I was going to go in for another of my own, but my brain kicked in at the last moment. Damn you brain!
"Etch, I think we're moving a little fast here."
"We've known each other for three years, Keith!"
"And you've always told me that you were too old for me."
"I was FLIRTING with you!"
Ok, I had no response to that.
"I've wanted you to make a move for over a year now. Ever since you wrote that song. I knew then that you really understood the me that I had to hide from all of my school friends. I always have to hold something back from them. I wouldn't fit into their ultra-conservative world view. But you know me."
"Etch. . ."
"Let me finish. Do you think I would go skinny dipping with anyone else? Do you? You saw me, all of me, and you never turned away."
"This is about your surgery isn't it?" She had surgery scheduled for the Monday after school got out.
"What if you don't love me after? What if you turn away from me then? I couldn't stand it if that happened."
She hugged her arms to her stomach and turned away from me, sobbing.
I walked up behind her and wrapped her in my arms. She grabbed onto my arms and held them tightly to herself. "I can't lose you now that I've finally found you."
"You can't lose me that easily, Etch. I survived two years of you actively pushing me away."
"But, I will be changing. You might not love me anymore if I'm different."
"I saw you as you are at the pool, in my dreams you are what you will be. Have you told your counselor about me, and your fears?"
She squeezed my arms. "Of course my psychiatrist knows about you, but I'm afraid if I told him about my fears that he would stop the surgery. I can't live without that either."
She peeled herself out of my arms and went back over to her makeup table. "I'm a complete mess."
While she fixed her makeup, I slipped down to her father's office to talk to him for a moment.
"I think that Gretchen should talk to Dr. Allen today, Sir"
"I allowed the 'Mr. Andersen's and Sirs when you lived somewhere else. While you are under my roof I insist you either call me Dad or Tom."
"I will consider calling you Dad after Gretchen and I get married, but til then I think I could live with Tom."
"Does she know this?"
I blushed and he chuckled at me. How come guys chuckle and girls giggle. Just a thought.
I continued, "I think that's part of the reason she needs to talk to Dr. Allen. She's afraid that people won't love her anymore after she gets her surgery."
"People meaning you? Any truth to this?"
"I love your daughter no matter what. . .I mean. . ."
"I know what you mean. I've seen how you treat her, and have to say that I wouldn't have been that patient were I in your shoes. I just wanted to hear it in your own words. You'll be driving?"
"Yes, I just hope she doesn't kill me for touching her baby. She isn't really in good shape to be driving herself right now."
He tossed me his keys, "just don't scratch the paint."
In that moment I could have called him Dad without any qualms. It's not every day that someone tosses you the keys to a classic Aston, in suburbia no less. "Thank you, Sir," which I amended to, "Thank you, Tom," when he glared at me.
"What are you two conspiring about?"
I turned to look at Gretchen. She had wiped off her previous makeup and gone for her more regular shades. Guess we were done kissing for the moment.
Tom got on the phone, to the psychiatrist it seemed, so I was left to explain, "your Dad and I agree that you need an emergency session with Dr. Allen today."
"You're going to jeopardize everything!"
"Etch, hear me out. We have three weeks to sort it out. If we'd waited, sure, you might have a problem. You still want this, right?" She nodded so I continued, "then you have nothing to worry about. Besides, your Dad gave me the keys to the Aston."
"Oh no, save me from your driving." She put her hands up in a high drama pose. She couldn't keep it up and started giggling.
I was sorely tempted to tickle her for some reason.
I hugged her instead.
Tom turned to us after getting off the phone. "He can see you at ten, and he wants to speak to Keith for a bit before talking to Gretchen."
"I can't afford. . ."
"Keith, he wants to see you about Gretchen, but he also wants to talk to your about your poetry."
"I still can't. . ."
"Let me worry about that. You two just go out for a couple of hours before Gretchen's appointment. You should go on a first date after all."
"Dad!"
"Tom!" We said this almost simultaneously.
"It is not ladylike to whine!"
Both of us groaned. It seems this line has been used way too much recently.
"Heard that one, huh? How 'bout, Would you like a little cheese to go with that?"
Tom gave me a couple of hundred dollars and we went out to the garage. It was silver. It was the most beautiful car in the world.
We went out to eat, which was uneventful. When we came out there were paparazzi all over the place. . .just kidding. People around here knew that Mr. Anderson drove an Aston, and there would be no other reason for someone to be following us around.
That and the fact that we lived in a sleepy little town in southern Utah. Two hours from Salt Lake, and four from Las Vegas. I don't think there were any paparazzi out this way.
I only mention them because of the conversation we had on our way out of the restaurant. "You know, Keith, we're going to have to come up with something for Desdemona off stage."
"I thought that I was only supposed to dress that way for concerts?"
"You're going to have to make some personal appearances elsewhere, or you are going to be followed around everywhere, just so people can get a picture. The more mysterious you are, the more that people want to find out who you are."
"Crap."
She was about to speak, so I put my finger to her lips. I had an idea that I was trying to formulate into words. She kissed my finger, and instead of flustering me, like it would have yesterday, it clarified everything.
"Desdemona's signature is the pink hair and shoes. Sure, she doesn't need the combat boots with every outfit, but she will usually use them. Her makeup will be two colors at a time, even if those colors may change."
"She always seemed flamboyant subdued to me." Gretchen spoke around my finger. It was a little more distracting than her kiss.
"Then that will be her clothing. And her jewelry. She will have flashes of color, mixed with black. Burgundy, green, dark blue, anything that works with pink. She is more formal on top with jackets and corsets and such, with flamboyant bottoms like the leggings and skirt."
"You know, we could do this better with a consultant."
"Where are we going to get the money for that, and before you say your Dad, remember that we don't even know if we can be successful at this."
"You're good, Keith. Really good. Everyone can see it."
"Fine, but nothing really expensive until we get some sort of a contract."
She threw me into a hug, and I returned it without any difficulty. I loved this girl.
We drove the twenty minutes to the clinic where Dr. Allen worked. There wasn't anyone else in the waiting room, but the receptionist told us that he was in with another client, so we sat down to wait on the couch. Gretchen folded herself around my arm and leaned against me. I just lived in that moment for as long as I could.
"Keith?"
"Yes," I said as I stood.
He looked at me a little quizzically, so I hammed it up a bit. I flipped my hair with my right hand, you know the fingernails, and said, "you like?" With a wink of my left eye. I had a dot for the iris of the Eye of Horus on my eyelid.
He looked at me strangely until Gretchen started to giggle. He smiled and motioned me back.
I'm not going to go into details about what we talked about. It was an hour. At an average of probably 100 words per minute, that figures out to about six thousand words. That's a lot to type, believe me.
Here are the highlights. I am mildly OCD. He mentioned my nails and general grooming, as well as my poetry. He didn't think it was a problem, since my coping techniques seemed adequate. My words not his.
We spent most of the time analyzing my feelings about Gretchen. He wanted to truly understand where I stood. I think one small exchange will make my feelings understood. I think you can guess at his suggestion from my response.
"Listen you sick son of a bitch, I'm not gay. Gretchen is now, and will always be, a woman in my mind."
Ok, so I overreacted. Trust me, I have no problems with another person's sexual orientation. I guess, however, some of my mother's attitudes have sort of rubbed off on me.
"Relax, Keith, I didn't mean anything by it. That was because of your Dad, wasn't it?"
Yeah, he's observant, and we did spend some time talking about my Dad.
We finished up, and I went out to the waiting room to fulfill the purpose of its creation while Gretchen went in to talk to Dr. Strangelove.
It was almost two hours before the door opened again. "Keith, could you join us please?"
I shudder to think what this was costing.
I walked in and at Gretchen's look I joined her on the couch. She had been crying and ruined her makeup again. She leaned against me.
"First of, I'd like to apologize, Keith, for my behavior earlier. It was a bit out of line, but I needed to get to the root of who you were, in relation to Gretchen. It's a little unorthodox, I know, but it can get results.
"Gretchen, you are suffering a bit from depression right now. Like I tell some of my other patients, you shouldn't make any major life decisions while under any mind altering condition. I am not going to postpone your surgery, yet, but I want to know before you go through with it that this isn't something that you are doing to try to feel better.
"Keith, I want you here because I know that you've been important to Gretchen for a while now, and that you are more important to her than anyone but her father. I have to say, though, I have some questions about what you are looking for in a relationship."
When did he talk to me about what I want in a relationship. . ?
"It wasn't what you said, but the way you said it. Ok, look, I'm not saying anything you two don't already know. You're both young. However, I know you've both spent a lot of time supporting one another emotionally. I also know that there are things that Gretchen hasn't told you, Keith.
"You two need to talk about some things. Think about this as a couples counseling session."
He chuckled at this thought. "If more of the married couples who I see had done this before getting married, I probably wouldn't ever have to see any of them now."
"What, they wouldn't have gotten married in the first place?" Gretchen snickered when I said this.
"That's probably true of some of them, but I think most would have the tools to work through their issues without outside help."
"Gretchen?" He looked at her, and she held onto me tighter, but she began to speak in a quiet voice.
I'm not going to tell you what we spoke about. It is her place to tell it, and she is a really private person. She cried a lot, and I really felt like it on a couple of occasions, but didn't. I ended up holding her while she cried.
We talked about coping techniques, and about how I should listen. Apparently girls don't need to be taught how to listen.
It wasn't until we were outside and buckled into the car when something struck me. "You think of us as a couple?"
I looked at Gretchen waiting for an answer and she nodded.
"Why didn't you tell me before?"
"Why didn't you ever ask me out?"
"Because I thought you were still going out with Steve 'I'm a footballer' Hansen."
"You know we broke up in August."
Ok, she had a point. She'd invited me over for the breakup party. Yeah, she'd been the one who dumped him. That should have been my first clue, since she had never broken up with any of her other boyfriends. They'd always broken up with her.
Keith, meet cluebat. Thwack!
"You know, Keith, you're cute when you're flustered."
I put the car in gear. I wasn't even going to respond to that one, except to grin at the road. I decided that we needed to get something a little more fancy for lunch. I decided to drive us for sushi in Provo. You'd be surprised at how many halfway decent sushi places there are in Provo. There's even a place that offers handmade all you can eat.
If her dad was paying, we could afford the twenty dollars each.
Godzilla Roll for the win.
I realized as we were pulling into the parking lot, that this wasn't really the first date that Gretchen and I had been on. Sure, it might be the first official one, but I had taken her to this restaurant on more than one occasion. Just the two of us.
If I thought about it that way, we had been dating off and on for the past two years.
I mentioned as much to Gretchen.
"Don't over analyze it, Keith," may have been what she said, but the smile on her face looked more like, "Finally, he gets it."
Yep, meet Keith, the slowest human mind on the planet. Watch him take two years to realize one and one is two. The kiss she gave me as we walked into the building more than made up for the time it had taken us to get here.
"Welcome back, Keith," said the Asian gentleman at the cashier counter.
Did I mention that I come here a lot. It is the main reason I sell my soul at Hot Topic over the summer. Sure, it's nothing but Goth wannabes, but I get to wear my own clothing, and not some nasty uniform.
Sitting there actually reminded me of someone I'd met while working last summer. I got out my cell phone and dialed her up. I know, way to bail on my indie solidarity.
"Hello?"
"Hi, this is Keith."
"Finally decided on some body piercings? Let me guess; your girlfriend wants me to pin a medal on your soldier for you."
"No, a more normal piercing, but unique hardware."
"You mean the 'Skull and Crossbones'?"
"Of course I mean the 'Skull and Crossbones'."
"How do you know I didn't sell them already?"
"Did you sell them already?"
"Of course not. I told you before that I made those on a lark and no one would be crazy enough to actually wear them."
"Same price as last time?"
"Actually, I was considering giving you a 50% discount just to see you wear them out the door."
"What if I told you I would be on MTV wearing them?"
"I'd pay to see you wearing them on MTV"
"Just giving me the earrings would be enough for me."
"You're serious?"
"The guys signed 'Up in Flames' up for Gothplosion, and MTV is covering it this year."
"Ok, fine. You pay me 20 bucks to do the piercing, since there is no way they'll fit in a gun, and you've got yourself a deal."
That was good, since the $5400 price tag would have cleaned me out. Each of the studs had two real rubies and four diamonds. Sure, none of them were that big, but on top of the vanadium steel setting, it kind of added up. I wouldn't tell Gretchen what I had almost paid for these. She'd decide that this was my idea of 'not expensive' and we'd be in to see an image consultant before I could say jump.
We stopped by Madam Zeela's Boutique, and got my ears pierced. All I have to say is manual piercing, ouch. I was really thankful for the fly nut to secure them on the back. That was a lot of money per ear.
We went over to the Towne Center (a fancy name for a mall) to see a movie. We were 40 minutes early, so we decided to walk around the stores. They were putting a poster up in the window of one of the music stores. It was the blonde who had been kissing Josh.
I dragged Gretchen into the store to talk to the employee putting up the poster. "Hey, who is that?"
"Sarah Carerra. She's supposed to be a new up and coming star. Haven't you heard her song, 'Intuition'. They're just about playing it nonstop."
I just looked at him, I would have thought it was obvious, but he colored after a moment. "I guess not."
"Honey, just think, a year from now, you could be up for the Best Female Artist against her at the Tween Awards."
I gave a mock shudder and laughing we walked out to see the rest of the mall.
Ok, so apparently, the earrings were kind of obvious. And apparently I looked a little androgynous in my clothing.
"Ask her where she got her earrings."
"No, you ask her."
I turned at this point and gave each of them Zeela's card. "She does custom jewelry."
They giggled but took the cards. "She is so cool looking. Maybe we should try the Goth look."
I gave out another fifteen cards before we got back to the movie. She'd given them to me with the stipulation that I give a card to anyone who asked about the earrings. Well, there was a lot more footwork for me to do before I paid off these babies.
I'm just glad that Zeela thought of me as a friend.
I did buy a lot of jewelry from her over the past year.
The bracelet cross, her design.
Um, now that I think about it, I have purchased a new piece of jewelry from Zeela every time I come with Gretchen to Provo. Maybe I should ask her about paying Gretchen a commission. . .
We watched the movie, which let out a little after seven and drove home, a little fast, to meet the agent that both of us had completely forgotten about.
He was in Gretchen's living room, along with Bobby and Jake, when we arrived.
He took one look at me and blinked. "Where in the world did you get those earrings?"
"Madam Zeela's Boutique. She is an old friend and she gave them to me in exchange for some free publicity for her shop."
"Um...She gave those to you? This is a costume mock-up, right? If this is the same Zeela I'm thinking about. . .wow. She gave them to you. . .you didn't sleep with her or anything?"
"She's about twice my age!"
"But $5000 earrings."
"What!?" That was all three of my friends.
"How did you know that?"
"I read the trade publications. Those were made originally for Angelina, but when she saw them she turned them down. She wanted her money back and Zeela gave it to her."
"Well, Desdemona will make them famous."
"Desdemona?"
"Stage name."
"About that. I was telling your friends here that I don't buy anything sight unseen. So, I need to hear you play."
We climbed into vehicles and went over to Jake's house. I am thankful that I keep my Baby there. Mom would have destroyed it throwing it out the window.
"So, Mr. Fields, what do you want to hear first?"
"Call me Richard. Play anything you think will wow me."
I looked at the other two. We could play Vivaldi, but that was only cool. They didn't know Black Flag yet, since I had only written it this morning.
"My Life with You is Hell." Gretchen's was the deciding vote. We had gotten the most practice on that one anyway.
We played Gretchen's life in song.
"Ok, Keith, Up in Flames has a manager." We discussed fees, and felt that they were reasonable. He said that he would get us studio time somewhere after Gothplosion, and told us to 'lay low' until then. I still didn't think that we would be getting anywhere, but you know how it is. I tend to be a little pessimistic where the band is concerned. I would like nothing more than for us to succeed, I just didn't think we would.
Jake and Bobby's parents signed their management contracts for them. We had two weeks to figure out how to get me signed without my mom. Gretchen also kept looking at the earrings as if she had something to say, but was quiet the entire ride to her house.
I was really not looking forward to any of this.
Edited by Dean Vandusen and the ever patient Julia Phillips.
So, I'd met Desdemona, or become her temporarily. And I was helping to create her mythos by purchasing $5400 earrings that Angelina said were too gaudy. We had met Richard Fields, who signed the band, well all except me. My Mom threw me out, so the chances of her actually signing the papers were negligible. Gretchen and I had gone on an epic all day date for our first official one, and I think we were about to get into our first fight.
We arrived home and Gretchen had still not said a word to me. I handed the keys back to her dad, and as soon as we were out of sight of him, she pulled me upstairs. "Five thousand dollars?"
"Um, well, they're actually fifty-four hundred." She gave me a 'not helping' look. "Etch, I have the money to cover it, and I wanted something for Desdemona that people would remember."
"Oh, they'll remember those alright. Have you considered that you can't take those out for a few weeks?"
"Oh shit."
"Yeah, exactly. You have to go to school the next three weeks with those earrings."
"I can't do this. People will connect me with Desdemona, and then all of this is pointless."
"No, it just becomes a little bit more difficult." She got a little smile on her face.
"Ok, you're creeping me out, Etch."
"How about we start rumors about Desdemona."
"Huh?"
"You and I were gone yesterday, right? Well, you say you went to a concert in. . .Denver? for a new singer called Desdemona. Say she's the one who inspired your. . .hand gear, and you decided to get some knockoffs of her earrings. Let people know she's going to be performing at Gothplosion."
"How is that going to work? I never went to Denver yesterday."
"Look, if you don't think it would be a good idea, then talk to Richard about it."
I did. He thought about it a moment, and then thought a moment longer. I almost thought we had been disconnected when he spoke again. "Ok, Keith, I agree with the plan overall, but we need to tweak it a bit. And, I need to look into merchandising now, since apparently she has knockoff earrings available when she does a show. Hmm, you have the original jewelers number?"
I gave it to him.
"Ok, then lastly, you met Desdemona after the show. She was losing her band, and needed a short term replacement so you offered that your friends play for her at Gothplosion. I assume no one there knows you are in a band? Good, keep it that way. From now on, Desdemona is the lead singer for Up in Flames, and always has been."
Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive. Sir Walter Scott sure knew what he was talking about. I'm going to need to start writing this all down so that I can remember what 'truths' belong to Desdemona.
"Oh, one last thing, Keith. I have a friend at a club in Denver. He owes me a big favor. As far as anyone will know, Desdemona played there. The name of the place is 'Hole in the Wall' and they have been known to let indie bands play there. For reasons I will not discuss, I have a hand stamp for the place. I will be by in twenty, since we have to make it real."
This guy was good.
"Um, Gretchen, how did you meet this guy?"
"He's my uncle."
"Your mother's brother? And he still talks to you?"
"He's the only one. Most of the family blame me for my Mom's mental breakdown."
I shouldn't have brought it up. Gretchen is afraid enough as it is. Schizophrenia is a genetic disorder after all, and she is so afraid of developing it herself. Yeah, I know. Talk about the poster children for the improbable made flesh.
We went downstairs. Such a simple phrase, and a simple act. Ok, I really am rambling now.
"Daddy, Keith can't sign with Uncle Rich because his Mom threw him out."
Thanks, Gretchen, for summing my crappy life up in a single sentence.
"Well, Keith, we have grounds to fast track an order of emancipation because of abandonment."
"Wait, what?"
"You knew I was a lawyer, Keith. Even if I'm not currently practicing."
"Well, I knew that, but you were a defense attorney."
"Just because I practiced a different sort of law, doesn't mean I don't have a good general understanding of it. I won't be representing you, however. I will get one of my old contacts in family law. You can meet Jordan tomorrow after school. The sooner we get this filed, the more likely we can get it in front of a judge."
Ok, so I had no hopes that this would work. When my father was being taken to court by the ORS for back child support, it had been months before we saw the judge the first time. I couldn't see how this would be any different.
"Aren't there other things we could do? Adoption or Fostering or something here?"
"Those would take a lot longer. We have a time limit. This is the best option. My friend will explain everything we need to get this put through."
Things just got better and better.
Richard stopped by and stamped my hand. I went up to my room and went to sleep. It was going to be another busy day tomorrow. I had just fallen asleep when someone jumped on my bed, and by someone I mean a bouncy Gretchen.
"Etch!"
"Do I need to call the Waambulance?"
I groaned. It was too late in the evening for bad jokes.
"I'm not done talking about those earrings, Mister."
"I'm trying to sleep, Etch."
"Don't think your conversation with Zeela went over my head, Keith. You were fully prepared to pay fifty-four hundred dollars for those."
"I needed. . ."
"Don't give me that. She knew you wanted them. You were looking for an excuse. Can you even afford them?"
"Yeah...barely."
"You need to be smarter about your money, Keith."
"You're not my Mom, Etch."
"I'm your girlfriend, which is more important in some ways, Keith."
Ok, she has a point. I mean, Moms have to live with your decisions. They might disapprove of your life choices, but ultimately you are a separate individual and not beholden to their choices for you. Girlfriends on the other hand need to be appeased, or you never see them again. Well, I suppose a parent can disown you, but that's more a case of self mutilation than anything else.
"Look, Etch, you know that my Mom had all of my dad's child support direct deposit to my account. That and my wages tend to keep me flush. I really want Desdemona to work out."
"We would have spent less on an image consultant."
"Ok, you're right. I'm sorry." Feeling a little impish, I flopped out of bed into a full prostration. "Can you ever forgive me, my Liege?"
She put her foot on my head. "I kind of like this look on you."
"Hey!" I twisted and pulled her down on top of me where we ended up in a tangle of limbs.
"Keep it down up there."
"Sorry, Daddy."
I disentangled myself before things got any more out of hand. "We really need some sleep, Etch, and you should probably go to your own bed."
She pouted a bit, but she got up and went back to her room. I remembered to lock the door this time. Not that I wouldn't have loved to spend some more quality time with her, it's just that with us getting closer and closer like this, I was afraid of something happening. I really didn't want to disappoint Tom. That and while I did love Gretchen, thinking about her dangly bits kinda turned me off.
Ok, so I'm a bad person, but at least I try to be honest with myself.
I slept fitfully that night, plagued by dreams of black curtains and shards of glass. I wonder why that was.
School was fun. I talked about Desdemona a lot. Told everyone she was my inspiration in a couple of things, including my nails. I'd never played the 12-string at school, so I didn't need to explain that. People asked me about the club stamp, and I told them about the concert. Their eyes started glazing over when I described hand positioning and such.
I had a wonderful day.
It was even better for me when I heard a couple of girls talking as I passed:
"Did you hear that Desdemona's playing at Gothplosion this year?"
"Isn't that a Goth thing?"
"Yeah, and MTV's showing it this year."
"I'm so gonna watch then."
"She also bought Angelina's earrings. You know, the ones she was going to wear for that movie?"
"She bought THOSE? I thought Angelina said no one would ever wear them?"
"Well, Keith is wearing a pair of knockoffs."
"That's so cool."
There were a couple of other overheard conversations, but that was probably the best. Two people talking about someone as if they were in the know. I smiled, realizing that the rumor mill was working for me.
I wondered where the rumor about the earrings had started, before I heard Jake talking to a couple of his friends. Ok, before you go off the deep end, I called Bobby and Jake before school to tell them the deal.
Apparently there were four of us fueling the Desdemona frenzy.
Yeah, I heard someone using Gretchen as a source.
The pinnacle of my day was when someone I'd never spoken to before in my life stopped me in the hall.
"I hear you went to the Up in Flames concert and spoke with Desdemona last night."
"Yep."
"Kewl. What's she like in person?"
I extracted myself as quickly as I could after passing some generic phrases his way. I didn't know how I felt about some guy having a crush on me. It was something I was going to have to get used to. I shuddered.
Ok, so that wasn't the highlight of my day. That came shortly after. "You ready to go?" Gretchen had glomped onto my arm as I was walking down the hall. Last period had just ended and I was on my way to my locker.
"Hey, Etch. Aren't you worried about what your friends will think?"
"Nah, you're the man of the hour. You actually met Desdemona."
"This is so insane."
"No, what's insane is that Desdemona already has a website."
"What?!"
"Yeah, someone told me at lunch. They knew that you and I talked, and they wanted to know if you had any pictures for it. I gave them some, telling them that they were before she got the 'Angelina Earrings'"
This was insane. Desdemona was the most popular girl in school. What in the world had I done to get myself into this?
After stopping by my locker, and dropping off the book I wouldn't need to finish my already completed homework, we headed out to Gretchen's car.
Tom's associate worked in Salt Lake, so we had a nice long drive ahead of us. We held hands while Gretchen drove. Well, when she didn't need to shift gears. No we didn't do the 'cute' little passenger shifting gears thing.
We found a parking garage a couple of blocks away from his office and got out to walk. Sure, Salt Lake has wide streets, but there is almost nowhere to park. Especially since they brought the tram system in.
Well, walking is good for you.
I had assumed that his associate was male. Look at the budding misogynist. Jordan Cox was anything but male. If I hadn't had Gretchen there on my arm, I probably would have made a fool of myself, and I wasn't that articulate as it was.
"I got the particulars from Tom, I just need to know some specific details."
We went over my bank accounts, and how much was in them. We covered my job and other plans. She said I would have to be evaluated by a psychiatrist regarding my understanding of the situation. I would be able to use Gretchen and Tom as witnesses to my Mom's behavior. I paid a retainer, and we were off to the races, so to speak.
"Before you leave, Keith, I would like to try and call your mother to see if she will voluntarily allow emancipation. If that is the case, we could be done very quickly."
I gave her my mother's work phone, and she called her up, "Dr. Loftgren's office, Tracy Robison speaking."
"Hello, Tracy, I'm Jordan Cox. I've been hired by your son to initiate a temporary order of emancipation so he can take care of legal issues of consent while he is not residing with you. We would be revisiting this in six months time, so it would just be for the next half a year."
"That ungrateful little punk really thinks he can live on his own? Fine. Where do I sign?"
Ok, so that's not the response that I expected. We made an appointment to meet to sign the papers on Friday.
We scheduled an appointment with the child psychologist for tomorrow. That was Thursday. Two days to take care of the paperwork so I could sign with my manager.
We went home, enjoying each other's company as she drove. The truck came out of nowhere. It was one of those oversize loads carrying those huge sections of pipe. It broke free, tumbling onto the road. I saw it rolling toward us as Gretchen tried futilely to stop. I heard the sound of tortured metal before I jerked awake with a start. Apparently I'd fallen asleep.
We'd just gotten home, and the car stopping had influenced my dream.
"You're cute when you sleep."
What guy wants to be called cute? Ok, I admit, I kind of liked it coming from her.
We lay down on my bed and just talked. You know, the natural easy conversation of friends. It was like a million other conversations going on in that moment, and completely unique to itself. As it continued, her responses got further and further apart. Eventually she just stopped responding. I turned over to see what was going on, and realized that she was asleep.
I lay there and simply watched her sleeping. I was still amazed that she'd let me catch her. At some point I must have nodded off myself, since the next thing I knew I was looking into her eyes and the morning sun was streaming in through my window.
"Mornin' Handsome."
"Mornin' Beautiful."
"But my hair's a mess, and. . ."
"You're always beautiful to me."
That earned me a quick kiss before Gretchen got up to get ready for the day.
School was school, and Desdemona Fever was rampant. It was suddenly as if Desdemona had always existed. I overheard someone telling their friend that they'd purchased tickets for the Up in Flames concert last summer, but hadn't been able to go.
What in the hell?!
I couldn't have been this popular on my own if I had tried. I mean, who did Desdemona think she was, mooching in on my audience? This was supposed to be my moment. What right did she have? She'd brought the entire school behind her, not just the half that I could relate to.
I was in a horrible mood by the end of the school day, which was only somewhat improved by Gretchen. Ok, so it was a lot improved by Gretchen. I think it's physically impossible for me to be upset in her presence.
We drove over to my appointment with the psychologist. We had a decent conversation about a number of things. I think she was trying to get my general understanding of how the world worked. I talked with my lawyer later that evening, and she told me that we had everything I needed for tomorrow.
"Jordan, I have another question. I need to establish a legal alias."
"That shouldn't be too difficult."
"My alias needs to be female."
"Why?"
"Ok, so I am going to be signing a contract with a talent manager. I will be singing as a girl."
"There aren't many guys I know of who could pull that off."
"Toss me on speaker phone, I know the quality will suck, but you'll get the idea."
"Ok, ready."
I sang the chorus to 'Black Flag'. It is a sort of show case of my range. It starts at an A above middle C and goes up from there.
"Ok, if that wasn't a recording, then I'm convinced. Legally, however, you're male. You don't have plans otherwise, do you?"
"Oh, no. I'm perfectly happy with who I am."
"Ok, let me look into it. I'm not sure what we're going to be able to do in that regard, and probably we are just going to have to create it as a stage persona."
"Ok, well, thanks for the effort."
"Not so fast. Hmmmm. Ok, I'll get back in touch with you. I'm not sure how it would stand up in a court of law, but I have a way we could potentially take care of it. You leave it to me. I should be able to get this done before Monday."
My lawyer talking about skirting the law for me was a little much, and I was glad, for once, that I actually had homework to do. Like I said: I finish it in class usually.
I finished my homework and Gretchen and I went swimming. No skinny dipping this time. We started getting a little too into it, so I decided a cold shower was in order. For me at least. She laughed at me when I got out.
"I guess you really do like me."
"Oh, shut up."
I lay on top of my covers, thinking about the past week. Tomorrow was Friday. Jazz concert in the evening, after signing papers at two places. Yes, I'd called Richard and told him that I should be emancipated tomorrow afternoon. We had a grand total of fifteen songs that we'd practiced off and on during the past five years we'd been playing at being a band. Of those, only 'My Life with You is Hell' really struck me as something worthy of an album. 'Black Flag' would probably work as well. We'd need more songs. I toyed for a moment with the idea of doing covers of songs for other artists. When I thought about singing 'U + Ur Hand' by Pink, I really lost it. I laughed.
"What's so funny?"
"Me singing 'U + Ur Hand.'"
She giggled at that. "How 'bout, 'Just a Girl?'" I only hope No Doubt won't kill me for that one.
Well, we had two more songs for the album, since I think the irony of both of those songs would be delicious. That left me to write, or steal, another eight to twelve more songs. For an album that would probably never happen.
We kissed goodnight.
With no new information, or concrete evidence, Desdemona Fever was cooling a bit, and Sarah Carerra was starting to be a new topic of conversation, at least with the sophomore and junior girls. The freshman class went to the junior high school in our district so I'm not sure who they were talking about. Sure, Sarah Carerra was cute, and she had a great voice, but she was a little too much teen pop for my tastes. To each his, or her, own. Yes, I'd finally heard 'Intuition.' Some girls were playing it in the quad today.
Classes over for the day, and another week done, we drove up to Salt Lake to sign the first of the documents. My mother glared at me the entire time. She signed first, and then I signed. The notary dated and stamped it.
And just like that, I was an adult for the next six months.
It was really anticlimactic.
We called Richard and made a stop by his office. I showed him my copy of the paperwork, and signed my name on the line. That was a lot more important to me than a piece of paper telling me what I'd known for the past couple of years: I was raising myself.
The contract with Richard was a part of my future. Provided anything went right, I would soon be a living breathing rock star. Just a female one. Every time I thought about that, it creeped me out. I was male. I knew I was male. No, I'm not just trying to convince myself.
I mean, come on. Who wouldn't wonder with a friend like Gretchen? That's one of the things that we talked about. A lot. It was so interesting to me, the path her life had taken her on. I just knew that it wasn't my path. I could wear Desdemona's clothes, but she was me, not I her. Ok, that was about the most grammatically convoluted sentence that I have ever written. At dawn, the author will be drug out into the street and shot. No last minute commutation of sentence allowed.
We drove home, and I changed into the clothing for the concert. Tom had purchased a new shirt and pants for me today, since my old ones were now torn. I should have done it for myself, but with all the trips hither, thither, and yon I hadn't had the time I needed. Ok, that's an excuse. I just didn't do it. I need to take better care of myself.
Jazz is fun. I had a couple of solos in the concert. The first one, since it was in the right key, I did as variations on the chorus from 'My Life with You is Hell.' The second I weaved back and forth between 'Black Flag' and the verse from 'My Life with You is Hell.' Standing O, thank you very much. It was only after the concert that I worried that I might be giving too much of Desdemona away.
Saturday we practiced. I gave them what I had figured out for 'Black Flag,' and they gave me a bass and percussion line. When we were done, we had two songs in our repertoire. I mentioned that we might want to do some covers of other bands music, and Bobby was the first to mention 'Just a Girl,' and Jake wholeheartedly agreed. I'd already printed off the tabs for myself and Jake. Bobby thought that was the most hilarious thing he had ever seen, and it took us half an hour to get him calmed down enough to come up with a percussion line. We had 'Just a Girl' ready in another thirty minutes.
I hammed it up a bit, and Jake and Bobby said that if we ever do a show, and play that song, that I need to bring those moves into it. I said I'd think about it.
I didn't need to think about it. There was no way in heck I was going to act that girly on stage. I'm embarrassed I acted that girly in Jake's garage.
Sunday, I went to church with Gretchen. She and her father were members of a different faith than my mother and I, but I just couldn't bring myself to go alone to my previous place of worship. Talk about a culture shock. It was almost as if we didn't believe in the same God. Did I even want to believe in a God that didn't accept Gretchen for who she was?
I thought about that for the rest of the service. I tried to put on a happy face for Gretchen, but I knew she wasn't buying it. I decided it was high time for a hike. Nature calms me. I get out into the scrub, beyond sight of the town, and just feel the vastness of all creation. It's the first place where I truly knew that a God existed. I know that it doesn't work that way for everyone, and maybe I just have an impressionable nature, but I see God in the world around me, and the desert is my place of communion. Unfortunately, I wasn't in the mood to be calmed today.
I have to say that I yelled at Him. I told him off for creating issues like what Gretchen lives through. I berated him for allowing bigotry and hatred. I questioned how a loving father could ever truly allow mankind to exist. In that moment I almost felt that another flood would serve us right. I hated myself as much as I hated God. I won't relate even the tenth of what I said to God. I will relate what I felt afterward.
I felt peace. I don't know why, but I did. I think that God wants us to choose our path in this life, and loves us no matter what choices we make. If only we could learn a bit from Him.
Sure, he has the choices that he would prefer that we make, but it is up to each of us to come to terms with him about it.
I walked out of the desert changed. Not in any overt way, but in minor ways. I was ready, I hoped, for anything that this world had to throw at me in the next few weeks. I'm sure that I would need it.
Gretchen was already in the pool when I got back, and so I jumped in, with all my clothing still on.
"Keith!"
"What?"
"You got me wet!"
"You were in the pool." Big cake-eating smile.
"But I didn't want to get my hair wet. Now I have to wash it."
I'd love to help. No, I didn't say that aloud, afraid I wouldn't be able to resist if she invited me along. Afraid that she would invite me to help. I really need to control my fantasies. I think my eyes glazed over a bit thinking about it.
She splashed me in the face.
We splashed back and forth a bit, and then I picked her up and dunked her. She came up, having held her breath, and kissed me.
She won. She usually does. Girls have unfair advantages.
I let her have the shower first, and I changed rather than drip onto their carpeting. I'd gotten my good clothes wet, but after wearing them for the concert, and to church, and out in the desert, I figured they needed a good washing. Not wanting the chlorine to eat at them any more than it already had, I rinsed them out in the sink in the laundry room before tossing them, along with the rest of a load, into the washing machine.
I'm not a total slob, after all.
Have you ever actually looked at a ceiling before? We tend to ignore them, assuming that there just there. I was staring at the ceiling, thinking strange thoughts when a human missile attacked me. I must have closed my eyes because I hadn't even noticed Gretchen stalking me, like some blonde jungle cat looking for dinner. It wasn't until I grabbed her to try and save myself that I realized she was naked. Well, almost naked. She was wearing her underwear.
"Um, Etch? This probably isn't a good idea."
"I locked your door."
"Babe, you know I love you, right?"
"Well, part of you loves me," she said with a knowing smirk.
"Hon, I know you think you want this. Heck, I think I want this. This just isn't the right time."
"I knew you were lying to me."
"Gretchen, stop."
She'd gotten up and moved over to the door. I jumped from the bed, and hugged her from behind as she tried to open the lock.
"Etch, stop for a moment."
"Let me go." She was getting louder, and I'm sure her dad heard us. I unlocked the door for her. She ran for her room and slammed the door.
I went and sat down next to it and tried to talk to her through the door. "Your father took me in, Etch. He allowed me to stay here with his beautiful daughter in the next room. I couldn't betray that trust. I won't betray that trust.
"Etch, I love you. I love you more than breath, or music, or anything. I would give up almost anything to be with you forever. Just not this. Don't ask this of me, please? I just about wasn't strong enough to refuse you."
"If you loved me, you would have accepted me." Gretchen had thrown on some clothing and was rushing for the door.
I tried to make a grab for her, but she avoided me. I shouted for her Dad, "Tom! Help me!"
I ran outside and stood behind her car. She revved her engine and yelled out the window at me, "If you don't get out of my way, I'll drive over you."
This was insane. What had caused this. "Gretchen? Keith? What's going on?"
I hated having this discussion in the road, but I couldn't move for fear that Gretchen would leave. In her current state I had no idea what would happen. "Gretchen threw herself at me, literally, and when I said no, she flew off the handle."
"You're only pretending to love me. Neither of you really want me around. I can do better on my own." She began to move the car, and I braced for the impact, but it never came. I opened my eyes and saw Tom standing between me and the car.
"Gretchen, honey, turn off the car please."
She broke down and cried. I walked to the car door, opened it up, and took her into my arms. "It's ok, Etch. Everything's going to be ok."
"I'm ugly, and bloated, and no one really loves me as I am. How is that ok?"
I kissed her. I just kissed her until she relaxed, and then I kissed her some more. Ok, so maybe girls don't have all of the advantages.
When I finally stopped using my cruel and unusual punishment, she had a goofy grin on her face and threw her arms around my neck. I think she even squealed, but I'm not sure because of the pounding in my ears.
"Gretchen, you may want to let your boyfriend go before you kill him."
We walked back inside, and into the front room. Gretchen cuddled next to me on the couch. "I don't know why I did that. I've been feeling weird all week."
"Your doctor told us that there might be some side effects from stopping the hormone treatments."
I looked quizzically at Gretchen.
"I had to for my surgery." She looked embarrassed to be admitting this.
"Not going to get any worse, is it?"
"Oh god, I hope not."
Gretchen didn't want me to leave her, again, so we ended up lying on her bed. We fell asleep together again. Waking up beside her was something I could get used to. She was so beautiful lying there. I woke up first this time, and got to see her open her eyes and realize I was still there.
It was a beautiful moment.
"Good morning, Beautiful."
"Morning, Handsome."
She kissed me and then made a face, "Blech, morning breath."
I smiled at her, "You were the one who kissed me, remember?"
"And I want to do it again, so go brush your teeth."
I got up and performed my morning rites. Gretchen was in the bathroom in a flash after I shut off the water. We kissed and she seemed a lot more satisfied with the results this time. "Now, get out so I can shower and change."
"Right away, Miss Bossy Pants."
She hit me playfully on the arm as I left the room.
The day passed quickly, and the number one topic of conversation? Of course, Sarah Carerra and her #8 single. I still heard things here and there about Desdemona, but it seemed that without anything to feed it, Desdemona Fever was going the way of the dinosaur. For a moment I felt panicked, and needed to do something about it. But did I really? The only reason we'd started the rumor mill was to explain away the earrings if anyone connected them to me through the contest on Friday.
I wonder what 'Bodies' would sound like sung by Desdemona. I wonder what sort of arrangement I would need to make with Drowning Pool to actually get it. It sort of really fit my mood, if not her style, in that moment. What am I talking about? We were the final arbiters on what was, and was not, our style. Sure, we were a Goth band, but we were also Metal, and Experimental.
In between classes, I called Richard. "Does fair use cover producing a video of us singing 'Bodies' and putting it on YouTube?"
"Where did this come from, Keith?"
"Well, I don't know, I guess it's just that Desdemona seems to be losing ground to this Sarah Carerra person at my school. I know, the rumors were only for the concert for pre-damage control, but I kind of liked the second hand popularity, well a bit at least."
"Isn't the lead singer of Drowning Pool male?"
"Well, yeah. . .wait you know 'Bodies?'"
"No, but Google is a wonderful thing."
I chuckled a bit at this.
"Let me get back to you on this one, Keith. We may have some out of pocket for this one, but let me get the information before we make any decisions."
I finished the rest of the day, and was driving home with Gretchen, when the phone rang. "How soon can you be up here, Keith?"
"Hello, Jordan. What's the big rush?"
"We found a, barely, legal way for you to get an ID with your alias as female. Don't ask me to go into particulars, and chances are if we are taken to court it won't hold up, but let's just say that until something is specifically proscribed, in this case it's legal. Since it isn't a separate identity, and is legally still you, nothing says that your alternate identity can't present as female."
"Um...are you sure?"
"As sure as I can be. Trust me on this one, kid. Oh, and can you come up here as Desdemona? I have a friend at the DMV who will get us in and get you a license."
Well, at least she knew a good criminal defense attorney if this all blew up in our faces.
"Etch, change of plans. Desdemona needs to go to Salt Lake."
She giggled and squealed. I wasn't even sure that was possible with the human larynx. We got to Gretchen's house, and she pulled me upstairs. She spend a couple of minutes searching through her drawers and then pulled out a couple of. . .breasts?
"What are. . .?"
"Breast forms, silly. They will give you a bit of padding up front."
I suddenly realized what she wanted to do.
"Um, can we talk about this?"
"Desdemona needs to be female, Keith. That means sometimes, she needs to have breasts. We can explain it away with costumes like the corset, but other times, it will just be too weird."
"This whole thing is too weird."
"Do it for me?" Game, set, match, puppy dog eyes and pouty lips.
Within minutes, Gretchen was putting the final touches on the girliest makeup I've ever worn. Ok, I had to admit it didn't look half bad on me.
She wanted to pluck my eyebrows a bit, but I drew the line there. Desdemona was supposed to be a little androgynous after all and my eyebrows had never been all that thick.
A pair of jeans, and a black tee-shirt. The pink boots and hair. And the bra and panties. I wondered if I'd ever get used to them. Part of me hoped I wouldn't.
I looked in the mirror, and had to admit I didn't look that bad.
"Let's get this over with."
She kissed me for luck, and we were out the door and on our way to Salt Lake. We met Jordan outside the DMV, and she handed me some papers to sign.
"What are these?"
"It is a legal establishment of alternate identity."
"Ok, I trust you Jordan."
I signed the papers, after reading through them quickly. We went inside through the employee entrance. He wasn't what I expected. He was a bit like Santa Claus is supposed to be: Fat, jolly, and white bearded.
"So, you actually want a license with the single name Desdemona on it, huh? Trying to be a bit like Madonna are we? Well, not to worry. We'll have you all fixed up in no time."
I filled out the paper work, and then came to the signature line. I thought for a moment, and then scrawled something that looked vaguely like Desdemona. It would look good on a poster anyway. The big D was recognizable, and the word became more indistinct as it went on.
We took the picture, me smiling like a maniac. "Um, could you take the earrings out?" I looked at the picture and saw what he meant. They caused a bit of a flash and washed the sides of the photo out.
"I just got my ears pierced, and need to keep them in."
"Pretty girl like you? I'd think you would have gotten them pierced long ago. Oh well. We work with what we've got."
He took a couple of more shots, adjusting my head minutely each time. We ended up with an almost professional looking glamour shot. For my ID. Well, it would definitely be interesting to flash that, to say the least.
"So, what do you think?" I asked, showing Gretchen my new ID. Apparently it paid to come to where they were made to get your work done.
"I only wish that my ID looked that good."
My phone rang. "Desdemona, speaking."
"Keith?"
"Sorry, Richard. Having a bit of fun. Jordan got the alias thing taken care of and we just got my new ID."
"That was fast. I have some information for you. According to their agent, we can pay a onetime fee for the song, since we are an indie band, and we can use it how we see fit, as long as all recordings we use are 100% our own, nothing of theirs."
"Ok, so how much."
"There's the problem. He said it would be a thousand."
"I have the money for it, Richard, but there's someone I want to discuss it with first. Can I call you back?"
"Sure thing, Desi."
"Desi?"
"There's no way you're going to get me to keep referring to your character by the full name. It's a mouthful."
I laughed and ended the call. Did I really want to do this? Should I even do this? It wasn't my music, but it really touched me on a certain level right now. And we would have permanent use rights to it.
"You still with us, Desdemona?"
"Desi," I answered automatically, not really paying attention to what was going on around me.
"What?"
"Oh, sorry, Jordan. Richard, my agent, suggested that as a short form. You know, for informal situations. What were you saying?"
"I was asking you if there was anything else you needed?"
"What is all of this costing?" I'd suddenly realized I might not have as much money as I'd thought.
"Tom covered it. Just let him know that he owes me that date he's been promising for the past ten years."
I was a bit shocked, but Gretchen giggled, "I'll let him know. Thanks Jordan."
"Take care of yourself, Gretchen." They hugged and Jordan turned to me, "If I ever convince that man to marry me, I'm going to be Gretchen's step-mom. So, you better take good care of her for me until I do."
Ok. Now I have reached confusion level five. It must have showed on my face.
"Jordan's had a crush on my Dad since law school. She knows he's married, but she never gives up."
"Divorce isn't a four letter word, you know, Gretchen."
"No, it's a seven letter one." Gretchen stuck her tongue out as she was saying this.
"Take care you two."
I was about to broach the subject of purchasing the use rights when Gretchen picked up her phone. "Hello? Oh, Hi Daddy." After this she listened for a moment, and then the blood drained out of her face. I saw her swaying a bit, and rushed over to catch her. I lowered her carefully to the ground and picked up her phone.
"Hello? Hello?! Gretchen!?"
"Tom, It's me. She fainted."
I heard the pain in his voice as he spoke, "Her mother is dead. Suicide. Apparently the medication they had her on wasn't dosed right and she suffered a depressive episode."
"I'll get her home, Sir." I hung up the phone, and searched her purse for keys. I got them and then got Gretchen into the passenger seat. I helped her into her seat and got her belted in, then got myself into the driver's seat. As usual, I only had to make minor adjustments.
We were off and flying. Apparently it was a bit too fast. I was not really paying attention to anything but getting Gretchen home when I saw flashing lights in my rear view mirror. I looked at the speedometer, and had one of those moments. I was doing a hundred miles an hour.
I pulled over quickly and put the car in park.
"What's going on? Keith?"
"It's Desi right now, remember?"
"What's wrong, Desi? Why are we pulled over."
"I was kinda not paying attention, and was speeding."
Gretchen reached into her glove box and pulled out her insurance information and her registration.
I heard a knock on the window. I looked up. And up. And up. I rolled down my window. The giant of an officer spoke to us in a rolling baritone. "Evening, ladies. Do you know how fast you were going?"
"Not until I saw your flashing lights. It was about a hundred at that point, but I might have pulled my foot off the accelerator when they startled me."
"That's pretty close to what I clocked you at. What was the big rush?"
"Gretchen's Mom just died. I was trying to get her home to her father."
"Could I get your license and registration please?"
I handed my new license over with Gretchen's paper work.
"Wait, are you that Desdemona that my son's been raving about for the past week? If so, I have to say you look a lot different without your stage makeup. Same pink hair."
"Wanna see my combat boots?" I lifted my foot a bit so that he could see the pink thing.
"Ok, I believe you. Tell you what. You give me an autograph for my son, and I'll let you off with a warning."
He handed me a blank sheet of paper. "What's your son's name?"
"William. He usually goes by Buddy though."
I wrote out on the paper. 'To Buddy, for a great first impression,' and then the sprawling signature I'd devised.
"Will that work?"
"Yes, that'll be fine. Just make sure you slow down, Ok ladies?"
"Yes, Officer," Gretchen and I chimed together.
After I'd put up the window and begun to drive again, Gretchen spoke, "You are a natural. You're really getting into this character, aren't you?"
"It's still just a role, Gretchen. I have to constantly think about what I'm going to do, or what I'm going to say. Acting. I've done a lot of it over the years."
"It didn't look like acting to me."
"Well, when you do it right, it's not supposed to."
Ok, this could be a problem It's not like I was trying to alienate my girlfriend, and I didn't even know why this was so important to her. I'd always known I was a boy.
Well, that's not quite true. Before I'd turned seven or eight, I just didn't realize there was a difference. There were people who were adults and people who were kids and that was the only distinction I made. I accidentally saw my Mom in the shower at that time, and realized that she wasn't the same as me under her clothing.
Yeah, I was a bit oblivious as a kid. I was lost in thought, when Gretchen tried to get my attention again. "You haven't been giving me a problem, at all, with dressing in girl's clothing."
"Etch. . ."
"How do you feel in that clothing?"
"Normal. It's clothing."
"But, you have long nails. . ."
"On one hand to make playing my guitar easier."
"But. . ."
"You know how bad I am with kids."
"That doesn't necessarily mean anything. . ."
"Etch. . ."
"No, Desi. You are dismissing this out of hand. I love you no matter what, you know that?"
I'd started the car and we were moving forward already, at a much slower pace than before. Was she right? Had I just not given it any thought? Clothing felt like clothing to me. Even when we'd done Hamlet in Reverse and I'd gotten the role of Ophelia and worn the flowing skirts envisioned my (by) the director. Men in Scotland wore skirts, and called them kilts. It didn't really make a difference to me either way. Could that be because I was secretly a girl?
"I don't think of myself as a girl, Etch, but I don't think of myself as a guy either. I don't really think about my gender much. I am."
"Desi. . ."
"Etch, really. I don't think that way. I love you, and respect your chosen path. I know, I know. You feel like it is necessary for you."
"Desi, but, you seem to shine as Desdemona. You are so. . .behind the scenes as Keith."
"I am King of the Geeks as Keith, Etch. Haven't you ever noticed that there are two societies at our school? One in which you run, and the other where I am? I was as popular in my crowd, as you were in yours. I have lots of friends at school, but they are school friends. We don't hang outside of school, just like you hang with me and not your school friends."
Her expression fell a bit. It was as if she was realizing something about herself that she wasn't ready to admit.
"You really like the way I look in girl's clothing, don't you?"
She nodded silently. She opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it again. I gave her a moment to collect her thoughts, comfortable in the silence between us.
"I liked you a lot before you first dressed as Desdemona. You were always there for me, and I wanted you to get over yourself and just ask me out or something. When you first dressed as Desdemona, something clicked inside me. It was as if I was seeing you for the first time, and I needed you to. . .be with me."
"I saw that in your eyes. That's why I kissed you."
"But you were so much more alive in that moment."
"I was myself. I'd been wanting to kiss you since the moment I first saw you, but I always felt that I would lose your friendship if I did. When I saw your need, I figured it was now or never."
"So, you didn't feel a sort of release dressing up?"
"No," I chuckled at the thought. "Look, Etch, you still see me as a boy, even in these clothes, right?"
"I see you as Keith, yes."
"Ok, I still feel like Keith in these clothes, even with these breasts you gave me. No, don't think I'm starting any hormones to get my own. I know these breasts are part of my clothing. I can take them off. But, if you would like me to dress this way at home, I am happy to do so. I won't do it all the time, but it's not something I am opposed to."
"What does this mean?"
"It means that I am still Keith, but Desdemona can come out to play occasionally."
The squeal of delight from Gretchen told me that I'd said something right. She kissed me on the cheek. "Careful, Etch. I'm driving here."
"You didn't even take your eyes of the road."
We made it home without any further incidents. Gretchen and I talked about inconsequential things. I pulled into her driveway and turned off the car. "Thank you, Keith."
"For what?"
"For taking my mind off my Mom."
She kissed me on the cheek and walked inside. I could really get used to this.
There was a lot of crying, and some reminiscing of better times. I only realized when I lay in bed with a sleeping Gretchen in my arms, that I hadn't gotten the chance to tell her about the song.
Because of the problem on Sunday, Tom had already scheduled Gretchen for an appointment with her counselor, so she dropped me off at school the next day, and went off to her appointment. She'd be arriving later in the day. Since we were preparing for finals she couldn't miss any more days.
"Hey, Bobby, guess what?"
"Um, you're going full time as Desdemona?"
"No. I have something of hers, though." I showed him the ID.
"Wow, man, you're smokin' in this picture."
"Thanks I think."
"What's going on?" Jake asked as he came up.
"Desdemona's hot."
"Sure, but what made you think of that?"
Bobby snatched the ID from my hand and showed it to Jake. "Damn, Keith, if I didn't know better, there's no way I'd think this was you in drag. Wait, when did you get the wig back?"
"Gretchen had three pairs of the boots and two wigs. I wore the second one yesterday when I got this taken. Oh, before I forget, there's a possibility of us getting a use license for 'Bodies.'"
Jake just gaped at me. Bobby found his voice first, "You're shittin' me. As in Drowning Pool."
"Yep."
Jake looked at me strangely, "Is being Desdemona changing you? First Pink and No Doubt, now you're willing to shill for Drowning Pool. You used to say that we'd only ever do our own songs.."
That stopped me. Was I changing? Sure, the two 'girl' songs I was only doing because of Desdemona. . .ok so 'Bodies' was a cry against Desdemona as well, but it was Keith fighting back. When did I get to be so complicated?
"Ok, so maybe I want to do 'Bodies' because it's what I feel, and I don't have to write my own song when it expresses it so perfectly."
"Chill a bit, Keith. Jake didn't mean anything by it, right Jake?"
"Yeah, man, I was just making a comment."
"Sorry, guys, girl drama, and by that I mean Gretchen."
"What, she doesn't like you as Desdemona? I mean if it's a choice between Gretchen and the band, you choose the band right?"
"If it was a choice, Gretchen wins and you know it. No, she likes me a little too much as Desdemona. . ."
"Oh. . ." Bobby responded, but I think the image of Gretchen and I going at it, both of us looking like girls, broke Jake's mind.
"Snap out of it, bro."
Jake shook himself, and wiped his chin, to make sure there wasn't any drool there.
"Ok, that was an image that I wouldn't mind seeing again. . ."
"Jake. . ." I said with a warning tone in my voice.
"What image?" sometimes innuendo went right over Bobby's head. For a smart guy, he was kinda dense sometimes.
"Desdemona and Gretchen."
Ok, this time Bobby glazed over. "I'm standing right here, guys."
"Have you seen that picture? I mean seriously Keith. Don't think of it as yourself. Just look at it."
I looked at my ID again. Ok, it was really for the first time. One thing you don't want to get in tight jeans is aroused.
"Crap, I see your point." I tried to adjust myself inconspicuously while Bobby and Jake snickered at me. Apparently I was showing pretty clearly because one of the girls passing by in the hall went beet red after looking at me. She looked like she wanted to die after I noticed her looking.
I turned back to my two friends, and they were smirking at me.
"There's a reason that the fanboys are still hot on her tail."
"So, the license for 'Bodies' would be a thousand."
Jake and Bobby looked a bit stunned. "Well, there goes that idea. I know that I've only got about a hundred to my name," Bobby said when he regained his voice.
"Yeah, I've got about thirty cents."
"Guys, money's not the issue. I can afford to pay the fee."
Both of them looked at me strangely. "Keith, how much money do you have?"
"Enough. I don't really want to go into it."
"Spill. You know our finances."
I quietly said, "Six thousand in checking."
"Um, do you have a savings account?"
"Yeah, don't you guys?"
They looked at each other, then back at me, "You are the most adult teenager we know. We don't have savings accounts."
"Yeah, man, we have nothing."
"Um." I blushed and couldn't think what to say. "Well. . .I have almost a hundred thousand in savings. It is supposed to be my college fund. My parents and I have been putting into it since I was born, and it is a long term, high yield, account."
"Dude, you're rich. Why don't you hire a lawyer to resolve the issue with your Mom so you can sign?" Bobby just nodded his assent.
"Oh, yeah, about that. I'm emancipated for the next six months and I already signed."
"You are an adult." We all laughed at that.
"Let's do it. Let's film us doing 'Bodies' and post it to YouTube. You know my Dad has a professional digital video camera." Bobby's Dad was a wedding photographer, who did both stills and video.
We still had some time left on lunch, so I called up Richard. "Hello? Keith?"
"Yeah, the band wants to pick up 'Bodies,' if it's still on offer."
"It should be. So, you can cover the fee?"
"Yes. Can you take it from a credit card, or what?"
"Yeah, give me your card number."
I trusted him only because he was family, well Gretchen's family. Crap.
"I'm sorry to make you work today. I completely spaced what happened."
"I like working through things like this, Keith. Don't worry about it. I'd long ago resigned myself to the fact that she was dead to us. This just made it real. Thanks for your concern."
I hung up with and at my friends questioning looks, I said, "Gretchen's Mom died last night. Richard is Gretchen's uncle."
"Oh, is Gretchen ok?"
"Her Mom's been away for a long time. It's more a case of her never coming back, than losing her in the first place."
"Someone talking about me?" I was glomped again. It was the second time this had happened at school, and I knew that this time It wasn't because of Desdemona, well not directly.
"Hey, Gretchen," Jake said in welcome, and Bobby gave her a small wave.
"Hey, Etch, how'd it go?"
She looked really happy, "Apparently I am adjusting well, and he puts my worries last week, and Sunday, to a hormone imbalance."
I wondered if she should be saying stuff about it right now, since Jake and Bobby didn't know everything about her. I wasn't even sure if they knew about her surgery, which was planned for after school let out this year.
Gretchen answered that question next, "I'm still scheduled for my surgery to resolve the problem the Monday after school gets out."
"Great," I said and kissed her. I'd planned it as a little peck, but she didn't let me go, and it got a little heavy. "Mr. Robison, Ms. Anderson. This is a school, not a bordello."
"Yes, Mrs. Leary," Gretchen and I chimed together. She glared at us, but we couldn't hold it and giggled. Crap, I giggled. What was up with that?
"Just see you remember it." Mrs. Leary was the principal, and was a bit of a stickler where public displays were concerned.
The bell rang and we headed off to class. The rest of the day went fairly quickly and I was once again in Gretchen's car on the way to her house.
"How you doing, Etch."
"It's a bit surreal. I know Mom's not coming back, but I think I already mourned her. I haven't seen her in over two years."
"I remember that trip."
"So, what are you going to wear for the video?"
"Um, the same thing as for the concert?"
"I don't think so, Keith. Desdemona is a girl. Girls like different clothing. She's going to wear something else for this video."
I thought of arguing a bit more over this, but the look in her eye changed my mind, "Yes, dear." She giggled, so I must have scored some points.
Jake and Bobby came over to our place, since they needed costumes for this video as well.
"Keith, I want you to shave your legs."
"Um. . ." I'd succeeded in getting this far without shaving my legs, why did that have to change now?
"Because I want you to wear a skirt."
"Um. . .I wore leggings with the last skirt."
"This one will look better with bare legs."
It wasn't worth the argument. I wore pants to school anyway.
While the guys worked with Gretchen on their costumes, I shaved my legs. Really new experience. I don't think I spent this much effort shaving my face in a given month.
Ok, I'll admit. Shaved legs are sexy, even if they're yours. I might just continue shaving them for the feel. I came back in the room, and Gretchen kicked the other two out. From somewhere Gretchen pulled a pair of pink stiletto boots. Of course they fit. It was a little disturbing to me that I wore the same clothing size as my girlfriend.
She pulled out the skirt she wanted me to wear. I'm not sure what the style is actually called, but it was interesting looking. There was an over skirt, with a point in front and back. The under skirt had a point on each side. It kind of looked like an upside down tulip. The underskirt was purple and the over skirt was a deep, almost navy, blue.
I had never felt so exposed, and at the same time covered as I did in that skirt. The way that Gretchen was appreciating the way it draped against my bare legs did it for me as well. Ok, I liked the skirt, a lot.
She arranged the false breasts in a bandeau, hiding them, and making some of my skin push out of the top. It was a fairly tight bandeau. She gave me a sort of poncho thing for the top, which covered me until I moved. We mixed up some white cake with a touch of blue and just a hint of red and went to town. When we finished, I was covered from my head to my waist in cake. We left my legs alone. We put a coat of purple on my nails, both hands. Some eye shadow, and a touch of black on my cheeks and lips and I was ready to go. After putting on the wig we let the boys back in, and they just stood there.
"Wow. Dude. You've got breasts."
"They're rubber."
"Still, you've got cleavage as well."
"Will you two just finish getting into costume so we can do this?"
I decided to practice in the stiletto heels while Gretchen worked on the makeovers for the other two. It was a lot easier to get the hang of than I thought it'd be. Not easy by any stretch, but not impossible. I was actually able to make some decent headway when Jake and Bobby came out. I'd never realized how ripped Bobby had gotten moving his Behemoth around. Without a shirt, and makeup designed to highlight it, he looked like a Greek god. He almost looked metallic. I don't know where Gretchen got the kilt from, but Jake was wearing one. He had a black tee-shirt on top. "We ready to do this, guys?"
Three hours from the moment we arrived until we had a complete music video. Repeating portions of the song, different camera positions, and a couple of complete run- throughs. I was dead tired after we were done, and happy to take a break. I'd never realized what a wizard Bobby's Dad was with editing software before. He took the raw footage, laid down the better of the complete run audio tracks, and then pieced together the video footage that fit each portion the best, added in a couple of post processing effects, and then it was done. Thirty minutes after he'd selected all of the shots he wanted he declared it done. Three hours of work for a three minute video.
He uploaded it under our new account name: DesdemonaUpInFlames. We logged into the chat room. I created a new account there, with the same name we'd used on YouTube.
SkepticInDenver: i cant find ne1 here who went to the show. fliers @ Hole in the Wall though
FirstFan: I know someone who drove all night to be there.
SkepticInDenver: its a hoax, d00d
I<3Desdemona: I have her autograph.
FirstFan: We KNOW!!!
SkepticInDenver: ur dad got you it.
DesdemonaUpInFlames: You boys love to bicker, huh?
SkepticInDenver: FrEsH mEaT!
FirstFan: Heya, welcome to the insanity.
I<3Desdemona whispers: want to private?
DesdemonaUpInFlames: Thought you'd want to know this.
DesdemonaUpInFlames: cu all in Las Vegas ;)
The link lead to the video. There were 43 people in the chat room before I posted the link. One remained after about thirty seconds. I logged out before any of them could log back in.
Tomorrow was Wednesday, so only two more days 'til the concert. Gretchen has another visit with her shrink on Thursday, and I just home that the rumor mill was enough to make a distance between myself and Desdemona, because ready or not, here I am.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
My life so far: My Mom threw me out of the house for dressing like Desdemona. I signed my papers of Emancipation making me a legal adult at 16, for the next six months at least. I have ID showing me as Desdemona. Gretchen and I are dating, but that's no surprise to the people who know us. Richard Fields is the manager for Up in Flames, and he got us fair use rights to 'Bodies' by Drowning Pool. We made a video, and I flirted with my fans online.
The bodies of students lay everywhere in the quad. Here and there smoke curled from gaping holes torn in the masonry. The banners for the opposing armies lay strewn around. Some bore the flame emblem of Desdemona. Some bore the stylized script of Sarah Carerra.
Here and there a crippled student was helped from the field of battle by a compatriot. Cries for sports drinks or bottled water could be heard amidst the cries for mother or the wordless keening of lost souls.
I stood there alone, unharmed, in the midst of it all. There was a quiet beeping sound that drew my attention downward. I looked at the bomb at my feet, and knew it would be over soon. 5. . .4. . .3. . .2. . .beep, beep, beep.
So it was all a dream, but it felt real. I dreaded going to school today, hoping that nothing untoward happened. I just had a feeling that I wouldn't get out of this thing intact. I carefully chose my most masculine looking clothing, making sure I had jeans without holes or tears. I still had shaved legs after all. My jeans felt weird on my hairless legs. Neither good, nor bad, just different. Ok, I admit, they actually felt kinda good.
Hey, I know what you're thinking, but you'd be wrong. Guys shave their legs. You know, like Olympic swimmers and cyclists and things. Reduces drag or some such.
So, I'd be the first drag increasing leg shaver in this example, but still, there are guys who don't want to be girls who. . .oh shut up.
From now on I will only try to explain myself once every thousand or so words. Maybe.
Whatever, so I was going to school, to see the fallout from last night's video.
Well, it wasn't my dream, but it was. . .I'll just describe it, shall I?
The quad is a large open indoor space at the north end of the school The southwest corner of the quad connects to the north and east halls of the two storey "old wing" of the school. The west side goes past the office out the west door. North west of the quad is the auditorium and the fine arts section of the school, you know, my domain. North is the outside quad area. South is a single classroom accessible from the quad, and through the wall is the library, which is accessible from the east hallway next to the old wing.
East off the quad is the cafeteria. Northeast is the old gym, and further east is the new gym.
These are just the connected parts of the school. There's the whole new wing, the garage, the football field, the baseball field the tennis courts. . .the place could double as a community college.
Oh, you didn't want me to describe my school? Well, I thought it was funny.
Back to the quad. Bootleg copies of Intuition were playing from speakers connected to MP3 players. Laptops were playing 'Bodies'. Each group vying for as much of the airspace as possible. Everyone trying to stay there as long as possible before rushing to class, and then coming out and doing it again in the next five minute break between classes.
I felt myself torn. Sure, I loved that Desdemona was popular again, but hated, again that it wasn't me, and kicked myself for my ambivalence. Also, how could I inspire this warfare when Sarah Carerra was the real artist.
At lunch, people had branched out into Miley Cyrus, Pink, Blink 182, Train, Cake, Five for Fighting, Katy Perry, Evanescence and many more groups than I have the time, or ability, to name. I think I even heard Ozzy somewhere.
On my way to pick up my food, I even heard a couple of people who had synched 'Bodies' by myself and Drowning Pool so they were running in a duet. Since I had kept about the same timing as the original, and since I had done a straight octave transposition, it didn't sound half bad. The Behemoth and my 12 string certainly added something to the song that had been missing before.
The video caused me another problem
"Hey Keith, how's it feel to impersonate a girl!"
"Excuse me?"
"You heard me! You're wearing a girls earrings. That and your pretty princess nails, maybe you should start wearing a dress to school."
Ok, so Lionel "Brock" Hansen wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed, and could even be considered slightly less intelligent than warm Jell-O. I'd never considered that he might be, to quote Quigley, half a bubble off plumb.
It was Susanne Hansen that stood up for me, well, stood up to Brock. "Would he be able to borrow one from you, Brock? You seem to be his size."
Susanne hadn't ever struck me as the type to stand up to anyone. She was one of the Tech Crew, and tended to stay out of the spotlight as much as possible. Occupational hazard.
She was exaggerating when saying that we could wear the same dress size. First off, I think I was half as big around the torso as he was. His shoulders were quite a bit broader. And he probably weighed about fifty to a hundred pounds more than I did.
I expected him to pound her or something, anything, other than what he did. He blushed. "Maybe you could lend him your plum colored strapless gown."
Ok, what the hell. . .
Everyone was looking at Brock. Big football player Brock. . .As he began to cry and ran from the quad.
Susanne had a bit of an ohshit look on her face. I'm not sure if Gretchen, Susanne, or I were the first to react and follow him. . .into the girls bathroom?
What was going on? I gave Gretchen a look, but she just shrugged at me. I know that gender issues are supposed to be rare, but this was a little strange to say the least.
"Look, I know I wasn't supposed to say anything, Buffy, I'm sorry. It just slipped out. You of all people shouldn't have been getting into that though."
I heard crying coming from one of the stalls, "but it's not fair, Suzi. Desdemona is so good looking, and people are saying she could be related to Keith, and when Steve said she looked a bit like Keith, it made me so mad. I have to try so hard to even halfway pass and here Keith looks feminine without doing anything"
"Buffy?"
"What are you doing here, Gretchen? I can't face anyone right now."
"Hey, look there's now something we have in common."
The latch opened and Brock peered out of the stall, his eyes wide. "You? But, you're beautiful." Gretchen smiled and blushed.
"You too, Keith?"
"Oh, no. Not me. I love being a guy."
"Oh." He seemed a bit disappointed.
"Look, Gretchen and I are dating."
"You're gay?"
Susanne slapped him across the face. "Brock, do you really want to go there? Really?" He blushed and she turned to us. "I'm sorry about this, guys, he's kinda new to all of this."
"Sorry, Brock, but I'm a bit confused. You're kind of a big guy, and I know that up until last year you lifted a lot of weights. . ."
"I thought this is what my Dad wanted for me. The football career and everything. I even took steroids to speed my growth, since I wasn't developing fast enough."
I looked at Gretchen and we shared a glance. I figured that this was probably a girl talk, and made to leave. "Wait, Keith. I'm sorry for my comment. I'm still confused about who I am, or even what I am. I didn't mean to insult you."
"Look, Brock, or Buffy, I don't know you as well as Gretchen or Susanne. Frankly, I'm not into this whole girl-talk thing. . ."
Brock interrupted me, "Keith I have to tell someone else. I need to. The other girls are fine, but I want to tell a guy. I need to know. . ."
"How I react?"
"Well, yeah." He looked at his feet and blushed bright red.
"Dude, I'm flattered. . ."
"No, a sort of dry run. Not you."
"I'd have had to kill you." Gretchen was smiling as she said this, so I knew she was kidding. . .wasn't she.
"Look, you three might be comfortable in here, but. . ."
Brock looked around him for the first time since we'd come in. "Oh, crap."
We all skipped our afternoon classes. Personally I knew that I could pass the tests for those in my sleep, and Gretchen would be doing all night cram sessions. She always did. She's a bit of an over achiever and has a 4.0 GPA
We convoyed over to the Hansen's house, and Gretchen and I sat in his front room while he and Susanne went to change. Apparently Susanne was his sister. I should have twigged to their last names being the same, but Hansen isn't that rare a last name, and they were definitely in different social circles at school.
Gretchen and I simply relaxed in each other's company, waiting for the other two to get done. I don't know what I expected, but it wasn't that. Buffy had opted for jeans and a tank top. It was obvious that she had breasts. They were real as far as I could tell. Her makeup was impeccable. I'd never exactly call her pretty, but she looked at least somewhat female.
I'd seen genetic females who looked more masculine.
Her mannerisms were believable at least.
"Spill, Buffy. What's up?"
"I used to have tea parties with Suzi. When we were both really young. It wasn't about male or female. We were just sisters and so we dressed up, and played with her dolls. I always wondered why Suzi got the pretty dolls and dresses, and I got stuck with the trucks and stuff. My Dad thought I was a collector, because they all sat on my shelf, perfectly arranged, so he started getting me the rare expensive ones. They sat on the shelf as well.
"Sometimes I would imagine Suzi's dolls in the cars, but they were too small, the cars I mean. One day, my Dad caught us playing dress up. He took us both aside and explained that girls wore dresses and boys didn't. I was confused by this, since I didn't think about myself as a boy. Sure, we looked a bit different, but Suzi and I were sisters. We both knew it.
"About a week later, Dad caught us again. He took me aside and yelled at me. 'Didn't you understand before that boys don't wear dresses?' I was upset and confused. I didn't know why my Daddy was so angry at me. I said the only thing I could think of, 'Do you want me to be a boy Daddy?'
"I simply didn't understand at the time. I was five years old. My Dad spent a long time explaining things to me, and finally I realized that I was supposed to be a boy." Buffy stopped, as if unable to continue.
Suzi held her hand and started speaking, "She was in tears when she told me that we couldn't play together anymore. I still remember what she said that day, 'Daddy thinks I'm a boy, so we can't play dress up or tea party anymore.' I cried too. I was losing my best friend."
"I tried living up to Daddy's expectations after that. But I was small, and never big enough for most sports that Daddy thought I should play. I started taking Steroids when I was twelve. It was off and on. I started to develop breasts when I was fourteen. I hid them, but it was one of the happiest moments of my life. I bound my chest, and I would explain it away as bruised ribs."
Ok, a guy with breasts? Suzi saw my confusion and spoke up again, "It's a condition called gynecomastia. It's a common side effect of the steroids that he was taking."
"I kept taking them for another year, but it was getting to be too much for me. The more I became the boy that my Dad wanted, the less I wanted to live. I took forty-three sleeping pills to try to end it all."
"I found him in time, but the doctors found out about his. . .peculiarities. So did Mom and Dad. They made him go see Dr. Allen."
Gretchen and I shared a knowing look. Buffy continued, "I'd damaged my gonads through my continued steroid use. They wanted to put me on testosterone shots, but I refused. I'd already done enough damage to myself. After talking to Dr. Allen, I was prescribed estrogen instead."
"I was losing muscle mass, and was dropped from first string, but I had never been happier. Daddy still doesn't know what to make of it all, but he realizes now why I was so confused as a child with his 'man talks' as he calls them."
"Don't be modest, Buffy. You already have Dad wrapped around your little finger. He offered to get you plastic surgery this summer after all."
"I never said I was going to take it."
"Um, you know that it's not a good idea for a teen to. . ."
"Yes, I know that. Dad wanted to get it for me so I would have an easier time passing next year at school."
Ok, that explained quite a bit. So, Buffy would be coming to school next year. Gretchen leaned forward, as I leaned back into the couch. "So. . .who was it that you had a crush on."
Buffy blushed, and Suzi began to fidget. She spoke in a really quiet voice while looking at a spot on the carpet, "Robert Lewis."
I couldn't help it. I laughed. "You've. . .got a crush. . .on Bobby!"
"Be nice, Keith." Seeing Buffy's discomfort I laughed harder. I was getting a bit hysterical. I just couldn't stop. This had to be another dream. Like the quad battlefield or me naked on stage as a girl. I couldn't stop laughing.
"DESI!!!"
That did it. I looked at Gretchen shocked. Suzi and Buffy looked at me questioningly. I could think of nothing to say. She reached into my pocket and showed them my ID. My other ID.
"Keith plays Desdemona on stage."
"Then. . ."
"Yeah, Bobby is one of my best friends."
"Buffy, why don't you come with us to Jake's house. Keith and the band need to practice a bit, I'm sure, and you could meet them all out of costume, so to speak."
"Ok, just let me go get changed."
"No." I'm not sure which of the three of us said it first, but it was pretty much synchronized at the end.
"This is who you are, honey. You're going to be doing this next year anyway, so you might as well let the important people know now."
We got up to leave, and Buffy grabbed my arm. "Um, Keith, do you know if Rob. . .Bobby is dating anyone right now?"
"Bobby spends too much time on homework and his baby to date."
"His baby?"
"You'll see."
I called Jake and told him we were on our way over. Sure enough, he and Bobby had just arrived and were practicing their parts for Black Flag. We'd switch to My life with you is Hell as soon as I got there.
When we arrived, I went in first, and the girls came in a mass behind me. "You guys mind if we have a couple of groupies this time?"
Jake's eyes were sort of glued to Buffy's chest and he didn't even notice who she was. He nodded. Bobby on the other hand was staring at her face. He could almost place her, but not quite.
"I have a class with you at school, don't I?"
She blushed and nodded. He still couldn't place her. It was eating at him. I opened my mouth to speak, but Gretchen shushed me.
"Look, I know it's a little weird, but this is the real me."
Jake's and Bobby's eyes widened in surprise. "Brock?"
"It's Buffy, but yeah."
"Wow. I mean, wow." Jake's powers of conversation never cease to amaze.
"Those aren't fake, are they." Bobby said to her while looking at me.
"No, they're all me. You can touch them if you want."
"Buffy!?" Suzi said with a shocked tone in her voice.
"I'll take your word for that, at least for now," Was that a grin on his face?
"Look, I know it's sudden, and that you probably don't think of me as anything but Brock, but I. . .this really is me. I haven't been able to tell you in person, but. . ."
"You left those notes?"
She nodded. Wait, notes? What...? What's going on here?
"When they stopped I thought someone was playing a prank on me."
"I stopped because I needed to tell you the truth, but I couldn't"
"Look, Buffy? There's no way the person who wrote those to me was a guy. Period. If that was you, then I think I can accept at least dating you."
"Dude, Bobby, you had a secret admirer and didn't tell us?" Jake beat me to the punch.
"I thought you two put some girl up to playing a trick on me. There was no way I was giving you the satisfaction."
He walked over to her and kissed her on the lips. And it wasn't just a peck either. "Nope, you don't kiss like a guy either."
We stared at him while he turned and went over to the Behemoth. "So, we practicing or what?"
We played through 'My life with you is Hell' a couple of times, and then worked on trouble spots for about an hour. We played through again, and figured that it was as good as it was going to get at this point. Gretchen and I were just pulling up at her place when my phone rang.
"Keith?"
"Yes, Mom?" Great, what did she want now?
"You remember that your cousin's birthday is tomorrow?"
"No, you never told me."
"I'm sure I told you on Monday."
"Mom, last time we spoke was Friday, remember? Look, Mom, I assume it's at their house in Bountiful, right?"
"Yes, just make sure you don't bring that freak with you."
I hung up before I could respond in a way that I would regret. Before last week, Mom had treated Gretchen well. There were no issues between them, and I even assumed that she accepted her. Then, last week, she had completely blown a gasket.
"Hey, Etch? Wanna go to my cousin's birthday party? It's sort of a command performance, and I need a ride."
"Nathan?"
"Yep."
"Ok, should be fun."
***
Bountiful is about a half hour north of Salt Lake. After school we headed out. School was more of the same from yesterday at lunch, just more subdued than it had been. It seems it only took a week for the new girls on the block to be relegated to the same status as everyone else.
"Hey, guys. You remember Gretchen, right?"
"Yep. Welcome Gretchen." My cousin Nathan look a little quizzically at us.
"I needed a ride to get here, and Gretchen offered."
"Still don't have your own wheels?"
"Nah, I still spend too much on clothing and jewelry."
"If I didn't know better, I'd think. . ."
"Probably not a good idea to go there right now."
"Huh?"
"Drama you don't want to be a part of if possible."
"Okay."
My cousin and his wife had no children of their own, and he was a bit older than me. My Mom was the youngest of eight children, and Nathan was the oldest son of her oldest sibling. He was actually older than my Mom by a couple of years. Welcome to Utah, everyone.
Have you ever heard the joke that goes: You're probably in Utah if it's the mother of the bride who's pregnant?
Yep, that's my Mom's family.
"Need help setting up?"
"Sure, Send Gretchen into the kitchen with Stacey, and you and I can set up tables."
Eight kids, remember? Add spouses for most of them and the average of 4 kids, and you get a lot of people to be in one spot. Most of them were still in Utah. When we got together for something like this it took up the entire block, at least it seemed. It's been more than twenty years since the whole clan could fit inside a house. Sometimes I wonder if we shouldn't just hire a convention center when we want to get together.
We finished putting up all of the tables as the rest of my family started to arrive. I won't give you thirty plus names that you're going to forget the moment you read them.
"So, Keith, you and Gretchen?"
"There's a possibility there. We'll see."
"What's with the hardware?" Said another cousin pointing at the earrings.
"Long story. Short answer is I need it for stage."
"Still acting are you?" One of my uncles.
"In a manner of speaking. This has more to do with my band." You've got to realize, that I'm not the center of attention here. There are a lot of conversations going on at once. I'm just relating the ones that are about me.
"You still playing around with that? What are you up to now, fifty some odd rejections?" Thank you Grandpa Keith. They named me after him.
"No, only forty-seven." I say this with a smile, to let him know I don't take offense. I like my Grandpa.
I looked across the gathering and saw Gretchen the center of a group of my younger female cousins. By younger, I mean our age.
She fit in well with my family. I was having a happy moment, so of course that's when I saw my Mom arguing with a couple of my uncles and Nathan. Ok, so that's not the best thing that I could see. I rushed over to try and do damage control, only to hear the end of the conversation.
"If you can't be civil to a guest of my house, then I have to ask you to leave."
"I'm family Nathan. You can't kick me out."
"Tracy, you need to calm down. You're upsetting people."
"It's not people. It's an abomination before God."
"Get out."
I think the anger in my cousin's eyes finally got through to her. My Mom threw a look in my direction that suggested this was far from over, and then left.
"What's this all about?" I asked as casually as I could, knowing that I probably already knew the answer.
"Your Mom is spreading some story that you're gay and living in sin with Gretchen, who was born a boy."
Wow, this was going to be a fun one to disarm. Where are the real bomb techs when you need them?
"Ok, um. Part of what she's saying is true."
"You're gay?"
Why does everyone accuse me of that?
"No, Nathan. I'm not now, nor have I ever been."
"Look, I understand if you've had thoughts in that direction. Heck, we always liked your dad better than your mom."
"Nathan!" This was my Grandpa having come over to see what the commotion was.
"It's true, Grandpa."
"Yes, but it's not nice to say." There was a twinkle in his clear blue eyes.
"Ok, let's start with the short version, and go for clarification from there. Gretchen was born male, but always felt she was female, and she is going in for surgery to correct that after school gets out. I am a legally emancipated minor because Mom threw me out last week over Gretchen. Gretchen and I are not in any sort of a physical relationship, and since she will be female in the eyes of the law before we start anything, IF we start anything, I will still consider myself heterosexual. If there's a problem with either of us being here, then we can leave. And while yes, I am currently staying at her house, I have my own bedroom, with a lock on the door, and her Dad would kill me if I did anything like my Mom is suggesting."
One of my female cousins piped up at this point, "That's the short version?"
"Yeah, the long version is about fifty pages, where that was a paragraph."
I got chuckles over that.
One of my more conservative aunts came up to me, and I figured that I was about to get it now.
"Everyone is entitled to make their own choices, and their own mistakes, young man. Without evidence I won't believe, personally, that Gretchen ever was more or less than the female she seems to be. Heck, she's prettier than I am." This got general chuckles.
"You're mother is in need of serious help, I mean throwing a helpless sixteen year old into the arms of the very person she claims to be trying to save him from? Disgraceful." She had a twinkle in her eye like Grandpa's. "No, how are you set for money, Keith, since you're an adult now?"
I smiled at her. This is definitely not the response I expected. I expected something a little closer to my Mom's response actually.
"I'm good as far as money goes. I have right around five thousand in my checking account."
"Keith!" Oh crap. I never told Gretchen about how much the use rights for the song cost.
"Gretchen, I was going to tell you that the use rights for 'Bodies' cost one thousand, and discuss it with you before purchasing it, but with everything happening and so little time before the contest. . ."
"You're in for it now, Keith."
"Yeah, never make your woman mad, Man."
"Looks like you two were trying to keep your very real relationship low key, huh?" This last was my Grandpa. "Tell you what, Etch, isn't that what I hear him call you? We'll hold him for you so he can't run, and you can get it out with him. . .or beat some sense into him, whichever you prefer. I mean, a thousand dollars for a song?"
"The band bought the rights to the song. As long as we don't make any professional recordings of it, you know in a studio with someone else footing the bill, we can make, and distribute, recordings of the song as we see fit."
"Keith, we had a deal. And that was your money, not the bands."
"Etch, that's why I wanted to discuss this with you. It's an unlimited license."
"But, you lost money on it."
A light bulb went off in my head. Why didn't I think about this before? "Hold that thought, please? I need to call your uncle."
I had a thought. A really good thought.
Everyone was staring at me now. Ok, so now I AM the center of attention. Better get used to it, Keith ol' bean.
"Hey, Richard? Yeah, Keith. What limitations on distribution do we have for that license? So, we could say, I don't know, offer up the high quality version of the video on iTunes? That and provide an mp3? Do we take care of that, or do you? You're the best, thanks."
I turned back to Gretchen and she was trying not to smile. "Babe, ok, so I was hasty, and I should have discussed it with you. I should have made arrangements before hand for getting the video distributed. I didn't think and you were right. Will you forgive me?"
"Kiss him!" One of my cousins yelled, and Gretchen blushed. Yeah, we're a boisterous bunch.
"I need you to promise that you won't spend any more money on your band without discussing it with me and the band first, ok?"
"Yes, Etch. I promise."
She kissed me. There was general cheering. I had to explain the band, and why Mom threw me out over it. I think I managed to convince them that Desdemona was only a stage persona, like Ziggy Stardust. I'm not sure they bought it before Grandpa made a declaration.
"Family, for Keith to succeed in his career, people need to think he's a woman. You all know what a sweet, high, voice he has. He tells us all it's an act, and until he changes his mind we believe him. I want you all to get into family groups, and discuss this. I want a promise from every head of household that you will keep Keith's secret, and we won't discuss this with anyone, even ourselves. Desdemona is a distant relation. We don't know her if we should ever meet her. We don't do this to snub Keith, but to protect him. What say you all?"
Some of the discussions of families got heated. None came to blows. In the end every family disavowed all knowledge of Desdemona until formally introduced. In return I promised never to bring up my band at family gatherings until Desdemona had been introduced to them all, and then only while in my Desdemona persona.
Long way of saying that they would keep my secret for me. I'd seen enough of my family in action to know that I could trust all of them. Some of them would probably, secretly, buy up copies of 'Bodies' to help me out on occasion.
I made a quick call to Bobby's house.
"Lewis household, Robert Lewis speaking."
Since his dad used the phone for business, they had to be a bit formal when answering.
"Hey, Bobby. Is your Dad home? We're trying to get the video uploaded to iTunes so we can make some money."
"Yeah, Richard already called. It's taken care of, and we have the mp3 and video already up there."
And that's why agents made the big bucks. . .at a small percent of each transaction. Hopefully Desdemona started getting some hits.
"Oh, and we added a link from the info on YouTube to the files on iTunes."
Yep, I love my agent.
"Ok, well thanks."
In the half an hour, or there about, it took the family to have a council and come to an agreement, Richard had already brokered a deal with iTunes and gotten our music in uploaded. He must have had some contacts already in place.
Twenty four more hours more hours to the concert. So short a time. Gretchen and I drove home. We talked about many things and fell asleep lying next to each other.
***
School was hell. Or was it just the waiting and wanting the final bell to ring.
I was surprised to see Buffy there.
"Buffy? I thought you'd decided to wait til next year to come out, so to speak."
She blushed, but looked at Bobby who stood protectively next to her. Sure, Buffy was a big girl, but at 6'6" they don't get much bigger than Bobby. Sometimes I wonder if he didn't make his Behemoth so that he had a Bobby sized instrument for once. She was wearing heals and she was still shorter than him. Not by much, though.
"Bobby's acceptance of me made my decision easy."
"Watch where you're going, fa..oof."
Someone had walked up behind Buffy and was preparing to push her, when Bobby pushed first. Ok, so what he did couldn't be considered a push. More like a gut punch. He whispered something in the guys ear, and we watched as the blood drained from his face. Bobby kept speaking. The guy started trembling. When Bobby let him up, the guy turned to Buffy.
"I'm sorry for my mistake, Mistress Buffy. I will do my best to fix it by being your personal protector whenever Bobby can't."
"Thank you, Sir, but I think that I can do without your services. You are free to leave."
"But. . ." He looked really scared now.
"The lady asked you to leave." There was a menace in Bobby's voice that I'd never heard before. I never wanted to make him angry at me, that's for sure.
After the guy left, a sheepish Buffy turned to look my direction. "I never properly thanked you for yesterday, Keith. I'd also like to apologize. I shouldn't have acted that way. I should have been more grateful for what I did have. I almost lost any possibility at meeting Bobby properly because of my behavior."
Bobby was a bit confused and looked between us. "What happened yesterday? I know you disappeared from school. . ."
Suzi spoke up from behind Bobby, where apparently she'd been standing invisibly. "Brock made a last ditch effort to screw things up for Buffy, so Keith flushed him down the girls toilet."
Gretchen, Suzi, Buffy, and I laughed, and Bobby looked confused. "Don't worry about it, bro. It's all in the past."
I received a text message on my phone: Urgent. Call me. Richard.
Isn't auto-complete a wonderful tool. I called Richard. He told me the news. I dropped the phone. I distantly heard the bell ring to go to class, but I didn't recognize it for what it was. I kept having the same thing run through my head. One hundred thousand.
I couldn't even really understand it. How popular WAS Desdemona. How did so many people know who she was. Sure, that was just downloads, but my word. One hundred thousand people had downloaded her song alone. The video was a little more expensive, so I'm sure that it wasn't downloaded as much. Someone kissed me. One hun. . .Oh, Gretchen.
"Keith, are you alright?" Gretchen was talking to me. They were all looking at me a bit weird. I picked my phone off the ground. It still worked, luckily, and was still connected to Richard.
"How many sales of the video was that?"
A slight chuckle from Richard, "Only about fifty thousand of the video, but we make almost a buck and a half on that one. Total, before my cut, Up in Flames has made just over two hundred thousand dollars in less than twenty four hours."
"Thanks, Richard. Gotta get to class."
I hung up the phone, still a bit shocked. They all looked at me a bit expectantly. Realizing that Jake wasn't with us, I decided to keep them in the dark a bit longer. "Get Jake and find me at lunch. You're going to need time to process."
Gretchen looked at me, as if she was planning a course of attack to get it out of me, but I rushed off in the direction of my last class of the morning. "Meet me at lunch!"
I was such a stinker.
The class, Algebra, seemed to take almost no time at all to complete. Next thing I knew, we were south of the cafeteria at the top of a set of stairs. They lead to the upper bleachers on the west side of the old gym. No one came up here usually, and it was one of the places I would go to think. I'd gotten the latest numbers from Richard before coming to meet with everyone.
"So, Keith, Spill. What's wrong? What's happened?" Gretchen would kill me when she found out. . .probably.
"Well, we sold a couple of songs and some videos on iTunes last night and this morning."
"Oh, is that all." Jake said nonchalantly.
"Yeah, there was an initial rush, but it seems to have petered off a bit."
"So," Bobby said, "How many we sell? A hundred?"
I smiled.
"A thousand?"
"Five thousand?" This one was from Buffy. I smiled even bigger.
"You can't tell me we sold more than five thousand in a single day, did we?" Jake added his two cents.
"What if I told you guys that flying first class wasn't outside our price range?"
They all looked at me, the surprise evident on their faces.
"After the fees for the publishing agency and iTunes, after Richard's fee, Up in Flames has already made about two hundred fifty thousand dollars."
Jake fainted dead away. We took a couple of minutes to revive him. "Guys, I had the weirdest dream. I dreamt that we had a video on iTunes and we sold enough copies to make over two hundred and fifty thousand dollars."
"That's no dream, Jake. That was reality."
"Up in Flames now has two hundred fifty thousand dollars?"
"A little over that, yeah."
"It's not supposed to happen this way. It's supposed to be harder than that."
"Look, it might be a fluke. People might have downloaded by mistake, thinking they were getting something else. Who knows? For right now, let's just enjoy the moment. . .and not spend any of our money until we're sure."
"Way to kill the party, Keith. But hey, it's a cool thought for a moment or two. We might, possibly, almost, be rich."
"Guys, unless we spend frugally, all it means is we don't need summer jobs. We are middle class, for about three years, if we manage our money well."
Everyone laughed at this. "What?"
"You really are an adult, aren't you, Keith." This was from Gretchen of all places. We laughed at that, and headed down to the quad to participate in the general craziness that is high school.
***
We drove Jake's van across the desert to the oasis that is Las Vegas. Four hours in any vehicle is a bit boring. While there are a few twisting canyon portions of the trip, most of the trip from home to lost wages is monotonous. Scrub and mountains. Scrub and valleys. Scrub and flat as far as the eye can see. Mainly, it is a lot of scrub brush.
We arrived at the venue shortly after six thirty.
"Name?"
"Up in Flames." We were in costume already, since there really was nowhere to change here. I'd shaved before putting on the leggings, the second time, since they were really uncomfortable with the stubble that had grown back since I'd shaved them on Tuesday.
"So, you're Desdemona, huh? If I didn't know better, I'd say you were the one being promoted here tonight. I'd say good luck, but we both know it's fixed."
Wait, he already knew who I was. . .at least by reputation? We entered the place, and I got my first clue as to why he knew who I was. We had a swag table. There was a cute blond in an Up in Flames fitted tee sitting behind the table. Her eyes got big as I approached. "It's an honor to finally meet you, Desi. My Dad's told me sooo much about you. I bought your song on iTunes, and am soo looking forward to hearing some of your own music. This is like so cool."
Ah, Gretchen's cousin.
I fingered the knockoff earrings. We had them in two sizes. Small and Life-size. "How much are these?"
"The small ones are twenty, and the big ones are a hundred."
"Is your Dad around?"
"Last I saw him, he was schmoozing with MTV."
"Thanks."
We walked around the place. We had about an hour before the doors opened at eight. I saw a lot of hopefuls, as well as the 'Belle of the Ball' otherwise known as Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools. Their real name isn't important to anyone but themselves and their agent.
Finally, we found Richard as he was giving a business card to a guy in a collared shirt. "Make sure you get some good footage of my girl, ok?"
"If she looks anything like this chick, I'll be glad to."
Richard turned around, and somehow, on the spur of the moment, we air kissed. "Hi, Richard. Spreading my fame abroad, I see?"
"Desi, this is Noah Brandt, executive producer. Noah, Desdemona of Up in Flames."
I took his hand with just the gingers of mine. "Pleased to meet you, Noah." I said with a big smile.
"You wouldn't happen to want to get a drink before the show, would you?"
"I am way too young for you and drinking, Mr. Brandt, as I'm only sixteen. And I think my girlfriend would have a problem with it as well."
Yep, I broke his brain. I could see how playing a girl could be fun. Course, that's all I wanted it to be. Playing. I wanted to be able to take off the girl and still be myself when I was done.
Noah shook himself, and smiled at me. "Well, you're right about the too young thing. There are going to be a lot of upset fanboys when they find out. If you were twenty-one, which is my lower limit by the way, I'd take you for that drink, girlfriend be damned."
"I'll have to tell her you said that. She'll enjoy it." Would she ever. I had a chuckle at myself as I walked away.
Bobby and Jake carried our instruments for us. Too many horror stories of lost, stolen, and ruined instruments at events like this for any of us to relax. At quarter to eight, they ushered us into the small greenroom, made smaller by the number of people in there.
"Ok, ladies and gentlemen. The order is going to be. . ." ten faceless, possibly talentless, hopeful groups followed by, "Up in Flames, and finally Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools." See, everyone is getting into the spirit of things. Or that's just the power of the narrator to edit anything as they see fit.
We waited through the horrendous wailing, badly tuned instruments, and occasional brilliance of the other ten bands to play. The tenth got done, and there was some applause, possibly because they finally stopped playing.
I'd gotten my 12 String out of the case while they were 'playing' and made sure my tuning was correct. Then we made sure that the Base and 12 String were in tune with each other. We were the only ones other than Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools, who were left in the green room, since apparently they had us go elsewhere after we performed. Didn't matter to me.
We went out to the stage, and Jake and I plugged in. There was a slight double pop from the speakers when we did it. Almost in synch. Bobby sat down at his drum. I walked to the front of the stage and waited.
The lights went out in the bar, leaving a single white spotlight on my face. I looked down at the mic, not in fear of the audience, but preparing myself for the emotion of the song. I dropped my right hand to my side, holding first one finger up, then two and finally three.
I brought my hand quickly to the strings and started the screaming fall from near the bottom of the neck all the way till I was running an open E double. Jake and I wove the bass line back and forth for a moment or two, as if fighting for the spotlight. I screamed my guitar, and he snarled his bass, but then he took up the incessant bass line. It was a low rumble like a thunderstorm over the horizon.
I started in on the mid range melody, and began to sing, my voice forming a sort of descant above the pounding surf of the music:
Outside of my mind lives the darkness
it takes me from myself and consumes me completely
Inside of my mind all reside in loneliness
and I live within myself pushing, running, turning you away
I ran a short bridge and a key change into a more Major key from the Minor key harmonies of the main verse and launched into the chorus with a screaming tenor line almost drowning out the bass and drums. I lived the words for the moment, giving my soul into them:
I feel all that you cut me
and I know that you don't own me
but you will not live without me
and it isn't that you want me
but I sing this all about the hell that is my life with you.
I dropped back down a bit to the original melody as I sang the second verse:
I don't know if what I feel is what you want
and I know that you're here to make all of it stop
I lose myself within the voice, of your sick taunt
And I sit and say that all I want is for you to go away.
I ran a second key change, this time dropping into a different minor key, plucking out the sepulchral tones that the chorus could produce. We slowed from the pounding rhythm we had used from the start, and I sang each word as if it gave me physical pain to let it go into the world.:
I feel all that you cut me
and I know that you don't own me
but you will not live without me
and it isn't that you want me
but I sing this all about the hell that is my life with you.
Almost before I finish the end of the chorus, the drums start beating a steady rhythm. A heartbeat. Filling the words I have to sing next with life. The original melody picks up again in its original key The music ran the same length, but each line stopped early, letting the music run alone:
You killed me went I went away
My feeling for you flew away
My life with you is gone away
The last line of this verse was spoken instead of sung. I started quietly and low, slowly speeding up and getting louder The music ended before I did, so my band went silent leaving me to finish alone:
I damn you to the hell you live and know that all my life I live and you will not rule my love of life so get yourself away!
Everything fell silent for a breathless moment, even the audience seemed to wait in anticipation. We dragged the silence on for a couple more seconds, then Bobby struck the rim of his tom three times to give us the tempo, and then we picked up on the third strike with the words and music for the first chorus:
I feel all that you cut me
and I know that you don't own me
but you will not live without me
and it isn't that you want me
but I sing this all about the hell that is my life with you.
The other two dropped off leaving me for a solo on my 12 string. I played as if the rest of the song had just been a setup for this one moment. I varied all of the versions of the melody and chorus, playing my soul into the music. I shifted into the second to last line of the chorus to single bringing my solo to a close and at the right moment, the other two came in for the final line of our song:
I sing and play the hell of you away!
It no longer mattered to me if we won this contest. We had played better than we ever had in the past, and winning now almost felt like it would be anti-climax to emotion we had brought to the song. The crowd erupted into noise, but it was so loud I couldn't tell if it was positive or negative. We left the stage as we had entered it: silently with our heads held high.
There was no one to direct us as we left the stage, so we went back into the green room as Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools, left. I don't get tired of saying that.
Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools.
They weren't a bad band, and if we hadn't been there, there's no doubt that they'd have won a fair contest.
But, it wasn't a fair contest, and we were there.
There were boos when they were awarded the first prize.
I heard something from the crowd that slowly got louder. Chants of Up in Flames interspersed with Desdemona. They got together finally and it became a crashing call for us. We walked back out on stage and plugged in.
"Everyone having a good time?"
I saw cameras being hurriedly turned back on, and Richard stopping one of the suits from getting back on the stage.
"YEAH!" was the general consensus, with a smattering of "Hell(s) Yeah) and a late "I love you Desdemona! Have my babies"
There was some laughter at that.
"Silently, we released a song this week. We recorded it. We uploaded it. A lot of you downloaded it. This is a thank you for that."
I turned to Jake and Bobby and quietly spoke. "'Bodies'. Follow my lead."
Let the bodies hit the floor
Let the bodies hit the floor
Let the bodies hit the floor
Let the bodies hit the flooooooooooooor!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
***
If anything they were louder this time. They even sang along, but that's what happens when you sing something a lot of people know. Maybe they will get that way with 'My life with you is Hell', and 'Black Flag' eventually.
"Good night, Las Vegas. You'll be with me in my dreams tonight."
We got home about five am.
***
The phone ringing woke me up at a little after nine o'clock
"Hello?"
"Keith? Richard. We have a problem, but I've taken care of it. Apparently when our production company uploaded your song, they listed it as Drowning Pool and not Up in Flames. Since the folks at Apple don't know which of the people wanted to buy the song, and which were simply trying to download the other, they've refunded everyone who downloaded your song. Good news is they caught it, and corrected the artist, before the contest last night. The worse news is they've assessed us a penalty because it happened."
Oh crap, "How much?"
"Ten cents per download. So it's only thirty thousand dollars."
"We don't have thirty thousand dollars."
"It was only the song that was screwed up. The video is up to seventy five thousand downloads. That means we have seventy eight thousand after paying off all of the fines."
"Thanks Richard."
I'd only gotten about four hours sleep at this point, but figured I might as well stay up now. I'd have a hell of a time getting back to sleep.
I went downstairs. Gretchen was already up, and reading the entertainment section of an online newspaper. She tried to browse away, but I stopped her. It was a critique of the contest last night.
"Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools, proved what it means to be a Goth band in today's world of pop princesses and teen idols. They provide a main stream sound, while at the same time giving the crowd what they're looking for. The five piece ensemble includes two Base guitars, the drummer, a backup singer on six string guitar, and the lead singer.
"They did a cover of Evanescence's 'Bring me to Life' giving it a new twist with a male lead singer.
"Their costumes were more of the same, with cubic yards of white cake on their faces, and enough black cloth to make a tents for an entire boy scout troop, should they opt for that color instead of their more normal olive green.
"On the other hand, 'Up in Flames' should have stuck with what was probably their first band name 'Down in Flames' and then never humiliated themselves here in the first place. From the strange harmonies of a 12-string guitar as lead, to the whiny sound of lead singer Desdemona's voice, this band could only be worse if stories about the drummers Leviathan instrument are true, and he chose to bring it.
"The words to the song were derivative and trite, and brought nothing new to the Goth genre.
"The only thing about this band that is truly memorable were the costumes that they wore, and I'm sure that many in the audience, like myself, wanted Desdemona's phone number. She makes a truly striking figure in her black corset to with burgundy flashes, black toule skirt, burgundy leggings and white and burgundy harlequin makeup. She could have worn something in a stiletto heel to complete the ensemble, but the pink combat boot, matching her pink hair, completed it well enough."
Of course he would try to destroy us in print. Only natural when we really won the contest, right?
***
Sometimes I really question Jake's sexuality. He watched the Tween awards. He had tickets to the Josh Holliday concert. I mean seriously. He had four tickets to the concert. Of course they were for Jake, Bobby, Gretchen, and Myself, right? Nope. Jake decided to give his ticket to Buffy. I figured that I needed to take some of the attention from Buffy, so I went in my 'Bodies' costume, minus the body covering white cake. It had taken me about two hours to clean it off Tuesday night.
I was glad for the warmer summer weather when we got out there. I heard a few mentions of my name, but this wasn't really my audience.
I didn't even know who my target audience was. Who was I really? We got out in the grass where our tickets put us, and Bobby lay down the blanket we would be sitting on. We waited as the crowd filled in, and finally the band came on stage. Then, before I knew it, there she was.
I tried to think of her as competition, but the moment she started to sing the opening bars of 'Rock Star' I knew I was outclassed. I was glad that I was in a completely different market, whatever it was, than she was.
"Good evening, Salt Lake City!"
From 'Rock Star' to 'Pop princess'. A burning rendition of 'Open your Eyes'.
I was lost. I had barely performed two songs last night. I thought I'd killed it. I was a hack. My one moment of fame, and here I was being shown up by this. . .
. . .perfect talent.
Gretchen and Buffy got up to dance for 'I Just Wanna Have Fun'. Luckily I could smile a bit at them and play the Goth princess, aloof and cold, on the blanket. I needed to think.
There had to be something I could do, right? Someway to compete? Did I need to compete at all?
Did I just find my niche and stay there? Her style was all over the place. Almost as hard to pin down as my own. Did I want to try to compete with her? Change my look?
Did I need to?
What I did was unique. I played to my strengths without giving an inch to other peoples preconceived notions of what I should be. Being Desdemona on stage was a part of that.
The song drew to a close, and like the other times, Sarah came to the microphone to speak.
"This next song is very special to me," she paused for a moment after saying this. "I wrote this song with my best friend. I've known her since I was two years old, and we've done everything together."
Her eyes glistened a bit with unshed tears
"This is the first concert I've ever performed. I wish with all of my heart that she could have been here tonight. But even if she isn't here in body, I know she's here in spirit. I'd like to dedicate this next song to her. 'Ever After', Chloe. Always."
Songwriter? Songwriter! That was supposed to be MY thing. The place I could shine on my own.
She began to sing, and I knew I had lost before I began. Where my work always felt derivative and trite to me, hers was simply perfect. I looked at Bobby and Gretchen and Buffy all enjoying themselves, and I simply couldn't stand another minute of it. How could they do this to me?
Then I sat back and enjoyed it. It really was a good song. There was just something so powerful about the emotion of it.
She of course finished the concert with 'Intuition'. It sounded better than the recording did. It was then I realized she actually sounded better live than on CD. Well, all I could hope was I sounded the same since I didn't use Perfect Pitch or any of the other similar software titles out there.
***
The rest of the concert wasn't bad. I knew what to expect from Josh Holliday. I got some cuddle time with Gretchen, and Bobby and Buffy got some of the same.
We walked back to the car, still experiencing the glow from the concert. My phone rang.
"Hey, Keith, can you guys come on over to my place after the concert?" It was Jake.
"Sure man, but you missed a once in a lifetime opportunity, man."
"It was just a Josh Holliday concert."
"Sarah Carerra opened for him."
"You're kidding."
"Nope, you missed a first."
"Crap. . .well, I didn't miss the other first."
"And what was that?"
"The first national broadcast of Up in Flames. Don't worry, I recorded it."
"Ok, see you in about three hours. Traffic looks like it's going to be bad."
"Ok, see you."
Gretchen obviously wanted to know what was up. "MTV has already played the contest. Jake recorded it."
We climbed into Gretchen's baby and drove home. I tried my best to ignore the two people in the back seat. "Can you keep the petting to a minimum please?"
"We were," said an indignant Bobby, while a very embarrassed Buffy adjusted her blouse. They toned it down after that. Shortly afterward Bobby leaned against the side and fell asleep. Buffy cuddled up against the snoring giant.
We got to Jakes, and he queued up our coming on stage the first time.
"Do we really come off as that aloof?"
"Wait a minute."
And then we began to play. It was transcendent. It was amazing.
"Wow, Keith, you're good," Buffy said looking at the screen in awe, "and this is a recording."
"I've seen you before, but never like this, Keith. You might even be better than Sarah Carerra."
"No way, guys. This is a fluke."
"Keith, have you actually taken a look at our video?"
I looked at Jake. "Yeah, I've seen it."
"No, I mean looked at it. When you put your heart into the music, it changes. It becomes yours for a moment, no matter who wrote it."
"What are you talking about?"
"Just watch." He'd paused it while we were talking, and started it again. I watched as the person on stage felt every word of the song. There's no way it was me, and yet I remembered every moment of that experience.
I remembered the heat of the spot, and the feel of the strings and frets.
I remembered the hush of the crowd before we began to play, its expectant weight.
I just didn't remember it like this. She was bare on that stage, and no amount of clothing would cover her up. She made love to every member of that audience, and with us as well as we watched again.
I remembered my dream. I'd been naked on stage. This was the same as the dream, only this time no one laughed. I bared the entirety of my soul, and people loved me for it.
My phone rang.
"We have the receipts from the contest, Keith."
"Richard?"
"Who else? Anyway, we sold out completely. After costs, that nets us another thirty-three hundred dollars. "
Well, something had to go right eventually.
"Thanks Richard."
His call reminded me of what the earlier call had been about.
I told the guys. They were understandably disappointed, but the news about selling about ten thousand dollars in swag at a small contest was nothing to sneeze at, and the profits were more than ten times our entrance fee.
***
I sulked on Sunday. I did go to church with Gretchen again. We went swimming afterwards without the drama of last week
Monday and Tuesday we had finals. We turned in books at the beginning of each class, probably since the teachers wanted to be done as quickly as we did. That meant that we had Yearbooks on Wednesday. Thursday was officially our first day of summer.
But, we're still on the horror that met me when I got to school on Monday.
Someone had printed out a poster of a screen shot of Desdemona from the contest. It was done on individual sheets of paper, and then pieced together on the wall like a giant jigsaw puzzle.
It had then been laminated, somehow. The end result was a plastic covered poster of me ten feet tall and thirteen feet wide.
People were worshiping at the feet of it, or more specifically looking at it a bit in awe.
"What's up?" I asked one of the kids I knew from Jazz band.
"Didn't you hear? Desdemona entered a contest, and then when it was stolen from her, she gave an impromptu concert. The video has received over seven hundred thousand hits."
"What video?"
"The one on YouTube. Actually it's videos, not just video. There are a bunch. The raw footage MTV shot is the best quality though."
"Take this down this instant."
It was Mr. Forrest. The poster was blocking the door to his classroom.
The ups and downs of the music industry have already struck us hard. We were flush for a moment, and then lost most of it. Where would tomorrow take us. I aced my tests of course, so that's not interesting, but there is still a wild summer ahead of me and the rest of the crew. My circle of friends is sure growing. Gretchen and I grow closer. Of course, Gretchen has her surgery to look forward to. And we will be putting out feelers to studios to try to "break in" to the biz.
Sarah Carerra and images from her concert are © Megan Campbell. All rights reserved.
My Mom threw me out for being Desdemona, a Goth rocker. I am a legally emancipated 16 year old, and living at my girlfriends house. The rest of my Mom's family supports me. We uploaded a song and video to iTunes, but due to a mix-up we ended owing more money than we made. Luckily a video uploaded to the same place saved us from having to pay over thirty thousand dollars out of pocket.
Summer time! Ok, so in my rush to finish last time, I neglected to mention that my nemesis now has a #1 hit single. Ok, so she's not really my nemesis, especially since she has no idea that I exist, but I always wondered what it would be like to have one. A nemesis that is.
I finished up with school and figured that it would be a great time to get back to my job at the Hot Topic. They'd said that i always had a job there when I wanted it, so I'd planned to head up on Thursday morning to make sure that the offer still held. When you're a rock star, plans change.
My phone rang just as I was about to head out the door.
"Desi? How soon can you meet me in Salt Lake?"
"Um, a couple of hours, why?"
"Well, specifically I need you to meet me at the airport."
Ok, what's going on?
"We need Jake and Bobby as well?"
"Not necessary, but definitely useful. A label contacted me this morning about you."
"Um."
"Ok, it was about the band, but you specifically. They want to see you yesterday, but will settle for this afternoon."
"And we're meeting at the airport, because. . .?"
"Their office is in Nashville."
"They realize I'm not even a little bit country?"
A chuckle over the phone and then Richard continued, "Yes, they know that. They want to see you."
"Ok, well, since I need to get ready I don't have enough time, so could you give the boys a call? Thanks."
Crap, a long plane flight, humid environment, looks like I get to take a purse with me. Oh goody. . .but how else do I take all my makeup with me without looking out of place. I was definitely going to need a touchup or two before this was over.
Gretchen was at her therapists again, so I raided her makeup table and then closet. Have I mentioned before that being the same size as my girlfriend creeps me out a bit? After picking an outfit, it was back to the bathroom to shave again, face for once, and other places. I got dressed in a simple black dress, took a moment to adjust the false breasts, touched up my makeup and ran out the door. And then ran back in, as I was missing two items: The pink wig and the boots.
Then I thought to go into Tom's study.
"Tom, I have a flight to Nashville I have to be on. Do you still want me to just drive your car, or could I get a ride to the airport?"
"I'll drive you. I take it you're ready to go now?"
"Yep."
We went out and got into his Aston, this time I had the passenger seat.
"This brings back memories. Last time I saw that wig it was on my daughter. Of course then I simply thought it was a phase."
"Well, I'm not like your daughter, you know that, right?"
"I know. It's just a little nostalgia on my part. You don't act the way that Gretchen did, even back then. I'm not saying you're a Neanderthal, or a burly football player or something. You're just masculine. I don't know how to describe it better than that."
"I know a big burly Football player, and she's a lot less masculine than I am."
"She? How did that happen?"
"Apparently she's had problems since she was a little girl, only her father saw her as she physically was, a boy. He pushed her into sports and such."
"How did you meet her?"
"One of those random series of events that seem to plague my life right now."
Tom chuckled a bit at that. "Why are you off to Nashville?"
"Apparently a label out there wants to do a demo tape with Up in Flames."
"I hope that works out for you, Keith. I want you to be able to support my little girl when you guys get married."
Ok, so I deserved that. I'd been the first one to suggest it to him after all.
"Yeah, I care enough for your daughter to wear a dress."
We both laughed at this. I really liked Tom. I think he would have fit well into my family. Family, oh crap.
"Hey Tom? I made a promise before we found out your wife died, and I just haven't thought about it until now."
My nervousness got his attention, "don't worry about it, Keith. It's not like you killed her or anything."
"Jordan wants you to take her on a date, and wanted me to pass on the information. It was more of a joke and such before, since you weren't divorced or anything. . ."
"Actually, Keith, I'll let you in on a little secret. My divorce was finalized about two years ago. Jordan and I have been dating pretty much steadily since then."
Ok, sometimes learning that the entire world doesn't revolve around you is a bit of a shock. I mean, people having entire lives outside of your sight or understanding? Crazy talk.
"Is it serious?"
"Yes, it is. A lot of the joking she was doing was for Gretchen's benefit to sound her out. I've asked her to marry me, and I just don't know how to bring it up to Gretchen. She didn't even know her Mom and I got divorced."
"If it's not too personal, could you tell me why?"
"Her Mom wanted to prevent Gretchen from becoming the woman she's always been. When I got a court order preventing her from doing anything about it she stopped taking her medication and had a psychotic break."
"When was she diagnosed?"
"With Schizophrenia? She started having hallucinations when she was pregnant with Gretchen. She was convinced that a parasite was inside her and she even tried to cut her out. I called an ambulance and they were rushed to the hospital. They had to deliver her immediately, since the cut had entered the uterus and pierced the amniotic sac. Gretchen was just barely able to breathe on her own. Her mom was hospitalized for two years that time."
He was a little choked up thinking about the past. He looked intently at me. "Did I ever tell you how grateful I was that you befriended Gretchen so quickly after we moved here?"
"Why would you be grateful?"
"Did Gretchen ever tell you why we moved here?"
"She mentioned something about making a fresh start, and I always assumed, when she told me, that it had to do with her condition."
"That's only partially true. I know she always meant to tell you the whole truth, but I think she was always a bit embarrassed about her past."
"But why?"
"Because she wasn't always the person you know now."
"I can handle the fact that people thought she was a boy."
"No, that's not what I meant. I'll just tell you about it."
***
Thane looked into his closet. He had a division in it. On the left were the few male clothes that he had to hang up: a couple of button shirts for church, a couple of pants for the same. On the right were his dresses and skirts and button blouses. He would have loved to go shopping with his mom, since that's what mothers and daughters were supposed to do.
Thane didn't think of himself as male. When he thought about it at all, he saw himself as female. He hadn't told anyone but his Daddy about it, and he wasn't sure his Daddy really understood. He had some makeup that he'd spent a long time gathering. Not the over-the-top Goth makeup he had all over the place on his makeup table. These were more muted colors, fit to his coloration. The Goth thing had let him hide in a crowd, yet be himself. He was finally ready to show his family who he really was.
They'd sent him upstairs to get changed so that the three of them could go out to dinner and a movie. They'd been planning this for months for his birthday. He was turning fifteen today.
He decided that fifteen was enough years for his boy self to have lived. He'd been planning this almost as long as the three of them planned the party. His parents had asked him a number of times if he wouldn't prefer to have some of his friends join him for the festivities.
The Goth crowd weren't really his friends. They were all alone in a group of people. His only real friends were his cousins. The four of them went to the same school. He wasn't ready to show his cousins who he felt he was yet. They still thought that the Goth thing was a bit weird.
"Thane, you coming down?"
"I'll be there in a minute, Dad." He only called his dad 'Daddy' in the safety of his own thoughts. He grabbed a white blouse and a blue skirt. He'd shaved his legs earlier in the day in preparation, and made sure to wear pants, even thought the summer was warm for LA.
He put on a pair of blue flats he'd gotten to match the skirt and sat down at the makeup table. He'd been letting his hair grow out, and it barely fit into the high pony tail. He didn't dare do anything with his eyebrows in the limited time that he had, so he put on his makeup with a practiced hand, slapped on some lip gloss, and went downstairs.
"Mom, Dad?"
"So, is Desdemona coming with us tonight," her dad asked with a little smile.
"No, this is just me. This is the real me. Oh, I don't know how to say it. I don't feel like a boy."
"Thane Ethan Anderson, you march back upstairs this minute and put on some real clothing. I did not raise my boy to be a cross-dressing faggot."
"Amy, language!"
"Well, it's true, isn't it, Tom? Our boy isn't going to go around kissing other boys dressed like a trollop."
"First off, I think what she said is she thinks she's our daughter. Second, she looks very presentable, and could go to church dressed like that."
When her Daddy said this last part, she got a big smile on her face. The thought of showing the world who she really was made her heart flutter. She needed to do this.
"Church? What would our friends say?"
"That we have a beautiful daughter."
"They know we have a son."
"Well, they'll get used to it. So, my dear," Tom said turning to her, "did you know that we planned on calling you Gretchen Marie if you'd been born looking like a girl? Think you could live with that name?"
Gretchen made a bit of a face at the name, but Tom only laughed. "What, you thought you'd get to pick your own name? That's a parents prerogative. So, girls, are we ready to go out?"
"I refuse to be seen in public with my son in a dress."
"I'm sorry to hear that, Amy. Guess it's just you and me tonight, Gretchen. Our first father/daughter date."
Tom looked sadly at the retreating back of his wife for a moment, but then turned a beaming smile to his new daughter.
***
"You certainly seemed very understanding of Gretchen."
"It's the storyteller's prerogative to make themselves seem better than they actually are."
"You are certainly using that word a lot today."
He looked at me strangely for a moment, and then continued, "I didn't even know what it meant to be transgendered at that point. I still mostly thought this was a sort of phase. I wanted to be supportive, though, so I was willing to let it slide.
"Gretchen had a fairly normal summer, except she was dressed as a girl for all of it. We had her talk to a number of psychologists before we found one who even understood what was going on. When we finally figured it out, Gretchen's mom flipped. She started legal proceedings to prevent me from having any choice in our daughter's life.
Nothing had been resolved before she went back to school. I'd already informed the school of her decision to go back as a girl, and the principal had agreed to allow it. Of course, he had no real choice."
***
She took a couple of deep breaths to steady her nerves. The butterflies in her stomach seemed to be multiplying at an alarming rate. She'd worn a pair of hip hugger jeans and a tee-shirt in a feminine color and style. She wanted to fit in and disappear more than stand out. She'd been very careful with her makeup and hair this morning. Everything was as perfect as she could make it.
"Here, let me get that for you. New girl?"
She looked at the boy who'd stepped around her to open the door and nearly died right there. It was Larry Garcia. She'd had a crush on him for about a year.
"Not exactly new. Not exactly old."
"Ah, cryptic are we. Let's see. . .hm. Old person with a new look?"
She mutely nodded.
"Ah, so someone who blossomed over the summer. You didn't have pimples and greasy hair last year did you?"
She shook her head.
"Braces? Glasses? New hair color?"
Three successive shakes.
"This is a hard one. I really can't place you."
"We had lots of classes together. English, Geometry, History, and Gy. . ."
She shut up, but he puzzled what she'd been about to say through.
"We were in Gym together? But that would mean you were a boy, and there's no way you would look this good. . .wait, Thane!?"
She was on the verge of tears. She'd been found out before she even entered the school. How was she going to last the day.
"Wow. You look good. Wait, don't cry." He put his arm around her shoulders. "Look, I'm sure you didn't know this, but I'm the head of the LGTB club on campus. I only say that because you never came to any of our meetings."
"There's an LGTB club?"
Larry laughed. "Yeah. There were only four students in it, and I think the only reason that Sarah and Julie came was to make out in a safe environment."
"Sarah Genaro, the head cheerleader?"
"Yep, her and Julie Harkham. So, I assume that you are transgendered?"
"Yeah." She said in a quiet voice.
"Well, what's your new name, since I can't keep calling you Thane."
"Gretchen."
"So, if you don't want to answer, that's fine, but are you a lesbian or are you straight. Look, never mind. None of my business. I should be more tolerant of others."
She boggled at him a moment, but then blushed and looked at the ground when it dawned on her what he was asking.
"I'm straight."
"That's excellent! Would you mind going on a date with me on Friday?"
She looked at him in surprise. "But. . ."
"Oh, no, I started the club to show solidarity with my Dads. I still have trouble understanding it all, but I'm trying and that's what counts."
He reached out his hand toward her, "Shall we?"
She grabbed his hand and they entered the school.
***
She was sitting in her afternoon English class when she felt someone touching her hair. She spun around, but the person behind her was trying to look innocent. She turned back forward and he yanked on her hair.
"Ow!"
"Well, at least that's real."
There was general laughter from the class. She slapped him. "How dare you!."
"That's enough from you, Mr. Anderson."
"But, he. . ."
"I don't care. I consider your dress and appearance enough cause for anyone."
She got up and ran from the classroom in tears.
***
"How could a teacher even consider doing something like that?"
"He didn't for long. I made a call that afternoon to the school board, informing them that this behavior was unacceptable. They saw my side of things and they moved the teacher to a menial job in the district office."
"Why didn't they just fire him?"
"You can't fire a teacher with tenure, well, without a criminal act."
***
She was walking down the hall when she was pushed violently from behind. She picked herself up off the ground, straightened her skirt and tried to brush herself off. She heard the sound of fist on flesh and turned around. Larry had decked one of the football players.
"Hey, jerk, you don't hit girls."
"That's no girl."
Larry punched him in the gut. "Don't insult the lady."
"Screw you, fag!"
Larry laughed at him, "See, you can actually attack someone of your gender."
The football player threw a punch at him, but Larry sidestepped and tripped him. One of the other football players decided to step in, and was going to punch Larry from behind.
"Behind you!"
Larry stepped to the side and kicked out to the side. He caught the second guy in the gut as well. The coach walked up. "Break this up, Boys!"
"Larry started it."
"That's not true, Coach Nelson. Joe pushed Gretchen, and so Larry decked Joe. Then Mike attacked Larry from behind."
The coach looked at the other student, and then all the people involved.
"Joe, Mike, Larry. You get to go with me to the principal's office. You know there's no fighting in school, even if it is after school hours. Joe, by the way. You're off the football and wrestling teams, and I expect a transfer form in my office tomorrow morning because you're no longer welcome in weightlifting. You don't attack girls, period."
The coach looked at Gretchen with a slight smile on his face, "Don't you have a club to get to?"
***
"Wait, didn't she wear pants that first day?"
"Yes, but this event didn't even happen that same month. I'm giving you an overview."
"Ok, a little warning would have been good."
"Sorry. I expected you to ask me about the coach."
"Why would I have done that. It didn't seem noteworthy."
"Well, I guess it just did to me. I'd cleared his brother's name of a murder rap, and so when he found out about Gretchen he told me he'd keep an eye out."
Keith looked out the window for a bit, watching the buildings on the side of the road go by.
"She had it hard?"
"It was a mix. Her Mom stopped talking to her after the first month or so."
"What happened after the court told her that she couldn't stop Gretchen?"
***
All of the lights in the house were off, and the blinds were drawn.
"Thane, is that you, Baby?"
Gretchen moved quietly into their living room. Her mother was at the front blinds looking through a crack.
"They want to take you away from me, Thane, but I won't let them. They want to turn you into a girl, isn't that funny? Like you could ever be the changeling. I cut the germ out before you were born. I saved you, Thane."
Amy walked over to her and pulled her to the ground next to the wall. "I couldn't find all the cameras, so I turned off the power to the house. They might have some night vision cameras on battery. Didn't think of that. What do I do about night vision cameras, Thane? You'll help your Mommy, right, Baby? You'll tell me where they put the cameras?"
"There aren't any cameras."
"No, no no no no! That's what they want you to tell me. Tell me the truth, sweetheart. Mommy won't be mad."
Her mother was still holding onto her wrist, and gripping it tighter and tighter.
"You're hurting me, Mommy."
"There there, sweetie, don't worry. Mommy's going to make it all better as soon as you tell me where the cameras are."
Gretchen tried to get free and struggled a bit. Amy stopped. "What's that smell. Is that perfume? Have you been with a girl, my little man? Are you growing up already? Do you have a hickey? Let's get a look at you."
Amy pulled apart the curtains a bit and a beam of light fell on Gretchen. "Wait, you're not my Thane. You lied to me. The changeling tricked me all those years ago. You let me think you were dead, and you killed my son. You've taken my son away from me. Well, I know how to kill a changeling."
When Amy took the knife in both hands to strike, Gretchen pulled away, tripping, and got to the door. She ran into the arms of her Daddy, who'd just come through the door.
"Hey, baby. Is there something wrong with the power?"
"Mom's trying to kill me."
"You foul creature. Get away from my husband. You can't have him, Harlot. He's mine."
She lunged at them, but Tom reacted fast enough to get them out into the garage. He got her into the passenger seat, and then got behind the wheel. Amy finally managed to open the door and rushed into the garage before he could get it in gear. She used the knife to break the window and grabbed onto Gretchen's shirt. The force of the car taking off tore it from her grasp. "Call the police, Gretchen." He tossed her his phone.
***
"That's why you moved here?"
"Almost. One more part to tell."
***
The graffiti on her locker was even worse today. Most of it was unintelligible, but fag and queer were there amongst the others. Her cousins were behind the resurgence in hate.
"So, now you have Daddy all to yourself like you wanted. Has he made you a woman yet?"
"You know it isn't a real woman, Carly. It has to take it up the ass."
"Maybe if we cut its balls off it would feel better about itself, Lisa"
***
"Wait, those are Gretchen's cousins."
Tom just nodded sadly and continued with his story.
***
"Carly, Lisa, need some help here?" Joe had conveniently walked up at that moment.
"This thing wants to be a woman, can you help it?"
Gretchen was in shock and could only stare at her cousins like this had to be a dream. She didn't know what to do, and couldn't act at all.
"I have just the tool here." Joe pulled out a four inch knife with a hooked tip. "It's used for gutting fish, but I think we could use it here. Should be about the same thing."
Time seemed to slow down as he walked toward her. Larry came out of nowhere. Big, strong Larry. She smiled before she realized he was charging at Joe. Joe put up his hand to block Larry. They tumbled to the ground and struggled for a moment before Larry went still. Joe pushed him off and then realized he was covered in blood. "Larry? This isn't funny, dude. Get up man."
Gretchen began to scream. She couldn't stop. She collapsed to the ground and screamed and cried until she had no voice left to scream and no tears left to cry. She wouldn't allow anyone to touch her until her father came to get her. He carried her out to the car and took her home. He removed her from school the next day.
They moved the next week. There was a month left of school.
***
"What happened to Joe?"
"Because of his taunting and being suspended for fighting with Larry in the past, Joe was tried as an adult for murder in the second degree. His father actually thought he could pay me enough money to represent his son. He ended up getting a part time ambulance chaser, since none of my colleagues would take the case either. He doesn't get up for parole the first time for another year. Gretchen and I plan on being there to put a face on the victim."
"I'm sorry."
"You've done nothing wrong, Keith. Or should I call you Desi when you look like this?"
I looked at him a bit surprised.
"Yeah, Rick let me know the nickname he gave you."
We were just pulling into the airport at this point. "So, let me know if, and when, you need a ride home."
"Thanks for the ride, Tom. Just for the record? I think you should marry Jordan, and the sooner the better. Two years is long enough."
Tom chuckled as he drove off. I walked into the airport, and realized I only had a general idea of where to go from here. "Desi, over here!"
Jake and Bobby stood with Richard.
"Glad to see you could make it." Richard looked pleased.
"Yeah, finally. Took you long enough, Desi"
"I had to break my third date with Buffy, so I hope this is worth it."
We made our way up the escalator and through security. We were at the end of the concourse, so we hurried to do our final check in. And then we waited.
We were flying business class, so it seemed like everyone else got to load before us. Finally we were on the plane and on our way. Have I mentioned that I've never flown before?
Well, that was my first time. It was cool. I loved every minute of it. . .right up till we went above the cloud cover and hit our cruising altitude. Nothing to see, and a steady cabin make for a boring flight. Especially when the movie is "Hot Tub Time Machine". I listened to the Jazz station and tried to go to sleep.
I was half asleep as I passed through the airport. The label had hired a car service for us, and we got our first limo ride out of it.
"Hey, a mini bar!" Jake said.
"Leave it alone, Jake."
"Come on, Desi. We're rock stars. We need to live a little."
"No, Jake. Desi is right. I need all three of you clear headed for this, and besides, I'd be criminally culpable if any of you got drunk in my presence." He said this with a smile, but I didn't think that this was the main reason he didn't want Jake to drink. I'm thinking it was because he was one of his niece's friends.
The rest of the drive was uneventful.
***
We got out of the limo in front of a nondescript building on the waterfront. We walked inside. There was a receptionist behind the desk who was kind of pretty in a vague sort of way.
"May I help you?"
"Up in Flames," Richard said, "Where here to meet with a Mr. Kondie?"
"Let me check." While that's what she said, mostly she seemed to be chewing her gum like a cow in the field. Eventually she looked back in our direction.
"Yep, I have you here. If you'll just take a seat someone will be down to collect you."
We waited for about half an hour. It was really starting to feel like someone was trying to impress upon us his own self importance. Spotlight Studios had taken us right in, and we hadn't even released a song at that point. I started to get lost in thought, a thought specifically. Paper. I needed paper. "I need paper now."
I could feel the words coming to me. I had to get them down before it drove me insane. I felt a piece of paper thrust into my hands. I wrote myself our before they came down to get us. I had no title for it yet, because it felt incomplete, as if there was more of this story to come.
We were escorted up to the studio. "Hello, people. Nice to meet you." Every word he said rang false to me. "I'm Greg Kondie, and I'm the owner of Riverside Records. So, let's get down to business. Got something new for me? I've heard your cover of 'Bodies' and that song you did for Gothplosion, what was it?"
"'My life with you is Hell'?"
Mr. Kondie choked on that, "Is that the name? Quite a mouthful. Anyway, I've heard that one already, why don't you treat me to something new."
We moved into the sound booth, and I realized they didn't have a 12 string. I walked over to the microphone. "Mr. Kondie? I'm going to need a 12 string to play this song."
"Can you do without it? We have a tight schedule to keep."
Ok, he pissed me off. I picked up the six, since I'd learned the tabs for that before converting it to a 12 string arrangement. You don't piss on me. I turned to Bobby and Jake. "U + UR hand."
I knew that they'd expected to do Black Flag, but their smirks told me that they'd had enough of this prick as well.
The bounce of the beat took me over and I was dancing all over that room. It was really fun taunting the fat man on the other side of the glass. He was getting a bit hot under the collar, and so I milked it for all it was worth. There was no way that I would sign a contract with this guy, but I'd definitely get a demo out of this. I saw the recording light on the wall.
When it was done, I asked, "Could I get a playback of that?" This pissed the suit off, but the sound tech played it back for us. Mr. Kondie walked out of the room shortly after the playback started. It was as perfect as I could have hoped. We'd practiced it enough that we got it in one. It was a little raw, but I think it was good enough for what I wanted,
"Could we get a copy of that, please?"
The tech looked around the booth. Seeing that his boss wasn't in the room, he popped the maser out and walked it in to us.
"Look, for what it's worth, I think what my boss did was pretty rotten. He gets you all to fly out here under false pretenses, and then pulls this stunt."
"Wait what?"
"Crap, I shouldn't have said anything. Just watch yourself."
We all went into the control booth with the tech. I handed the master to Richard just as Mr. Kondie came back in.
"Desdemona, could I have a word with you for a moment?"
He walked ahead of me into the sound booth, and I pointed at the board in front of the tech. He shook his head and I looked at Richard. He gave me a slight nod as I quickly followed Mr. Kondie.
He'd dropped the blinds over the window to the control booth, and when I entered the room he closed and locked the door.
"That wasn't a very nice trick you pulled, Desdemona." He loosened his tie.
"What's going on here, Mr. Kondie?" I had a feeling that I knew exactly what was going on.
"Oh, I think you know. Sexy girl like you."
"I'm only sixteen."
"Even better. You see, this country is looking for people your age right now. I can make you a star, Desdemona. Your talent is obvious."
"Really?" Thank you acting lessons.
"Yes, really." He chuckled at me. It was a really throaty chuckle, and it made me uncomfortable.
"How much do you want this, Desdemona?"
"I want to be a star more than anything, Mr. Kondie."
"That can be arranged then. I just need to see. . .how sexy you can be. Can you show that to me?"
"But I'm only sixteen, Mr. Kondie."
"Girls mature faster than boys, did you know that Desdemona? It's a silly law that treats them both the same. Only a mature woman is ready to be a star. Can you show me you're a woman?"
"I really don't understand what you want, My. Kondie?'
He walked up to me and kissed me. Ok, that was about the sickest thing that ever happened to me. "I want to have sex with you, Desdemona. We can work out your career afterward."
Ok, I was wrong. THAT was the sickest thing that ever happened to me. "You guys have that," I asked, talking into the mic.
Richard came over the studio speakers, "We got that. Ryan has a key to the studio and is unlocking. . .now."
The door clicked and the tech opened the door. As I stepped out, he locked the door again and half turned the key. "Unless you can remove the key, you can't unlock the door from the inside. Mr. Kondie told me about it a couple of months ago. I really didn't know you were underage. All of his other clients have been older. I'm so sorry about that."
"Are you sure they were older?" I asked him. He'd been nice about the master tape, but he did work for that walking pile of puss.
"Oh crap. What am I going to do? I really didn't know. I can't go to jail. I didn't know." I hate to see a grown man cry.
"The police are on their way."
We waited for them to arrive. "He's in here, officers." Ryan unlocked the door. One of the cops stepped closer to Ryan, "We could bring you in for wrongful imprisonment you know?"
"Oh crap. I didn't mean it."
"Officers, give the kid a break. He just found out that he's working for a pedophile."
"Wait, what?"
Richard played back the tape for them. I made it to the point where I heard myself being kissed and dry heaved.
"This is the young lady on the tape then?"
"Ryan warned me that something might be fishy about Mr. Kondie, so I suggested that they record the conversation when he walked voluntarily into the studio."
"I don't know how admissible that tape is, since he had some reasonable expectation of privacy. . ."
"Are you a moron? This is his recording studio!"
The cop glared at me. "Missy, one more outburst like that, and we're going to throw you in jail. We're sorry about the inconvenience, Mr. Kondie."
"Hold it right there, you two. I think that you might want to talk to the person on this phone."
The cop looked at him quizzically, and then barked into the phone, "I don't know who you think you are, but you're inter. . ." His posture changed suddenly, "no, Sir. . .no, Sir. . .no, I mean yes, Sir. . .just a minute, Sir. You're now on speakerphone."
"Since knucklehead A didn't tell knucklehead B who he was talking to, This is Chief Terrell. You two screw ups have the misfortune to have tried to screw with the clients of one of my old college buddies. I owe this man my life, and if he tells me that something happened, you better damn well believe that we're going to investigate, DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR!!!!! Oh, and Richard, next time you're in town, bring Daisy by and we can catch up."
One of the officers took the second master, the one with Mr. Kondie on it, while the other handcuffed him. Before leaving the bigger one said, "Since the Chief of Police says you're alright, and has your agents number, you can go."
We headed downstairs. The receptionist was missing. There was no limo waiting for us this time, so we called a cab. More money down the tubes. This would probably be the most expensive demo ever. "Richard, see if we can get some sort of use rights for that song."
Apparently Pink, AKA Alecia Beth Moore, isn't as easy to get in touch with as Drowning Pool was. Sitting in the back of the cab, watching the miles go by, I felt the need to write again. I felt more words of the song coming at me, this time with a bit darker feel to them. One last verse, and an alteration of the chorus and I am done. I put a title on the song: My Own Person (You're Not For Me). Richard was still getting the run around. I called Tom and told him when we would be home.
He said he'd be there to pick me up.
Ok, this has to be a record for poor taste. Same movie on the way back. More Jazz to listen to. When I got out to the loading zone, Gretchen was there to meet me.
I was so happy to see her after my ordeal. It felt like I hadn't seen her in a week. I took her into a hug and kissed her. She blushed at looked around, "Desi!"
Oh, yeah, Utah and I look like a female. I blushed as well. We got in her car and started driving home.
"So, before you tell me about your trip, I have some good news. I got the final green light for Monday. I'm going to have my surgery."
"I'm so happy for you, Etch."
"Is that all you have to say about it?"
"Yes. I'm not old enough to marry you yet."
"Keith!"
"What? You know I want to make you my wife."
"You never even asked me."
"Gretchen, when the time is right, I will definitely ask you."
She blushed at that and I took her hand in mine. Well, at least I didn't scare her off with that.
"Etch, talking of weddings. . ."
"What about them?"
"Um, well, I wanted to talk to you about Jordan and your Dad."
"You mean how they think they are so secretive, but have been dating for a couple of years now?"
"That and. . ."
"How my dad asked her to marry him about four months ago, but they're both too scared to talk to me about it, and I'm letting them both stew?"
"You're cruel, Etch."
"Yes, I am. Very cruel."
"So, can I tell them you're fine with it, and want them both happiness together?"
"Of course you can. Since they are trying to use an intermediary. . ."
"What are you thinking?"
"Tell them I will only agree on the condition that both you and I get to be bride's maids."
"Oh no. No way am I doing that."
"It'll be fun, Desi. Besides, you'll get to see me change. The new me. . ."
Damn, she broke my mind with that one. I kept picturing the Gretchen from my dreams getting slowly undressed. . .
I'd break out of the loop only to see the Gretchen from my dreams getting slowly undressed. . .
"ETCH!!!"
She giggled at me. "Agree to it, or I won't let you tell them."
"You just want to see me in a bride's maid dress, don't you?"
"Of course I do. You wouldn't believe how sexy you look in drag. Especially that outfit. Keith is something wrong?"
I told her about my trip, and what had happened. I included which song I'd performed. She chuckled at that. She was horrified with what came after.
"I'm so sorry about that. If I'd known what had happened I wouldn't have joked with you like that. I never meant to make you relive that, even a little bit. I withdraw my request about being a bride's maid."
"No, Etch. I'm ok. It might be fun to have Desdemona part of a more private event like this."
"Private? My dad has over a thousand family and friends who will likely come, and Jordan has at least that many."
"Um. . ."
"Don't chicken out now, lover boy."
"Fine." I dialed a number on my phone.
"Who are you calling?"
I just looked at her and waited for the person to pick up.
"Hi, this is Keith. So, I talked to Tom. Yes he told me. Yes, he told me that too. So yeah, Gretchen would like to say something to you."
I handed the phone to Gretchen. She pulled over to the side of the road. "Hello?"
"This is Jordan. What's up?"
"Um, when you and my father get married, can Desi and I be bride's maids?"
"Of course you can, but Desi. . ."
"I kinda roped Keith into it. He agreed. I think he is starting to like dressing up."
"Don't believe a word she says, Jordan." I yelled from the other seat.
She laughed at that, and quickly finished talking to Jordan.
She pulled back out into traffic, and I held her hand again. "Did you really mean what you said before, Keith? About marrying me?"
"Of course I did, Etch."
She kissed my hand and said, "Thanks"
"What for?"
"For loving me in spite of my flaws."
"You're practically perfect."
We both laughed a bit at that. We rode the rest of the way to her house in silence. I simply projected my love for her, and soaked in her love for me.
***
Ok, first day of summer, take two. This time I was half tempted to just get into my Desdemona clothes preemptively. I got showered and shaved. Yes, I mean my body hair. I know I'd shaved yesterday, but I wanted to be perfectly smooth just in case. Tom had already given me the keys to his Aston, and this time Gretchen would be coming with me.
And again, just as I was walking out the door, Richard phoned me. Talk about bad timing.
"Hey, Keith. I was finally able to get in touch with Alecia. She's seen the contest footage, and the video, and says that at the present time she doesn't intend to allow us any use. Something about not having the proper image she is looking for."
"Can't we just do a standard royalties thing through ASCAP?"
"That only works for playing a recording of their music. Any time we want to re-record it, we need permission from the owner of the music. That reminds me of something. . ."
"What?"
"We have been fined by ASCAP for our playing Bodies at the venue, as has the owner of the establishment. Jordan is working with them to get it sorted out, since we signed a use contract with the publisher. It might mean we get some money out of the whole thing. I signed you up as a writer on ASCAP, and registered the band as a Performer. We need a copy of 'My life with you is Hell" to submit to them."
Why can't this all be easier? I'm sure that music labels do most of this work for you. I sighed. "Anything else I need to do?"
"No, that's about it. In the future, we need to make sure that all of our use contracts are filed with the proper agencies, but that was a failure on my part. You're the first independent band I've ever managed."
"Wouldn't you normally have someone else manage us? I mean, you seem to be, I don't know, well known. . ."
"I have a lot of talent in my stable, and normally I do have someone else do management. However, there's no way I'd let someone else handle my future niece-in-law."
I groaned at both the phrase, and him casting me as a girl. Gretchen got a call on her phone and answered while I continued bantering with her uncle.
"Is that even a real term? Niece-in-law?"
"It is now, because I said it, and I'm never wrong."
"Um. . ."
"Truthfully, Keith, have you ever known me to be wrong?"
"Well, you forgot to submit our license to the proper people."
"That was forgot, not mistaken. If I'd submitted it to an incorrect agency. . ." We both laughed.
Gretchen was trying to get my attention. She had a huge smile on her face. I suddenly felt like I had a ball of ice in my stomach. What now?
"Hey, Richard? I've got to go. Gretchen has something for me, and I'm sure you've got other things to worry about."
"Later, Keith."
"Bye"
Gretchen was just hanging up as well, "Ok, Jordan, I will."
"Ok, so what am I about to regret?"
"Well, since I am going to be recovering for about eight weeks after my surgery, at least if we want to be safe, and since they really want to get married soon, they chose August 9th for their wedding." Gretchen was literally bouncing.
"Ok, so what does that have to do with us today?"
"Well, we have to get fitted for our dresses today, since I would miss out on your fitting later, and I have to do it today or tomorrow."
"Ok, I guess I should go get changed."
I tried to sound put upon, but I was kind of excited. It would be interesting to see what this experience was like. I'd never looked for it, but I might as well embrace it now that it was here. You only ruin things for yourself and others when you don't enjoy the things you have to do.
I dressed myself as Desdemona again. Gretchen gave me a strapless bra that covered my breast forms. A bit of them poked out no matter what we did, so we mixed up some concealer, and adjusted the shade a bit. I'd need to get some of this in my skin tone. Heck, I'd probably need to get some breast forms in my skin tone as well. That was a worry for another day.
I'd shaved already, lucky me, so I tossed on an airy dress, in purple and blue, tossed on my wig and began to look at footwear.
"Etch. . .We need more Desdemona shoes."
She squealed and then giggled and threw me into a hug, "My little girl is growing up so fast."
"No, it's just that all I have is a choice of knee high stiletto boots or combat boots. Flats would look better with this dress."
She looked at me a little shocked. "Since when are you into fashion?"
"You're basically wearing the same style as I am, yet you have flats. I like the way they look better than either of my choices."
She blushed and looked down, "Oh, sorry."
"Look, I don't mind wearing clothing that is similar to yours. I think it's kind of cute like Desdemona is your sister or something." Gretchen brightened at this. "I just want some more comfortable shoes for when I am out as Desdemona."
"Ok, then, we are going shopping today."
Oh crap. What did I just get myself into?
***
We went to the University Mall, since neither of us thought that we could find what we were looking for at the Towne Center.
A word about the Provo/Orem area. The two towns are smashed up against each other. Provo is mainly in the river bottom area around the Provo river. Up the hill on the north side of the river is Orem.
Now, for some reason, they decided that each city needed its own mall. So, the teen crowd tends to go to the Towne Center, and the Tween crowd tends to go to the University Mall. This is more anecdotal than anything, but the stores seem to support this idea.
Strangely enough, there's a Hot Topic in each one. Course I worked at the University Mall location the last couple of years.
That wasn't our destination. Gretchen took me shopping. I mean really shopping. After I got over the whole, "Oh crap, I'm a guy in a dress," thing, I actually kind of enjoyed it. I got to see how a number of different styles looked on me, and started to branch out my wardrobe a bit. I was probably going to spend a lot of time playing Desdemona, so I might as well be comfortable doing it.
I was surprised at how many pairs of shoes I was able to find in varying shades of hot pink. It seemed that in every store I went to, all I had to do was ask if they had anything in hot pink, and then next thing I knew I was buried in dusty boxes. I think I'm starting to develop a shoe fetish. The feel of a new shoe sliding on is a wonder in itself.
It's a good thing that this is, mainly, for the band, since I spent more than a thousand dollars on shoes. I tried on a lot of outfits, but I bought only a few of them that I really had to have. I found a perfect pair of bright pink ballet flats that I wore out of the store. They even fit the shades of blue and purple in my dress.
Did I mention it was strapless?
I got a lot of looks wandering around the mall in my bright pink hair and my pink flats.
I thought it was just my outfit for a while until. . .
"Desdemona!!!!"
Ok, guys apparently occasionally squeal.
"Hi."
"Can I have your autograph?"
"I don't. . ." I began to tell him I didn't have a pen. Gretchen tapped me on the shoulder with a nice fat tip black marker.
"What would you like me to sign?" No promotional shots, no posters.
"Could you sign my shirt?" It had a logo on the back, but the front was basically bare and white.
Why not. . ."What's your name?"
"Francis."
"I take it you usually go by Frank?" He nodded.
I put a small #2 on his pec and started into the shirt. For Frank, Because you asked so nicely, Desdemona. Then, on impulse, I put my hand underneath the shirt just below my signature and left a kiss on his shirt.
When I looked up, Frank was beet red. I finished him off with a kiss on the cheek. "Be good now."
Gretchen and I cackled as we left him still standing there. No, it's not the same thing as giggling. A guy can cackle. . .I think.
We ended up at Allyse's Bridal and Formal, after a couple more autographs. I numbered each one. I hope I can keep track of which number I'm on. The last one I did was #5.
"So, how can I help you ladies?"
"We're here to be fitted for the Anderson/Cox wedding."
"Let's see, that would make you Desdemona and Gretchen Anderson then?"
"Yep, this is Desdemona, I'm Gretchen."
"If you ladies will follow me?"
We'd carefully tucked and taped me at home, using medical tape of course, so hopefully I could pass. My career for the moment depended on it.
"Ok, Hannah will be fitting you, Gretchen, and I'll handle you myself, Desdemona." She lead us into a back area which was completely screened from any of the entrances. The inside of the shop seemed bigger than it could possibly be. When I looked out the other side I realized that it was a big L and connected two shop fronts.
"Ok, ladies, if you'd please strip so we can get accurate measurements?"
We both got down to our underwear. Gretchen was bouncy.
"Ms. Anderson, I need to you stand still please." It sounded like Hannah was getting a little frustrated.
"Etch, honey, you need to calm down."
Looking at me being measured for a bride's maid dress stopped Gretchen in her tracks. She just smiled at me. I just shook my head and snorted.
"I take it you're not as exited for this as your friend?"
"She kinda roped me into it."
"I like your hair. Did you have to dye the shoes yourself?"
"If you can believe it, they were on back stock and clearance."
"Are all of your shoes pink?"
"Most of them, yeah. It's a sort of image thing."
"You're THAT Desdemona?" Hannah was staring at me.
"It's what my license says, yep."
"How did you think of the words for that song you did on MTV. It sort of talked to me."
I looked at Gretchen, asking permission with my eyes. She nodded almost imperceptibly.
"You mean, 'My life with you is Hell'? I wrote it about the life of one of my closest girl friends. She was going through some difficult times in school, and we spent a lot of time talking. I wrote out her feelings to get a better handle on them so I could help her."
"It's about you, isn't it," Hannah said turning to Gretchen
Well, there go my good intentions out the window.
"Yes, It's a bit of my life."
"It actually gave me the courage to ask my boyfriend to marry me. We're getting married on August 9th."
Gretchen and I laughed at this. "My dad is marrying his girlfriend on the 9th as well."
"Would you mind signing my wedding dress for me, Desdemona?"
"Friends get to call me Desi. Won't that kind of ruin the dress?"
"Not the outside. The inside."
I laughed at this. Of course. "Sure."
"Ok, let me go get it."
While she was gone, Linda, the one measuring me, finished up. "Let me go get the dress closest to your size and we'll pin it for adjustments. Do you know if you're wearing heels or flats?"
We'd gotten a beautiful pair of four inch heels which Gretchen pulled out of her bag of a purse. "Those actually."
"You weren't kidding about the pink."
"Well, like I said: It's a bit of a signature."
She chuckled as she moved out of the room. Hannah came back in a white confection of a dress, and sat down in front of me. "You're fiancé is lucky."
"If he only knew. I was planning on leaving him before we watched that concert together."
I flipped back the top layer of the dress, and signed the first petticoat. #6 For courage in the rest of your life, Desdemona (Desi).
I let it dry a moment, and then dropped the sheath back in place. She hugged us just as Linda came back.
The dress was a beautiful deep burgundy color. I actually fell in love with it before I ever put it on. It felt even better than it looked. I think I might have teared up a bit, because the next thing I knew, Gretchen was dabbing my eyes with a handkerchief. I took it from her, "Thanks, Etch."
"No worries, Desi."
"Lift your leg please," Linda said touching my right leg briefly. I complied with the request, and she slipped my flat off and the heel on.
"Other leg." That was done and there I was in four inch pink shoes in a burgundy off the shoulder dress. Somehow, it was as if that dress was made for me. It fit almost perfectly without being taken in at all. The style gave the impression of hips, and made me simply gorgeous. I was completely shocked, looking at my reflection.
"That's me?"
"That dress would make just about anyone look good. On you. . .well, I just hope the bride is a goddess, because otherwise no one will be looking at her."
I suddenly realized the import of her words, and looked frantically at Gretchen, "Etch. . ."
"Don't worry about it, Desi. She will look better, I'm sure." Gretchen pulled her digital frame out of her purse and paged through the images until she got to one of Jordan. "This is the Bride."
"Ok, I stand corrected. Even with the hair, I doubt anyone will give you a second look, Desi. Heck, I'm a bit in lust, and she's wearing a business suit. . .that and I am completely into guys." Linda was a bit flushed looking. I think she might have been a little in denial about her sexual preferences. Course, everyone says I'm a bit in denial about my gender, so I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.
"Ok, let's see where we are." She tugged a bit here, and pulled a bit there. In the end, she only marked a single adjustment, and that was to the bust. Apparently I didn't have enough up there to fill it properly. Then she marked the hem, which was still dragging on the ground a bit with my four inch heels, and we stripped it off. I was sad to see it go. "So, how are you going to pay for the dress?"
At that moment, I realized something. . .my personal card was in my name. Keith. Only my band account had a card with Desdemona on it.
"I've got this one, Desi. Seeing the look on your face, and seeing you in that dress, was worth the cost to me."
"Thank you, Etch." We kissed, a little more than a chaste kiss. It made Hannah a bit uncomfortable, but Linda looked a bit dazed.
"Sorry about that."
Linda shook herself, "Don't worry about it, Ladies. We're not ones to judge here. We even had a drag queen buy a dress here last month. Big football player looking girl if there ever was one."
Gretchen and I looked at each other and laughed. "Her name didn't happen to be Buffy, did it?"
"Yes, actually," Linda said looking a bit amazed.
"She goes to our school."
Hannah had finished measuring Gretchen at this point, and went to get her a dress. It looked good on Gretchen, and the two of us would look stunning next to anyone but Jordan. I still think I looked better in the dress.
They needed to make more adjustments to Gretchen's dress than to mine. "Ok, ladies. We will need you in here for the final fitting on the 2nd of august. That will give us barely enough time to make any adjustments that might be necessary. See you then."
We got dressed back in our street clothes, and I put the flats back on. Since we were done, I decided to stop into the Hot Topic. It was only after we entered that I remembered how I was dressed.
"Omigawd. It's Desdemona."
"Hey, Stacy, is Yancey in the back?" Stacey numbly nodded at me. I'm sure that she was wondering how Desdemona knew her.
I walked into the back of the store, and into the office. "So, Yance, you still willing to offer me the job I had last year?"
She looked at me a moment, "Who. . .Keith?! You're Desdemona?"
"Yeah, we decided if we couldn't beat them, we might as well join them."
"I will give you a job on one condition. . ."
Oh crap she's going to want me to. . . "I want you to dress as Desdemona. It'll be great for business."
I rolled my eyes at her, "Well, Etch and I just bought way too many pink shoes, so I might as well have some place to wear them. If I'm here working as Desdemona, I want my checked to say it."
"Well, that might be a difficulty with taxes. . ."
I produced my ID, "Legal alias."
"Well, in that case, Welcome to the Hot Topic family, Desdemona."
"Call me Desi."
Apparently, I had been employed all winter here, without any scheduled time. Yancey changed the names on the forms, and I was employed as Desdemona.
It was probably time for me to get a beater of a car to get myself to work. I'd used my Mom's car last year, since she usually walked to work during the summer.
"Hey, Etch, let's catch a movie while were here." I said as we walked back to the front of the store.
"Desdemona, will you sign my shirt?"
"Isn't that your uniform, Stacey?"
"Yes. . ."
"Go ahead, Desi, I don't mind," Yancey grinned while she said this.
I signed the shirt, #7 For someone who doesn't know she knows me, Desdemona (K)
I left her to puzzle on that one.
"What do you want to see?"
"No idea. I'm flying by the seat of my pant's here."
We walked out past the food court and into the east parking lot. A short hike past the bus depot and we were at the theater.
"So, we have A-Team and Karate Kid out this weekend."
"I am so not in the mood for a mindless action flick."
"But the A-Team is a classic. They are bringing an old TV show to life for a new audience."
"Karate Kid has Jackie Chan, and it was a cool classic movie as well. I want to see it. It looks heartwarming."
In the end, I lost out to Gretchen on that one. We'd have to come back later for the A-Team.
I sat there thinking about Gretchen's life for most of the movie, and missed a lot of the action. She seemed so well adjusted most of the time, but there were dark shadows lurking in her soul waiting to consume her. I wondered if we'd be able to make it through the long haul. I knew I loved her, and had loved her for three years. I had stuck by her through everything. To some extent, however, I'd never really known her. She'd kept this dark portion back, trying to let me only see the light.
It worried me about our future. Would she keep things like this from me then as well? What if she started having symptoms of schizophrenia? Would she hide that away? I didn't know, and my lack of knowledge scared me.
I held her hand through the movie, and looked at her rapt face. She seemed so innocent sitting there, and I wondered how much of that was real, and how much a front to hide herself away.
After Monday, Gretchen would be a captive audience for at least four weeks, and more likely eight. I hoped that I could spend some quality time with her, and we could get to know each other without all of the masks and acting.
A thought popped into my head: How was I going to convince Pink to allow me to distribute the recording of U + UR Hand we'd already made?
We got out of the movie and I turned my phone back on. There was a message from Richard to call him.
"Desi, I've got some great news."
"Great news?"
"Who is it," asked Gretchen. I mouthed Richard at her.
"Apparently, the information got out that iTunes was penalizing you for the name of your song being wrong. We've already had a hundred thousand downloads of your song, and the iTunes download server crashed for a moment. They are getting it back up, and more people are downloading."
"Wait. . .what?"
"It seems that your fans took offense at iTunes' policy and they are buying multiple copies of your song."
I stood there open mouthed. Gretchen took the phone out of my hand. "Hi, Uncle Rich. Yeah, she's in shock. Oh, really? That's great news. Love you, bye."
Gretchen kissed me full on the lips and I broke out of my catatonic stupor. "Well, looks like things are looking up for you again."
So, the song is selling on iTunes again. I have a job at Hot Topic again, just in time to be told I don't need my job. Well, it was fun working there last year, but we'll have to see what the future holds. Getting Gretchen through her surgery safe and sound is my next goal, and I need to find out what Jake and Bobby are up to, since I've heard nary a word from them in over twenty-four hours.
Everything in my life led up to a single moment. A chain of events dragged me into the depths from which I thought there was no return. I was kicked out, so I moved in with Gretchen. I was kicked out because of my band. My band became successful because I chose not to bow to my mother's wishes. Buffy became known to me because of my band becoming successful. Bobby discovered Buffy through me.
Bobby is an asshole.
Everything was going perfectly. I thought that finally things were starting to look up. Up in Flames had a loyal fan following. We were making money on our one single, and we were getting ready to record "My life with you is Hell."
It was peaches and roses. I never knew the corruption that lay underneath.
Ok, now I'm really starting to sound Gothic.
No one deserved this.
I was lying in bed and thinking happily about my life when Suzi called.
"Keith, have you seen Buffy?"
"No, Sooz, I haven't."
"Sooz?"
"I'm in a really strange mood right now, sorry."
"No worries. It's just that Bobby said she might have left for your house a bit upset."
"Why would she be upset?"
"It seems they had a fight of some sort. They went out for her seventeenth birthday, and things got a little ugly at his house afterwards."
"Want me to come help you look for her?"
"Sure. You know the area out there better than I do. Pick you up in about ten minutes?"
"Sure."
I hung up and looked out the window. It was a nice night out, so I didn't need to dress warmly. I went downstairs. Gretchen and Tom were laughing and talking in the kitchen.
"Buffy's missing."
"When, what happened?"
"She had a fight with Bobby apparently. She went off mad, and according to Bobby, she was heading of toward my house."
My eyes kept turning to the desert. I don't know why. Something out there drew me.
"What is it?" Gretchen was looking at me with concern.
"Something feels off. I don't know how to explain it. Suzi is on her way over to look for her. I was figuring that we could. . ."
"Keith?"
"I don't know. Something just isn't right. Buffy has a cell phone. Why wouldn't she keep it with her?"
"What are you thinking," Tom asked.
"It's probably nothing. I should just go looking. . .she's in the desert."
"Huh?"
"Look, it's just a hunch, ok? If I were pissed out here, it would be easy to try to take a short cut between my house and Bobby's and end up out of sight in a ditch or behind a hill. At night, with no moon, it would be easy to get turned around. Something really feels off about all of this.
I was still looking out the window when Suzi arrived. "Etch, you go with Suzi to look at all of the places around her that she might be. I'm going to go out into the desert. It's probably nothing, but I don't trust this whole situation. Something just seems off."
Without another word I walked out of the back door and through the gate in the fence. I walked across the access road that ran behind Gretchen's house and then it was nothing but scrub around me. I wandered. I had no clear direction in mind.
Do you even have a moment in your life where everything just works out? Have you ever just known that something was the right choice, only to find out later why?
That happens to me all the time. I'm not saying that I'm psychic. I'm not sure I even believe in psychic phenomena. Our brains take in more information than we can process. Every once in a while, all that random data will line up into a cohesive whole, and we get a glimpse into the infinite. Some people call this epiphany, and some call it inspiration.
It has occasionally been called luck, or even intuition.
Whatever it is, I let it guide me tonight.
I walked under the stars, wondering about the course of events that led to this moment. Why would Buffy have run off? I called Bobby to try and get his side of things while I walked.
"Hey, Bobby, what happened between you and Buffy?"
"Turns out she wasn't as into a relationship as I thought."
"What do you mean?"
"He was fine with dating, you know, but kind of frigid where any affection was concerned."
"I don't know. She seemed to be into you all the times I saw you two together."
"Yeah, but hand holding was about as far as he seemed to want to go. A bit of cuddling. That's it. I tried to kiss him at the restaurant and he slapped me."
Something occurred to me. Bobby was referring to Buffy as he. Something was off.
"What happened at your place?"
"Well, my parents were out, and I thought. . .look i have to clean up. Could you call me back later?"
"Sure, Bobby. . ."
I walked a bit more, and things still wouldn't lay right in my mind. There were too many jagged edges. Too many missing pieces. Why would Bobby need to clean up after only he and Buffy had a fight.
I called Gretchen, "I have a really bad feeling about this, Etch. Look, whatever you do, don't go to Bobby's house right now."
"Do you think we should call the police?"
"Yeah, let me do it."
I dialed 911 and waited for the operator.
"Hello, My name is Keith Robison. A couple of my friends had a fight, and one of them is missing."
"What type of fight?"
"I'm not sure, but my other friends parents aren't home, and he won't let anyone in. We haven't been able to contact the other friend on her cell phone for a couple of hours."
"This is all pretty vague, Mr. Robison."
"Buffy Hansen is missing. She was last seen at Robert Lewis' house. His address is 211 north Alpine Way."
"You said you haven't been able to contact your friend for a couple of hours, and she was last seen with Mr. Lewis?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"I would ask that you stay away from Mr. Lewis' house for the time being. We are sending officers over to investiga. . ."
"Hello?"
I looked at my phone. I was out of signal range. That was so odd. I'd never lost signal in the desert before. The moon had just come over the horizon and a flat bowl of land was revealed to me. There were some tire tracks from ATV's here and there, but not much else. it was even almost devoid of life.
I saw a small dark mound a little way off. It moved and I saw a glint of metal.
I rushed over to it, and realized it was a person. An earring had glinted in the light of the moon when it moved. The face was a complete mess, and some of the bones seemed crushed. There was blood all over the dress, so I assumed it must be female.
"Keith?"
Oh my god. "Buffy?"
"Help me." She passed out. I looked at my phone again. No service.
I ran back the way I'd come and dialed 911 for the second time tonight. I got the same operator. "I found Buffy, she's in the desert with me. She's beat up pretty badly, and I don't think it's possible she got her on her own."
"Where are you, My. Robison?"
"I have no idea. Can't you track my phone?"
"Your signal is bouncing a little bit."
I took a couple of stepps back from the depression. "Is that any better?"
"What are you doing?"
"Moving away from a dead zone. Tell me when my signal stabilizes."
"I have you localized. Wait there for police please."
"Hurry, she's covered in blood."
"Can you describe her injuries to me?"
"No, because there's almost no light, and I had to walk about half a mile to even get a signal."
"Fleeing the scene of an accident. . ."
"Are you a complete MORON!!!! I couldn't call from where she was!"
"There's no need to yell, Sir."
"There's no need to be incompetent, Ma'am. Use that boil on your shoulders for something other than keeping your hair in place. I couldn't make a phone call, to you, without moving from the scene. It was necessary. If you would like, I'll leave my phone here so you can get the rescue personnel roughly to my location, and I'll go back to the victim."
"There's no need to be rude, Sir."
"See my previous statement. You really need to learn to think. My friend is probably dying here, and you are telling me that I'm to blame for calling you."
"Hello, this is Carl, I'm Belinda's manager. I hear you are being belligerent?"
"Carl was it? Well, Carl, My friend is bleeding profusely. She is in a depression in the earth that for some reason get's no cell coverage. I am between three and five miles into the desert, and there was no one but me to call. To do so I had to leave her side, and Belinda told me I was breaking the law in doing the only available course of action. I informed her that she was incompetent and an idiot, which is why she transferred me to you. Now, do you think I'm being belligerent?"
"I remind you, Sir, that we do have a recording of this call."
"Carl? Why don't you give me to an actual manager. You know, someone responsible for your and Belinda's jobs. I'm tired of speaking to people incapable of thinking for themselves."
The venom in Carl's voice transferred through the phone, "Sir, I will have you know I am a college graduate, and am the only supervisor you are going to speak to."
I'd had enough of stupidity. "You said that this call is recorded, Carl?"
"Yes, Sir," he spat out.
"Then my lawyer will be in touch. When are the rescue personnel arriving? Hello?"
I checked my phone, and the call had been disconnected. I ran back to Buffy. I was in enough trouble already without having her blood all over me when police or others arrived, but I couldn't stand around and do nothing. I turned on my flashlight app and turned the face of the phone to face Buffy. I could see her chest rise and fall, so at least she was breathing for the moment. "Hold on, Buffy, help should be on the way."
I began to hear a sort of rhythmic thumping sound, and a helicopter came over the rise. I turned my phone toward them and waved it, leaving my flashlight app running. They landed about fifty feet away and an EMT got out and ran over to us.
"I found her out here, she's a friend from school."
"How did you find her?"
"I often walk out here, even after dark. I stumbled upon her." How could I say that I felt guided here? I tried my best. "Look, if you'll feel more comfortable having me go with you to the hospital, I'll stick with you. Otherwise I'm going home."
"That would be a good idea. The police will likely want to question you."
I sighed. The pilot got out, and they put Buffy on a back board, and hooked her up to an IV. They got her to the helicopter and turned on the lights inside so that the EMT could get to work. He cut her dress, and I saw the mess for the first time. She'd been wearing no underwear. She was so cut up that it was difficult to tell her gender, even though I knew what I should be seeing. I thought I'd help out the EMT.
"She's transgendered, but hasn't had surgery."
"That may be moot at this point. She doesn't have much left of her genitals. I need you to sit back, Sir."
I was shocked that anyone, especially Bobby could have done this to another individual intentionally. I tried to find a rational explanation for it, but my mind failed completely.
She'd lost a lot of blood, but thankfully no arteries had been nicked. I heard the pilot talking to someone, and heard his confirmation that we'd be flying in to Utah Valley Regional Medical Center. I caught bits and pieces of the conversation between the EMT and the pilot. I didn't understand most of it, but what I did hear didn't sound good. Severe lacerations. Smashed bones in the face and jaw. Reconstructive surgery.
I watched the lights of the cities pass by underneath. They were connected by the ribbon of highway, the car lights red on one side and white on the other. Only my worry for the health of my friend kept me out of the poetic state that wanted to form. I held her hand. Halfway through the flight she regained consciousness for a moment and squeezed my hand back. I looked into her pain filled eyes, and thought I saw a thanks in there.
She passed out a few moment later, and I noticed the Y out the window on the side of the mountain. It was lit up for some reason tonight. It meant we were almost at our destination.
We landed, and almost immediately some surgeons wheeled a gurney up to the side of the helicopter, ducking under the blades as they came. Information was passed on and they wheeled her downstairs. While they left, I called Tom. "You can practice law in Utah, right?"
"Yep, I took the exam in California, Utah, Nevada, and Colorado."
"Can you come up to the UVRMC? I think they may think I did something to Buffy, and I want you here just in case."
"You found her?!"
"Oh, yeah, I found her, argued with the 911 dispatcher, and got a free helicopter ride."
"Ok, wait til I get there before making any statements. Just in case."
"Can you call Gretchen and Suzi? I think I am about to be taken into custody."
A couple of police officers came up to the side of the helicopter.
"Keith Robison?"
"Yes."
"Could you come with us please, Sir?"
I got out of the helicopter and followed the officers inside. The led me into a nondescript room and I sat on the chair there.
"Quite a night you had out there, Huh?"
I said nothing. I just waited. The other officer spoke up, "Tough guy, eh?"
"On advice of counsel, I regret that I will not be making a statement at this time."
The two officers looked at each other and then the first spoke, "If that's the way you want to play this, son, we can, but it just makes you look guilty."
I chose not to rise to his bait, and waited the forty minutes while Tom arrived. I didn't expect Gretchen to come with him. "Are you ok, Keith?"
"No cuts or scrapes." I smiled at her, then my smile faded, "Nothing like Buffy."
"When you told us not to go to Bobby's house, we tried to stay away, but eventually the pull became too great, that and we'd already looked pretty much everywhere else. There were cops all over the place. I think the entire city police force showed up for this one."
"All four of them?"
Gretchen lightly punched me in the arm.
"Are you talking Robert Lewis? How did you know to keep your friend away from there?"
"I called the police on him."
"And you found the victim in the desert, coincidentally?"
"See, Tom, this is why I need you here."
"I can see that. Gentlemen, unless you are about to charge my client with something, then we are leaving."
"We can hold him on suspicion."
"Of what? Being a good Samaritan?"
"He was belligerent with the 911 operators."
Tom looked at me. "They accused me of leaving the scene of an accident. I told them that I had to leave to make the cell phone call, since there was no coverage where Buffy was. They got rude from there. I called them incompetent and told them my lawyer would be getting the recording of the call from them."
"You hadn't asked me at that point."
"I was more thinking civil action through Jordan. You know, get them fired or something for failure to think critically in a time of crisis."
Tom and the cops snorted at that one. "The operator really told you that you could face criminal charges for moving to a place where you could get cell coverage?"
"Yep, so I called her on it."
"Was it Belinda?"
"How did you know?"
The two cops exchanged glances, "We've had to deal with her before. She probably got Carl to pretend to be a supervisor as well, didn't she?"
"Yep, who is he anyway."
"Her fiancé who also works there. They've been written up for this crap in the past. I hope you do pursue this."
I looked at the cop in surprise.
"She sent us to arrest a former boyfriend because he wouldn't give her back the engagement ring she threw in his face when she stomped out."
"She was fined and written up for that one."
"Wow. So, am I free to go?"
"As long as you don't leave the state, yes. We will want to get a statement from the victim when she regains consciousness."
We went to the waiting room. Suzi and her parents were there already. We hugged.
"You found our son?" Buffy's father asked, before correcting himself, "I mean our daughter? It will take me some time to get used to this, but I'm trying. Thank you for that. Apparently she wouldn't have lasted much longer out there.
"The doctors have told us what was done to her. I am bringing in a plastic surgeon friend. He has a practice in Salt Lake. They need to rebuild the bones in her face. We've decided not to try to rebuild other. . .things."
Apparently he had a little difficulty referring to the male anatomy of his daughter. I probably would also.
We sat in the room and waited. It was after two am when a doctor came in to us. "She's out of surgery and has been moved to recovery. We'll keep her there until she regains consciousness and then move her into a private room. When she's in her room you will be able to visit her."
We sat down to wait some more, but it wasn't much longer before a nurse came to get us and showed us to her room.
I could see her eyes light up at the sight of us, and a slight moan escape her lips, but I assumed her jaw was wired shut.
Her face was covered in bandages. I was glad that I didn't have to look into that ruin again. I'm sure that the plastic surgeon was good, but there's only so much he would be able to do with the surface for now. She would have a lot of recovery after this.
It felt weird talking to her, when she couldn't talk back to us.
"Well, I guess you made it to your destination before I made it to mine," said Gretchen, "were you always an over achiever?"
We were able to understand her soft chuckle.
It was almost three in the morning at this point, so Gretchen and I went out to her car and drove home. Tom had left when we went to the waiting room. We drove home and I went to my room. As I was getting ready for bed, Gretchen rushed behind me and slipped between the covers. I hadn't seen her at this point and thought nothing of it really.
I put on a pair of sweat pants, my usual attire and slipped myself under the covers as well. I turned toward her, thinking she wanted to talk, and she kissed me. I was tired, and not thinking clearly. I pulled her toward me, and felt her responding to my touch. She pressed herself against me, and I realized she was naked under the covers.
I fought with myself for a moment before pushing away. I moved myself to the outside of the covers, trapping her in my bed.
"Etch, we can't do this. I won't do this to you."
"I need you right now, Keith. I just got to think about what might have happened, and before anything does, I want you to have loved me."
"Nothing is going to happen, Etch."
"You don't know that. No one can know that."
"I believe it. That's enough for me. I won't ruin our first moment together because of fear, Etch. I want every moment we share to be special. You and me, no regrets, no fear, no reservations. Can you truly tell me that is what you'd give me tonight?"
"But. . ."
I put a finger to her lips. "You know how I feel about you. You know how I react to you. This is the hardest thing I've ever asked of you. We need this to be right."
"But I love you, Keith. Isn't that enough?"
Every inch of me strained to take her in my arms. I wanted her more than I wanted breath, more than blood, more than food. In that moment I realized that there would never be another woman for me on this entire planet. Without her, nothing was worth living.
"Etch, You are the only woman I can ever love. I wake each morning and smile because you are alive. I go to sleep each night and dream of our times together. You give me hope, and help me to seek after my dreams.
"It's because of that, of all of it, that I won't do this tonight. It's because I love you, and know you love me."
She began to cry softly, and I kissed away her tears. "I love you." I said each time I broke our kisses. She began to laugh at me after the fifth repetition. "You are such a dork sometimes, Keith."
"Yeah, but you love me anyway."
"I know. I don't always know why I love you, but I do."
"You love me for my manly singing voice."
She giggled at me. I lay down and we both fell asleep quickly. Just as I was drifting off, I realized my door was unlocked and Gretchen was naked in my bed.
***
I felt a touch on my shoulder, and looked up to see Tom standing over me.
"Oh crap."
"Morning, Keith, You want to let my daughter up so that she can go get some clothes on?"
I jumped off the bed, and Gretchen wrapped the blanked around her. "Nothing happened, Sir."
"I know that, Keith, otherwise I would have come in here with a shotgun."
I looked worriedly at him, but he chuckled. "I don't have a shotgun, Keith. I'm joking." Gretchen was giggling at me.
"I heard you two last night, and listened at the door for a while. I'd like to talk to my daughter for a bit if you don't mind, Keith."
I grabbed a T-Shirt and went downstairs. I was finishing a bowl of cereal when the doorbell rang.
It was Mr. and Mrs. Lewis.
"How could you do that to our son? How could you let the police drag him off. He spent the night in jail, Keith. How could you!"
"Mrs. Lewis?"
"You told the police that he beat up that filthy faggot he's been hanging around with. How could they do this to our son."
"Your son almost beat a girl to death."
"She's no girl," Mr. Lewis replied, "We know all about Lawrence Hansen."
"She may not have physically been a girl before, but that's not the case anymore thanks to your darling son."
"Our son didn't. . ." began Mrs. Lewis only to be interrupted by her husband.
"What are you talking about, Keith?"
"Your darling son smashed all of the bones in her face. She has her jaw wired shut, and I'm sure pins and wires in place to keep the rest of it from falling apart. Her groin and legs were mutilated. There wasn't enough left to rebuild what she had, so they went the other way."
The both looked sick at this, imagining what had happened. "You talked to your son last night. Did he tell you what he was doing when I called him?" They shook their heads. "Cleaning up. He did this at your house, likely with your camera running, Mr. Lewis."
Mrs. Lewis vomited. Mr. Lewis looked pale.
"And for your information, Buffy was one of my friends. I don't take kindly to my friends being maligned by short sighted bigots who don't get their facts straight before accusing people falsely."
I slammed the door in their faces, and collided with Tom and Gretchen who were standing behind me.
"That could have been handled better, Keith, but I'm not sure I would have shown your self-control."
"And I might have let slip my own secret."
They hugged me. I made a phone call when we finished. "Um, Richard. We've got a problem."
"What's up, Keith."
"Bobby's been arrested."
"Wouldn't Tom be a better person to talk to about this?"
"I called the cops on him. He almost beat a girl to death. I want a new drummer. Figured, since you were the one who dealt with talent. . ."
"Well, we won't be able to find anyone else who can play the Behemoth."
"The Behemoth was a gimmick, and not a very practical one. I just need someone who can play percussion."
"Are you sure about this?"
"Yes, Richard, I am."
A call beeped through on my call waiting. "Keith, Bobby's been arrested for attempted murder. We need to get Tom to help him. This has to be a false arrest," Jake said breathlessly.
"Jake, actually, he tried to kill Buffy."
"Oh. . .ok. . .what are we going to do about a drummer."
"I called Richard to find out."
"Ok, thanks. Um, keep me in the loop when you find anything out." Something sounded broken in his voice.
The three of us had always been friends, but Jake and Bobby had been a little closer to each other than either of them had been to Keith.
I went back to Richard. "You still there?"
"Yeah, I have a couple of possibles in Utah, and one in Seattle of all places. We can set up a session with the guys in Utah first, and if they don't work out, we can use some of the band's funds to fly the guy from Seattle out."
"Ok, set them up for today. I think I need to keep busy or I'm going to go insane. I'll call Jake."
I tried to reach Jake a couple of times, but the phone just rang. "Gretchen, could you drive me over to Jake's house?"
We drove the short distance, and I was shocked to see my 12-string and amp outside the garage.
There was a note on my guitar: Keith, I need to think some things thought. I've taken ten thousand from the band account, and I'll be taking a little trip. Stay out of trouble, ha ha. You'll probably want to find a Bassist as well, since I'm not sure when I'll be back.
He had written if, but then crossed it out.
"Richard," I said after calling him back, "we need a new bassist as well."
***
I set up the amp in Gretchen's garage, and I began to play. I started with "My life with you is Hell", and then went into "Black Flag". I continued with "My Own Person" and a little "U + UR Hand". I began to play a soft melody, that I'd never heard before. It came out of the pain of the past twenty-four hours. It reminded me a little of the Five for Fighting song "100 Years" but with a sorrow to it that tore at me. I played it over and over until it was engraved on my soul.
I only looked up when I heard the pop of another amp being plugged in, and a bass line began to weave into the melody I was picking out.
We played through the song without words a couple of times in its entirety. The first time he was a bit heavy handed, but he softened it for the second time through. He played so lightly that you could barely tell there was any bass there. But the hint of it filled out the song. We came to the end. I was about to walk over and talk to him, when he whipped out some sheet music and jotted down everything we had done. He copied both of our music within the space of five minutes with no errors.
I gaped at him.
"Sorry, I hate to lose perfection. I try to write all of my best jam sessions down before I forget them."
"I wish I could write sheet music like that."
"Perfect pitch. It helps a bit. Hi, I'm Guthrie Kyle."
"Kyle Guthrie?"
"Nope, my last name is Kyle. My first is Guthrie. And before you say it, yes, my parents were huge fans, and had to name me after him. They wanted it to be obvious."
"The song writer, or the baseball player?"
"Song writer."
"Wouldn't Woody Guthrie Kyle have been better?"
"You'd think"
We both laughed about this a bit, and then a black full sized van drove up. One of the smallest people I've ever seen got out of the driver's seat. Ok, jumped would have been the best term for it. He'd had the side door specially modified so he could open it from the ground. He started pulling out drums and carting them to the garage.
"You want some help?"
"You think just because I'm short I need help?!"
"Dude, we just wanted to know if you wanted it. I always feel big and useless watching anyone do work while I'm on my fat butt." I managed to say this entire statement with a straight face.
He looked at me, and looked at me some more, as if he couldn't figure out what to make of me. Then he started laughing. "Ok, kid, you're alright. Sure, help me unload so we can get this audition going."
"Aren't we auditioning with Desdemona?"
"Look, guys, I can go get my costume on, and pretend for you, but this is the real me, and if we're going to work together, we need to come at it without preconceptions."
They both gaped at me, so I proved it by singing the first verse of "My life with you is Hell" acapella.
"And I thought I was weird. At least when people see me in the midst of my drums, they get the sounds they expect."
We set up the drum set, but Guthrie kept looking at me funny. Eventually I turned to him and asked him, "What?"
"You're really Desdemona on stage?"
I pulled out both of my IDs and gave them to him.
He looked upset. "Well, I guess I won't be able to ask you out then. . ."
The drummer began to laugh again. "You thought you'd be able to get a date with Desdemona just for trying out for her band? Everyone knows she's a lesbian. . .I mean, that he's straight. Ok, I'm confusing myself. I'm sure you've seen the photos on her fan site from yesterday."
"I thought she might just be European, you know, the hand holding and stuff."
"That kiss wasn't a friends thing."
I blushed.
"Yeah, but most people think it was doctored. No one could find her on an first class manifests for Thursday coming in to Salt Lake international."
"That's cause we flew business class. We were still having a dispute with iTunes."
They looked at me and then both of them burst out laughing. "I<3Desdemona was actually right. You were under the name Desi Arnez in business class from Nashville," said the drummer.
"Yep, that was us...but apparently I didn't even know what name my Agent had gotten me in under."
"Wow, loverboy, not only is Desdemona not a girl, but she isn't into guys. You are completely out of the running."
"Shut up."
We finished setting up the drums. I knew I could work with the bassist, but could I work with the drummer. He'd been really argumentative at first, but who knows whether the jolly version was more real.
He sat down. He pounded out a bit of a beat to check distances, then called out, "Ready for 'My life with you is Hell" on the count of five."
We barely had our instruments ready when he hit the trap the fifth time.
He put us through the song at a blistering pace. About twice as fast as I was used to, and when I turned to talk to him, he simply looked at both of us in awe.
"Can you guys do it any faster? I know when we perform it needs to be at the proper speed, but you two are amazing. The last pair of guys I tried that on lost me about halfway through, and that was a technically easier song than this one."
I looked at Guthrie and smiled. I screamed into the opening riff as fast as I could move my fingers. We were going at about five times the normal tempo, and I could feel the burn of the strings even through the calluses of my left hand. The opening was the toughest part, and we were off to eight times the normal speed when I hit the chorus. The drummer was lost for a moment, and then found his place and joined us. We finished up a bit slower, but still fast and breathing hard.
"Ok, I can die happy. I've finally found someone who can keep up with me."
Guthrie and I laughed. "So, what's your name?" I said looking at the drummer.
"Since I just came here for the hell of it, not sure it matters, but I'm Davey Dolenz"
I blinked at him for a moment, but let it go.
"Well, if you're here for the heck of it, then might as well try one last thing with us."
I began to play the unnamed song and Guthrie joined in. It had started simple like "100 Years", but the additional instruments added complexity. Somehow, even though it seemed complete with two of us, Davey was able to find a place for himself in the song. It was beautiful.
It gave the song more of a blues or jazz feel than it had otherwise had, but that seemed to fit as well.
Words came to me in that moment, and I just sang to the song:
Don't blame the girl,
It's not her fault,
This is her life, and it is hard
You hate your life, so I can see
Just don't take this out on her, or me!
We live your rules,
Not by our own,
Don't blame the girls
It's not our fault.
The two of them stopped playing and just stared at me. "Um, guys?"
"Yeah, you're Desdemona alright," said Davey.
"And I never knew she had this much versatility," said Guthrie with stars in his eyes.
"Wait, what?"
"You just wrote that, off the top of your head."
"Sometimes poetry just hits me, and I have to get it out. Saying it is often enough. . .but. . .um, could I borrow your paper and pen?"
I wrote down the Chorus, which came first this time, and then the first verse. I tossed in another chorus at the end. I knew this wasn't the end of the song, but I had some of it. "Mind if we try out the verse next?"
"You're the boss-lady."
"I'm a guy, Davey."
"When we're hangin and watchin the tube, you're a guy, but when we're working, you're Desdemona. That means you're a girl, boss-lady."
"I go by Desi with my friends."
"See, you even have a nickname for her," Guthrie said with a smile.
"Ok, let's try this."
We played the verse which had come to me:
When she was, just seventeen
She turned you down, where you were seen
You made her pay,
Hope killed through pain.
While the music played on, I spoke the last line of the verse, "She asked you more than once to simply turn away."
We played through the chorus again, but the emotion was too strong for me and I couldn't sing.
"That really seems to affect you,"
"One of my friends was attacked last night by her boyfriend, my former drummer, and almost killed. She's in the hospital with her jaw wired shut and covered in bandages."
"And you're playing music with us?"
"It helps me to relax. Helps me think. That and I'm afraid that my girlfriends dad wants to kill me a little because he found his daughter naked in my bed this morning."
They looked at me with grins on their faces. "Nothing happened beyond some kissing, I promise."
"Sure it didn't."
I punched Guthrie in the arm for that one.
"You really are a boy."
All three of us laughed. "Guys, would you mind heading inside while I made a quick phone call?"
I called up Richard. "So, about ready for the next pair?"
"Why would I want anyone else?"
"Well, those are my two most difficult clients. Guthrie is a bit of a prima-donna, and Davey won't play with anyone who can't keep up. Says it's not worth his time to be playing with mediocre talent."
"Guthrie is a good guy with an amazing talent for sheet music and bass, and Davey just needed to find someone who could show him up."
"Wait, you mean to tell me you actually like these guys?"
"Why shouldn't I?"
"Well, um, I sort of only sent them over because I wanted to look like I was trying to find both of them a paying gig. No one else will take them."
"Well, don't you think that it makes us fit for each other?"
"Yeah, and if only the Misfits wasn't taken as a band name it would really fit you three."
"Nah, I like Up in Flames."
"Won't Bobby and Jake disagree with you keeping it?"
"I doubt it, since Bobby wanted to be Nth Degree, and Jake wanted Meaningless Death Imagery."
"Isn't that the name of that band. . ."
I was confused for a moment, and then it dawned on me, "No, he really wanted to call us Meaningless Death Imagery. That's part of the reason I changed the name of Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools. It was such a cool name for a band that I had to use it somewhere.
"Ok, so, since I'm going to be paying them, what is the going rate for a drummer and a bassist?"
"A piece of the pie, just like I get."
"Only on stuff they record with me, I take it?"
"Yep."
"Then book us some studio time mid next week. I feel like getting 'My life with you is Hell' and 'Black Flag' up on iTunes."
"Life around you in never dull, Keith."
"Just the way I likes it."
Keith ended the call and went inside.'
"Well, guys. Welcome to Up in Flames."
Davey was the first to get his voice, "You're shittin me."
"Nope, provided you don't mind wearing Goth on stage."
"Can you believe this joker, Guthrie? He tells us that he wants us to join Desdemona's band as long as we don't mind wearing Goth on stage."
"Yeah. . .um, what is your name?"
"You looked at my ID and didn't read it?"
He pulled the IDs out of his back pocket and handed them back to me, after a quick glance.
"Keith, I for one would be fine with wearing a bright pink tutu, and having neon lights sprouting out of my hair, just as long as I get to be on stage. Compared to that, Goth is tame."
I looked at him funny, but he simply said, "don't ask unless you really want to know."
"Don't tell him. You shouldn't've told me, but you did, and now I'm telling you, you don't wanna know!"
We both looked at Davey, and he looked back at us with an innocent expression. "What? Don't tell me you never watched that movie."
I looked at Guthrie, and he shrugged at me. Some things were probably better left unsaid.
We watched a little TV. We were watching some music show on Vh1. "So, did either of you guys watch Sarah Carerra last night on the Tonight Show?"
Davey and I shared a look. "Um, do you have a crush on every female singer?"
"Just the apparently unattached ones."
"Hate to break it to you, Guthrie, but she's dating Josh Holliday."
"What's Josh got that I don't?"
"Talent," I said at the same time that Davey said, "good looks," and Gretchen said, "money," from the doorway.
"I know when I'm beat."
"So, who's this?" Davey asked looking at Gretchen.
She plopped onto my lap, "I'm Gretchen."
"You ever get tired of the big cross-dressing lug, I can always climb into your lap."
"The cross-dressing is a bonus."
"Ok, I didn't need to know that."
Everyone chuckled at this.
"Etch, These are Davey and Guthrie. Drums and Bass."
"Etch?" Said Davey looking at me."
"Yeah, my nickname for her."
"Mind if I use it, Fair Lady?"
"My, you are a flirt." Gretchen giggled a bit.
"At least you didn't call me a little one."
He finally cracked a grin and we laughed. "Geeze, you guys need to lighten up."
We hung out for a little while, and then I noticed that we would just have time to get up to the hospital for visiting hours.
"Hey, guys, I definitely want you two to play with me. Richard has your contact info?" I got two nods and continued, "ok, then as soon as we get studio time scheduled, I'll call you."
"Thanks for this opportunity, Keith."
"Yeah, man, thanks."
Guthrie and Davey let themselves out. We hopped in Gretchen's car and made the trip up to Provo. We parked and made our way into the warren of passageways that is the UVRMC. The difficulty comes from each portion of the hospital being built at separate times. At one point, each of the buildings had different floor numberings, and the floor would change from one end of a hall to the next.
We got to Buffy's room without much difficulty. She had a keyboard on her lap, connected to a small screen in front of her, and a bigger one connected to the wall behind her head. Apparently her dad wanted her to be able to communicate as easily as possible.
She smiled with her eyes when she saw me. I watched as the words slowly appeared on the screen: I hear I have you to thank for my life.
"I did what anyone would have done."
:Everyone else was looking in the wrong place.
"I just love walking in the desert."
:Just accept my thanks, damnit. You deserve it.
"Ok, you're welcome."
:Hi, Gretchen.:
"Hi Hon. How you feeling?"
:sore. My face hurts, and my legs hurt. My dad tells me I'll be beautiful after this. I keep telling him I was always beautiful inside.:
"I know, hon. You'll come out of this just fine."
:And thinner. I'm not able to eat anything right now. Liquid diet FTW.
We laughed a bit at this. We hung out for about an hour in her room, just trying to cheer her up. I think she did us more good than we did her.
Before we left, I had to ask her something that had been bothering me the entire time, "You seem really upbeat for someone in your position."
:This gave me something I have been dreaming of for years. I am suffering a little pain now, and I have nightmares of the attack, but my outside matches my inside.:
Gretchen squeezed her hand. It was amazing to me that most of her was wound free. "I hope they've had a counselor in to talk to you."
:They have. We talked a lot this morning. She thinks it will be a long road to recovery, and not just my physical injuries. I don't agree with her right now, but she's the expert, right?:
"Buffy, only you can decide whether or not you are recovering. Make sure you tell your counselor the truth, though, so she can help you the best she can."
After these platitudes, Gretchen and I drove home.
***
We went to church on Sunday. The rest of the day we relaxed and Gretchen prepared for surgery the next day. She gave me her keys for the first time voluntarily. She'd be in the hospital overnight and I would pick her up on Tuesday morning.
We checked her in and I drove off. Nothing there for me to do. I was just getting to the car when Richard gave me a call. "So, can you meet me in Provo in the next couple of hours?"
"Sure, what's up."
"We have a studio booked with AM Records to get "Black Flag" and "My life with you is Hell" ready to be uploaded to iTunes."
"Ok, I'll need to drive home and get changed, and then drive back up to Provo."
"Where are you now?"
"I just dropped off Gretchen at the hospital for her surgery."
"Ok, that should be fine. Get here when you can."
I made my way out of Salt Lake and drove home as quickly as I could, avoiding speeding of course. I grabbed a pair of flats. After looking through my closet for something comfortable, I grabbed a girls tee and a pair of pants from my drawer. Yes, they were girls jeans. I had to look the role. I put on my makeup and my hair, and picked out a pair of day glow pink tennis shoes.
I grabbed my 12 string and drove up to Provo and found the address that Richard had given me. I saw Davey's black van in the parking lot. I still had no idea what car Guthrie drove.
I went inside, and it was completely different from Riverfront Records.
There was a man sitting at the front desk. “You must be Desdemona.”
“Yep, who are you?”
“I’m Ammon, and this is my studio. Welcome.”
I was impressed. It seemed a smaller company than Riverfront, but there was a definite professional quality about the place that had been lacking in Nashville.
“If you’ll follow me?”
Davey and Guthrie were already set up, and waiting on me.
"Sorry, boys, I had to stop by my house for my guitar, and I was in Salt Lake when Richard called me."
"No worries, Desi.”
“Yeah, your beauty makes the darkness of my day bloom into light.”
I looked at Guthrie, and he broke out laughing. “I’m joking, Desi.”
I laughed with him.
Ammon came over the speaker, “ready to begin whenever you are.”
“I need a couple of run throughs with the guys on ‘Black Flag’ before we record it, is that alright?”
“It’s your time.”
I played through “Black Flag” singing the words quietly. Halfway through, both Guthrie and Davey slipped in. It ended up being somewhere between “Bring Me to Life” and “My Heart will Go On.” I know. It is hard to imagine, but there it is. Think a sweeping voice melody with some pounding accomniment.
We practiced it again, and then it was time to record it. “Ammon, whenever you’re ready.”
I began to play the introduction, which had me playing the top 6 strings alone. I went once through the melody, and then I was hit by the surf of the drums and the call of the bass. We merged and receded from each other like the surf, like the tides. As they kept playing this portion, I moved into a sort of moon rising over the ocean progression. I have no idea how to really describe it beyond that. The high strings of the guitar became the singing of the wind through the lines. I envisioned a merchantman on the high seas.
I began to sing slowly:
On the seas of life I sail, between the ports of youth and age
I have gi'en you but little of my thought.
I was young and was naive, and you, the fool, were thought a sage
In my heart is the battle that we fought.
I had given you my love, and found in you good truth and learning
you offered up my love for less than naught
When I came to you in pain, and thought to gain a balm of healing
Yet in vain would I search for what I sought
The bass line took on the creaking of the rigging, and I took on the pounding of the feet running to stations. The drums were the cannon as the pirate ship came into range and began its attack on the helpless merchantman:
It flaps in the wind from the highest mast, striking fear in the hearts of man.
And it looks on the world, seeking souls to steal, but mine not one of them.
I have braved your foul oath,
my sword has run you through,
I am ready here for you. . .with knee unbent
For this time when we shall meet,
'neath the glare of that pale moon,
it is your cloak and not mine. . .shall be rent
For your love I sought in ages past, but love gi'en not in return
And the end of our journey will be resolved upon that night,
Only one of us can live while darkness flies.
The bass and drums backed off, and we were back to the original melody. The merchantman slipped into the fog for a reprieve:
In the mirror are you seen, to be my own true other half
My dreams of you are lost to distant past
You sit and say, while those plans you made, a word on my behalf
Those plans to fly my bones upon your mast.
But I shall not falter, nor shall I fall, as my own true path I tread
And the laugh you hear in your dead ear, my last
For the quick shall flee before my wrath, and all behind be dead
As we look upon all that we have surpassed
We ramped back into the chorus. The pirates opened fire as soon as the sails were seen, but it was a warship, and the pirates were outgunned:
It flaps in the wind from the highest mast, striking fear in the hearts of man.
And it looks on the world, seeking souls to steal, but mine not one of them.
I have braved your foul oath,
my sword has run you through,
I am ready here for you. . .with knee unbent
For this time when we shall meet,
'neath the glare of that pale moon,
it is your cloak and not mine. . .shall be rent
For your love I sought in ages past, but love gi'en not in return
And the end of our journey will be resolved upon that night,
Only one of us can live while darkness flies.
I envisioned the pirates slowly sinking as we finished up the final chords, and the merchantman being escorted back to port by the warship.
We finished and I talked to the control room. "Can we get a playback of that?"
We listened to the sound and it seemed good, but since this was his studio, "What do you think, Ammon?"
"It seems good. There are a couple of rough spots in the transition between the verse and chorus. Want to try it again?"
We ran through it two more times before all of us agreed that it was good.
We'd all practiced our parts of "My life with you is Hell" enough that it only took us two times before we had it where we wanted it.
"You guys know 'Bodies'?"
They nodded at me. "Ammon, we're going to do one more track, if that's ok?"
"Your time, your money," he said with a smile.
It took us another half an hour to get "Bodies" where I wanted it. Finally, we had three tracks.
"Richard Fields said that you needed these in MP3 format. I can hold onto your masters for you as well."
"That sounds good to me. Just send them off to him when they're ready."
I turned to my two compatriots. "Well, hopefully people want us still." I said it with a smile, but there was a bit of worry in my heart.
"Look, You are one of the best singers I've ever met," Guthrie said. We all laughed at this. "I know, limited experience, but I have had a lot of tryouts. You bring out the best in the people you work with, or you just know how to pick the right people. Either way, you can't help but be successful."
"Yeah, boss-lady, you're an amazing talent."
I looked at the time, "I gotta run, guys. Visiting hours."
"Later, Desi."
"Bye, Desi."
I went to the UVRMC and up to Buffy's room.
:Where's Gretchen?:
"Up in Salt Lake for her surgery."
:Oh, yeah!:
"So, how are you feeling?"
:A little better. I'm still sore, and will be for a while.:
"Ok, well, glad to hear you're hanging in there."
:Thanks for coming here. I appreciate the visit.:
We visited a bit and I left her a bit happier than I found her, I hope.
***
I drove back up to the University of Utah hospital to pick up Gretchen. We filled out her paperwork and she was wheeled out to the curb. I ran to get her car and helped her into the passenger seat.
"So. . ."
"Yes?" Gretchen had a grin on her face.
"You know. . ."
"Sorry, yes, I know. Yes, it's swollen, and there is bruising, but I am all girl now." Her smile was radiant.
We talked about inconsequential items as I drove. She was beaming. She'd wince in pain a bit when I went over a bump, but it was overshadowed by her happiness.
I contrasted the two people I knew in this situation. Buffy had almost died. Gretchen went through it as a matter of course. Both of them got the same result.
When we got home, Tom was watching the news. I caught something that surprised me.
"Still no news about Sarah Carerra. As you know, she collapsed during the Wake Up program, and was rushed to the hospital. There has been no press release as of yet, but some information says that she has not regained consciousness yet."
I helped Gretchen to her room, and then tried to find more information about Sarah, but there wasn't anything new.
I kept track of both Gretchen and Sarah during the rest of the week. On Thursday, Sarah woke up. She'd be giving a press conference on Saturday, so I went and visited Buffy for the first time in days.
She seemed happy to see me. She'd downloaded the new tracks from iTunes and was listening to "Black Flag" when I walked in.
:I love this new song.:
"Glad to hear it. We recorded it on Monday with my new band members."
:Good. I'm glad that Bobby wasn't able to destroy you or me. We are better than him.:
I was a little worried about her words, but decided to leave it to her counselor. As I was leaving the hospital, I got a call from Yancey.
"Originally, I'd only scheduled you to start next week, I know, but could you come in tomorrow? One of my other employees had something come up, and won't be able to make it."
"Sure. I can do that."
"Will you do me a huge favor?"
"What. . .?"
"Come dressed like you did for Gothplosion?"
I laughed, "Sure, I can do that."
"See you tomorrow, Yancey."
"See ya, 'Desi'."
I drove home. "Hey, Etch, Yancey wants me to dress full blown stage Desdemona tomorrow."
She giggled at me. "Make sure you take my camera. I want photos."
"Fine, I'll get photos." I tried to sound put out, but I smiled at her.
I made sure she was comfortable, and waited on her hand and foot. It was getting late when I got a call from Richard.
"More bad news with iTunes?"
"Nope, good news this time. Your songs are selling well. You've been downloaded almost three hundred thousand times as of this point. I made sure the naming and organization was proper this time, and so did my publisher. We're golden this time. That's just over a hundred and fifty thousand dollars gross."
"Wow."
"That's only the songs we uploaded this week. 'Bodies' is still being downloaded. I split off a share for Bobby and Jake from those. I made sure that your purchases came from your share, and theirs came for their respective shares. That's why I hire accountants. After we take out shares for Guthrie and Davey and myself, including the sales of the video and 'Bodies', You have just over a hundred thousand dollars."
I was shocked. It had taken my mother, father, and I all saving what we could afford sixteen years to gather the money in my college fund.
I'd earned more than that signing in less than a month.
"Um, Richard, do you do accounting work for me, or am I going to have to hire a money manager or something?"
"Well, since you're almost family, I can help you out. What were you thinking?"
"I was thinking of tossing half of it into my college fund, putting ten thousand in my checking account, and then investing the rest somewhere, but I'm not sure where yet."
"Ok, I'll contact some brokers and see what I can find out regarding good investments for you."
"I don't want anything too risky. Just something that will give me a good return."
"Yeah, after your behavior and choices, I don't think it's going to be too difficult to get your emancipation extended."
"Hush. I still have to finish high school."
"You better put some effort into it, according to Gretchen."
"Yeah, I know. It just seems like there are better uses for my time."
"Can I give you some advice, Keith?"
"Shoot."
"Decide why you're doing it. Figure out where you want to go to college. You have enough money in there to pay for most four year institutions in the nation. Figure out where you belong, and get yourself there."
"Yeah, maybe I should apply to Juilliard."
"Why not?"
"I'd never get it."
"With how good you are on the guitar? I happen to know you could do classical guitar, Jazz studies, composition, voice. . ."
"Wow. . .that would be cool. Me, at Juilliard. In three years, Desdemona might be an ancient memory, so that might be a great place for me to be."
"Keep it in mind. Figure out what you need to get there, and do it."
"Ok, thanks."
I hung up and looked at Gretchen. "So, how would you like to live in New York for a few years?"
"Maybe I'm going to college somewhere else?"
"Like where?'
"BYU?"
"You can go to BYU?"
"Sure, as long as my pastor gives me an endorsement."
I chuckled at this. Well, that would be cool. "Well, time to go to sleep, Etch. See ya tomorrow."
I went to bed and actually dreamed of Juilliard. It would be something to try out, definitely. Juilliard would prepare me for a real career in music, after my band went the way of most bands: fade into obscurity.
***
I caused a sensation. I made sure to bring my marker with me, and I signed a lot of shirts, one or two chests, and even a breast. I did my best to touch as little as possible, but no contact is impossible.
#32 It may be transitory, but it's memorable, Desdemona.
I took a picture after I was done. I wanted to remember that one. The girl, a pretty blonde, asked for a copy and gave me her email address. She winked when she gave it, and the reason she asked me to sign that part became clear.
I'd have to get a Desdemona email address. Preferably one with industrial strength spam filters.
Toward six o'clock, as the crowds were thinning, I felt a tug on my skirt.
I looked down and saw a cute little girl standing there. I crouched down to her eye level. She couldn't have been more than six or seven years old.
"Hi, Honey, how can I help you?"
"Nice miss clown lady? Can I come to the circus with you?"
"I'm not from the circus, Honey."
"Oh." Her face fell, and she looked like she was going to cry, "Daddy always told me if I was bad he would sell me to the circus. I think going to the circus is better than being good."
"Don't you want to go back to live with your Daddy?"
"Please, miss clown lady, don't make me go home with Daddy."
"You can call me Desi."
"Ok, Dizzy."
I smiled, but didn't correct her. I looked up and saw Yancey standing over us.
"Hey, Yance, I think we have a lost girl."
She completely broke down, "I thought you'd protect me!" She wailed, and a man materialized out of the crowd gathering at the front of the store.
"There you are, Celia. It's time to go home."
The second he touched her, she screamed.
"Yance, call the police. I think we need someone better suited than us to sort this out."
What in the world did I get myself into this time. I just went to work to earn some money. Sure, at this point I don't really need it, but I like the store. Now, I've got a little girl turning to me for help, and acting like her father is hurting her.
AM Records is trademark Ammon Monroe and both are used with his permission
Sometimes, life gives you a little bit of a curveball. I went to work as Desdemona, and now I'm in the middle of something, but I'm not sure what.
"I called the police, Desi. They should be here within a couple of minutes."
"Look, this has been a bit of a misunderstanding. I'll just take my daughter. . ."
"NO!!!" Save me Dizzy!" She clung to me frantically. I had no idea what to do, but I wouldn't let her get hurt.
"Sir, I understand what you're saying, but I need you to step outside of the store. You're upsetting her, and we can get this sorted as soon as the cops arrive."
In the course of a week, I'd gone from being questioned by the police, to needing them desperately.
"Give me my daughter, Bitch."
"Sir, that's no way to treat a lady!"
He turned around and then looked down. Davey was standing next to him. "This mook giving you trouble, Boss-lady?"
"Yes, Davey, but we've already called the police."
The guy had tried to sneak around me while I'd been talking to Davey, but the girl was too smart for him. She kept me between the two of them.
Yancey walked up to him, "Sir, I suggest you leave the store if you know what's good for you."
"Clear a space, People!"
They turned around and the police walked in. It was the same two from the hospital. Oh crap. . .but wait, they only knew me as Keith.
"Sir, could you step outside with me, please?"
"I don't want to leave my daughter alone."
"Your daughter appears to be afraid of you. I would like you to step outside please."
"I forbid you from questioning her without me present. It's against the law!"
"Sir, I don't have to have you present to question her as a witness. Unless you're saying she has done a criminal act. I mean, she's only six or seven."
Reluctantly, the man followed the taller of the two out of the shop.
"Hi there. I'm Harold Timmons. What's your name?"
"Are you really a police man?"
"Yep, here's my badge, but you're too young to look at my gun."
"I'm Celia."
"That's a pretty name. So, Celia, I hear you don't want to go home with your Dad. Could you tell me about it?"
"He has lots of rules for me to follow. Like when I can eat and sleep. What I can wear at home."
"So, when can you eat?"
"Breakfast, lunch, and dinner."
"Do you get enough to eat then? Three meals can be a lot."
"I'm hungry a lot though."
"We can have a doctor check you out."
She went white and tried to hide under my skirt. It took a moment or two to coax her out. "Doctors help you."
"That's what Daddy said, but the doctor he brought hurt me."
"Where did he hurt you."
"Down here," she pointed to her belly and legs, "he had a big silver thing that he used. He said all big girls need checkups."
I was about to say something, but the Harold looked at me. He was angry, and doing his best to keep a happy face on for Celia. It looks like I might have misjudged him.
"Dispatch" he said into the radio on his shoulder.
"Go ahead."
"I need to get a child to a hospital for a full physical including x-rays. Possible abuse."
"I'll send out a bus to pick her up. unless you want to take her in your car."
"Celia, would you like to ride in a police car, or an ambulance?"
"Ambulances are for sick people."
"Right you are, Celia. Dispatch, I'm taking her in my car. Do you want me to go to UVRMC or Timpanogos."
"I'll let UVRMC know you're coming."
"So, you ready to go?"
"Only if Dizzy can come with me."
Harold looked at me, "Dizzy?"I
"It's Desdemona, actually, but my friends call me Desi."
"Got it. So, mind coming to the hospital with us?"
I looked at Yancey, "Oh, go on. You were about done with your shift anyway."
"Thanks, Yance."
Celia latched onto my hand and wouldn't let go. We went out the back way, to avoid her father.
Celia and I got in the back of the squad car, and were driven to the hospital. We followed Harold in, and at reception he was directed to take her to radiology. We went there and a nice lab tech took her x-rays. They did all the major bones, and the skull. They probably had no idea what they were looking for.
"Ok, they want her in room 305. Do you need directions?"
"I know where it is. Thanks." Harold said. He lead us to the room. When we entered, Harold said, "I'll go ahead and wait outside."
"This is different from the last time. Daddy had the doctor come to his house."
"Isn't it your house too?"
"I live with Mommy, but I had to stay with Daddy today. Mommy and Daddy don't live together anymore."
The door opened, and a doctor walked in. "Hello, ladies."
Celia began to scream. The doctor turned to run out of the room as Harold was trying to come in. He held onto the doctor while I tried to calm her.
"What's wrong, Celia?"
"You lied to me, you told me this doctor would be different. It's the same man."
"I really didn't know, sweetie. It's Ok. We didn't know who your doctor was. Officer Harold will take him out. It's ok sweetie."
She clung to me and cried. I had no idea what to do with kids. I tried to comfort her, but she just cried harder. She climbed into my lap and put her arms around me. I put my hand on her back and did my best to make her feel safe.
A female doctor came in a few minutes later.
"Hello, Celia, My name is Patricia. Want to turn so I can see your pretty face?"
Celia peeked around at the woman. "There it his. Well, Celia, I need to check you out, and I'm sorry, but I have to look at your private bits. Is it ok with you if I do that?"
Celia made a slight nod. "Are you her mother?"
"No, just a stranger, actually. I'm Desdemona." I held out my hand limply to shake.
"I heard that you lived in Colorado."
I blushed, "no, I live in Utah."
"Prove it. You may look like her, but just about anyone could be under that makeup."
I showed her my ID.
"Here I expected you to sing. You're name is legally Desdemona?"
"Legal alias."
"Well, I would have preferred you to sing."
"Autograph instead?"
"I have nothing for you to sign."
"How about the inside of your lab coat."
"Why not," she said with a bemused grin.
"Celia, could you sit on the table for a moment for me? Here, hold my purse and the cap of the pen for me, ok?"
She smiled at the responsibility, and sat there perfectly straight. Patricia handed me her lab coat. #40Because you wanted me to sing, Desdemona.
"Ok, so I really believe you now. That is definitely a Desdemona autograph."
I chuckled at this.
"Sorry for the distraction, Celia."
"Is Dizzy a famous clown?"
"Well, she's a famous singer who wears clown makeup sometimes."
I retrieved my stuff from Celia while they talked.
"Now, I'm going to have to ask Dizzy," Patricia smiled as she said this, "To leave for a bit, is that ok?"
"Yeah, you're nice. You won't hurt me, will you?"
"I'll try my best not to. I'll tell you if it might hurt a little, ok?"
Celia nodded, but with a worried look on her face. "I'll be right outside, ok?"
She smiled at me, and I left.
The officer was no longer outside, and I wondered if he'd taken the doctor into custody. Some things I didn't need to know. I looked at the door to the exam room. Some things I didn't want to know.
After ten or so minutes the door opened behind me, and a Celia missile shot out and clamped onto my leg. The doctor came out behind her, "do you know where the officer went?"
"I don't. No one was out here when I got out."
"Ok, go ahead and wait in the room while I find out what we need to do with Celia."
"The nice doctor lady said you sing."
"Yep."
"Do you know muffin man?"
I sang that for her, and a couple of other songs. She liked my farmer in the dell, especially when I put an elephant on the farm.
"Elephants belong in circuses, not on farms."
"Why not? Maybe the farmer always wanted an elephant."
"Silly, Dizzy."
We laughed a bit, and Doctor Patricia came back. "A woman from DCFS is stopping by. We're going to be taking Celia to her Mom's house for the time being. Her father is apparently being booked as we speak, as is Doctor Platt."
I didn't want to know. I didn't ask.
A severe looking woman in a gray business suit entered the room. "Let's get you home, Celia."
No introduction. Oh, well.
"Can Dizzy come with us? I want to show her my house."
"Sure, as long as it's alright with Dizzy."
"It's Desdemona." I said extending a hand.
"Hope." She said extending hers.
I bit my tongue to prevent saying something about the irony of such a dried up old prune being called "Hope". You always envisioned someone in blond pigtails and the blush of youth.
I guess even hope grows old eventually.
We drove into Orem and up to a fair sized house on a hill overlooking the scenic Movies 8 cinema. Celia practically dragged me to the house.
A pretty woman in her early twenties opened the door after what seemed like forever. She was wearing a pair of cutoff sweats as shorts and a damp tee shirt. "Celia! What are you doing home."
Hope spoke, "Your ex-husband has been arrested, so we're bringing her home. We suggest you don't allow him to be alone with Celia for the time being."
"Arrested?"
"Daddy hurt me, Mommy, and Dizzy saved me."
"Dizzy?"
"Desdemona," I said, "I go by Desi with my friends, and so she thought it was Dizzy. I'm fine with it."
"A little early for Halloween, isn't it?" The woman scowled at me when she said this.
"Ms. Desdemona is a minor celebrity of some sort. A rock star I believe."
Her attitude changed completely at Hope's dry words. She looked like she wanted to protect her daughter from me now. I just shook my head. "Nice meeting you, Ma'am. Sorry it was under these circumstances."
She looked mollified a bit, and opened her mouth to speak a couple of times before saying, "Look, I'm sorry. Ever since he left me for a younger woman, I've been worried about the female role models my ex has been introducing to my daughter. You seemed to be the worst of my nightmares come true."
"Look, ma'am. I didn't ask for this. Your daughter picked me to help her. I did what I could. We both know that this world can be a scary place. I'm just glad she was able to reach out to anyone."
"What's your name again?"
"Desdemona."
"Desdemona, look, I'm sorry. I should have been more grateful to have my daughter safe, it's just that I wasn't expecting anyone and well, um. I'm still trying to adjust to what's going on. . ."
She blushed bright red.
"Celia, you want to sing the farmer and the dell some more while Mommy cleans up a bit?"
"Mommy looks clean, she even has bubbles behind her ear."
She blushed even redder at this and brushed her hand through her hair. She missed the bubbles.
"She needs to clean up the house a bit, Doll."
"I can help."
"Celia, not this time, but I think we might convince Hope to sing with us, and after the house is clean, she needs to leave."
"Can you really sing?"
She sat down on the porch with us while Celia's Mom went in to "Clean up"
If anything she was a better singer than I was, and I was supposed to be able to sing for my supper.
She added in bunnies. She made a sound like a dog, which got Celia giggling.
"Bunnies don't bark."
"How about meow. They can meow, right?"
"NooOoo! They don't meow." Celia giggled at her.
"Well, smarty pants, what sound does a bunny make." I asked.
She twitched her nose.
"That's not a sound."
"Just cause you aren't listening right, doesn't mean it's not a sound."
Out done by a six year old. Girls must cheat.
We were all giggling like school girls when her Mom came back. "Mommy!!"
Her mother had tears in her eyes when she hugged her. Well, better late than never.
"Mrs. Connors, I'll be stopping by on Monday to check that everything's alright, is that ok?"
"I went back to my maiden name of Wells. Yes, stop by anytime."
"See you Monday, Ms. Wells."
After the door closed, I turned to Hope. "Think I could get a ride to the Mall. My girlfriend's car is there and I need it to drive home."
"Girlfriend?"
"Yep." I thought for a moment of what I could have said instead:
"Hi, my name is really Keith. I dress like this because I sing soprano."
"I never would have guessed. You look so natural."
"I've had some good teachers. Two of my friends are transgendered." and so on.
"Yep, I can drop you off there." She was oblivious to my internal byplay, thankfully.
We arrived at the mall. "Look, I know this is a weird request, but I like to have autographs of all the famous people that I meet during the course of my work. Would you mind?"
She pulled out an oversized autograph album. Some of the pages had phone numbers on them, and I figured I might as well. #41I hope my music can be as helpful as you are, Desdemona 435-555-1267
As I sat down in Gretchen's car, I grabbed a pad of paper I stashed under the passenger seat. I jotted down the words that ran through my head. I had another verse for "Don't Blame the Girls." I felt there was still a piece missing.
I drove home, thinking about everything that had happened today.
When I got home Gretchen yelled for my attention, "Keith, is that you?"
"Yeah, it's me."
"Come here quick."
I went up to her room, where she was relaxing in bed with her laptop on a cooling pad. "Apparently there's a betting pool about what the text for your 42nd autograph is going to be."
"Really?"
"Yes, really."
"So, what have they got?"
"Thanks for life the universe and everything. . .It's just another number. . .Doctor Who did it better. . .Here's for you, Mr. Robinson. . .and a lot of stupid ones."
"Jeeze, people, life is not a Douglas Adams novel."
"You should do that one."
"What, really?"
"Yes, that and I put up a hundred dollars on it half an hour ago. I never thought it would win, but I wanted that up there."
I chuckled at that. "I'm going to sign my guitar with that. Be right back."
I started with the Marker. #42Life is not a Douglas Adams novel, Desdemona. I considered prettying it up a bit, but that wasn't the way my signatures went. I put a lacquer over the top to keep it in place and went inside to let it dry.
I talked with Gretchen a bit, and then went downstairs to take pictures to upload to the site. I used the DesdemonaUpInFlames login.
I logged into the forums, and posted the pic in the #42 thread: Hey guys. Heard about this contest, so thought I'd put in my two cents worth.
I posted a picture of my guitar and logged off.
I lay in bed next to Gretchen and we talked until we fell asleep.
***
We were watching a broadcast of the tape of the Sarah Carerra press conference. I was getting more and more angry, the longer that it went on. How could anyone have done that to a sweet young girl like that. I was well and truly steamed by the end.
I'd caught his name as Brady, but didn't hear anyone mention his last name. I went online and did a search for Brady and Sarah Carerra and found a news article titled, "Brady Townsend fired for Sarah Carerra harassment."
Well, I now had a name. I grabbed a sheet of paper, and finished the song. I had all of it now. I had "Don't Blame the Girls." and now I just needed to get it online.
I didn't need any money for this one. It would make me feel like an accomplice to all of the hate.
I called up Richard, "I need a video camera and Guthrie and Davey. We have a response to the Sarah Carerra press conference to get online."
"Ok, Meet at Gretchen's?"
"Yes."
I spent the time waiting running through the music. Each of us had our part, and we would do this in a single take. No special editing, or anything else to detract from the message. I realized I was still in Keith mode, so I ran upstairs. "I need something for this song, Etch" I handed her the page with the lyrics on it.
"Third from the right should be a perfect dress."
The dress had a square neck line and was perfectly white. I was knee length on me. I wore my ballet flats, and my hair of course. I wore muted makeup.
Gretchen carefully came over and sat on the stool next to mine. "We should probably thin your eyebrows for this one."
I had a moment of panic. This would not be something I could hide easily.
"Without the normal makeup to minimize them they stand out a bit. It will help feminize your face a bit."
I took a deep breath and sighed. "Go ahead."
She carefully plucked my eyebrows and I was left with a very feminine visage looking out of the mirror. I just hoped they grew back or it would be fun going back to school.
She finished and I was heading downstairs when the doorbell rang. It was Guthrie. "Keith?! Wow, you look so different."
"I know. We need a more innocent look for this one. It is a different song than we usually use."
"Well, the guys are in the garage, setting up."
I went out. Richard had hired a full camera team. They had lights and a boom mic, and a full studio camera. Well, as long as we could afford it, I was fine."
"You ready for this, guys?"
Davey answered for all of us, "Yep. You lead."
"We have a slight addition to the song. I added a vocal bridge of sorts." I played through it a couple of times, and Davey and Guthrie figured out their parts. We practiced the song a dozen times, and then it was show time.
The red light came on the camera, and I began speaking: "There are people in this country who feel that just because we are in the public eye, that our entire lives are fair game. We are treated with derision and scorn because of our chosen careers.
"We are also looked down upon because we are women. I've got news for you: about fifty percent of the world is women. We nurture and raise. Many of us live the lives of second class citizens. We persevere.
"Over the past week, I was introduced to three women whose lives have been made harder by the choices of others. You all know one of them, as she was hounded this morning by people who should have known better. Two others have suffered worse fates.
"Sometimes, emotion speaks loudly to me, as it did in this case. I wrote a song, to let out that emotion so that it didn't choke me. It is what I really have to say on the subject."
The song began, and it, as always, reminded me of "100 years" with a blues bass and percussion.
Don't blame the girl,
It's not her fault,
This is her life, and it is hard
You hate your life, so I can see
Just don't take this out on her, or me!
We live your rules,
Not by our own,
Don't blame the girls
It's not our fault.
When she was just seventeen
She turned you down, where you were seen
You made her pay,
Hope killed through pain.
Spoken: She asked you more than once to simply turn away
Don't blame the girl,
It's not her fault,
This is her life, and it is hard
You hate your life, so I can see
Just don't take this out on her, or me!
We live your rules,
Not by our own,
Don't blame the girls
It's not our fault.
Another girl, was in the mess
Her life in public's view was lived to entertain us
You tore her wounds
You showed the world
Spoken: How dare you do this to an innocent like her!
There was more power to this new section, for a moment, I left "100 years" behind, and it was all rock ballad.
We live in pain, to bring new life
We are your daughter, your mother, your wife!
You put us down, you cause us strife
It is your fault, not ours, you see
how can you blame us for your bigotry
Don't blame the girl,
It's not her fault,
This is her life, and it is hard
You hate your life, so I can see
Just don't take this out on her, or me!
We live your rules,
Not by our own,
Don't blame the girls
It's not our fault.
One other girl, she was so young
She wasn't old enough to know why you had come
Innocence you kill
For your short thrill
Spoken: How could the one who made her feel safe do this to her.
Don't blame the girl,
It's not her fault,
This is her life, and it is hard
You hate your life, so I can see
Just don't take your hatred out on her or me!
We live your rules,
Not by our own,
Don't blame the girls
It's not our fault.
Spoken: Don't you dare to blame the girls for what is truly only your own fault.
"Thank you."
The camera crew was a bit choked up, and I think I might have been crying at the end. I know my voice cracked and there were tears on my face, but I have no idea where they came from. For a moment, I wasn't myself. I was just those three hurt girls.
One of the guys ran over to the big van that the camera cables ran into. A couple of minutes later he emerged with a CD.
"We were told you wanted to upload this to YouTube?"
"Yes."
"Ok, there are two files on here. One is a high quality original, and the other is for YouTube. Richard said he might want to do something with the high quality version."
Ok, I wanted no profit from this. I called up Richard. "I thought we agreed no profit. I do not want to make money on suffering."
"I know, that's why we are donating all of our proceeds from the sale of the video to Safe Passage Home."
"Is it a good charity?"
"Yes, and it helps battered women, so it fits with the message of your song. I figured that this would be the best way to make sure everyone knew you were serious. The text actually says that $0.57 of every sale goes to the charity."
"That's all our profit, so I guess that works for me."
"I knew you'd see it my way."
We uploaded the song, and I went and talked with Gretchen. We sat there on her bed and talked about the wedding, and other things. We laughed and enjoyed each other's company. "I love you, Etch."
"I love you too, Keith. Why don't we make it a double wedding?"
"Wait, what?"
"I'm not sure that Jordan would mind. And you are legally an adult. . ."
"I don't think that means I can get married without my Mom's consent before I'm 18."
"But. . ."
"I love you, you know that, right?"
"Well, yeah."
"I mean I really love you. You and no one else. There is no one in this world I would rather spend my entire life with."
"I know."
"Then have patience. I'm still in high school. You're not even legally female yet."
"Yes I am. Dad and I got the court order signed before my surgery, so all it needed was the surgery attested to by a surgeon. I got my new birth certificate today."
I smiled at her and kissed her, "That's wonderful!"
"So, will you marry me."
I hugged her to me, and held her. "Etch, I can't. Not yet. We're not ready yet."
"But, I need you. I know you want to wait, and figured. . ."
I chuckled a bit, still holding her. "Honey, if it means this much to you, and you can convince your father not to kill me, we can consider other options. I will not, however, marry you till I'm 18 at least, and I would prefer to wait until then. Call it my upbringing peeking through."
"You're being so girly about this. Isn't it the guy who's supposed to wheedle, and the girl who's supposed to resist?"
"Call it old fashioned sensibilities. I want to do things in the proper order."
"Fine, fine. I'll wait. I'll try. You just get your behind in gear and turn 18, ok?"
"Well, it's not like it's two years away."
"What do you mean? You're still only 16."
"My birthday is in two weeks. That means it is only twelve and a half months 'til I'm 18."
My phone rang. I'd changed the ringer to a polyphonic of "My life with you is Hell" when a call for Desdemona came through. Yeah, they already had them and I was getting no money for them. I thought again I would need to ask Richard about it, and promptly forgot when I heard who was on the other end of the line.
"This is Desdemona."
"Is that legally your name? This is Alecia Moore."
"Yes, it's legally my name. Um, what can I do for you?" I think my awe shone through in my voice.
"Lady, you're famous, just like the rest of us, especially after that YouTube stunt you pulled earlier today."
"It doesn't mean that I can't get a little heroworshipy when someone like you calls me."
"There's the spirit. So, I caught your video, and I have to say that I misjudged you a bit. I heard from your agent that you wanted to play 'You an Your Hand'. I'll let you on one condition."
"Anything."
"I like your spirit, girl. Here it is, as long as you release a recording of 'Stupid Girl' at the same time, you can do 'You an Your Hand'."
"Um, ok. Sure."
"And I have to say, you cost me some money with your #42 stunt. I thought you'd go with Here's for you Mr. Robinson."
We laughed and said good-bye.
Again I had days that were ups and downs, even ins and outs. Why does life have to be like this? Why must it give only to take away. I knew that little Celia would bring with her those things that were done for the rest of her life. It half made me wish I'd told her I was really a boy. Something that could remind her later that not all men would be like her father.
I sat down on the bed next to Gretchen and told her that we could sing the Pink song I wanted, and now had an additional song. So, I had a total of seven songs now for a future album.
"So, what's the big plan next, Keith? Where do you take the band from here?"
"I don't know. I spent so much time trying to get to this point, that I have no idea where I want to go. Maybe I should contact Spotlight Studios again, and see if they are still looking for someone with my talent."
"You've done ok with yourself so far."
"I'm only just beginning to realize everything that a big label does for you. They would have handled the problem with iTunes, and I would never have lost money over it. I would never have had to deal with the guy back east, since I would have already been signed."
"They wouldn't have protected you from your band breaking up."
"True, some things you still have to deal with yourself."
"What's wrong with contacting Spotlight? They wanted you before."
"Maybe I should."
She grabbed my phone from my hand, "Hey."
I didn't want to hurt her, so she easily kept the phone away from me as she dialed.
"Uncle Richard? Can you set up a meeting with Spotlight Studios and Up in Flames? Yeah, Keith was dithering about it."
"I don't dither."
"Yep, that's what he said. Ok, I will. Love ya."
"He said he'd contact them on Monday."
I snorted. Well, life with Gretchen was never dull. "What was that for? You know you needed to do it," she said reacting to my snort.
"I know. It's just that I was never sure if I could face them. They were the ones who put the idea for this in my head. It sort of feels like signing with them would be a big 'I told you so.'"
"So, what of it. Keith, you are a special person. It's really time to get out there and show the world."
"Fine," I said grimly.
"That's not what I like to hear. You need enthusiasm."
I put on a big cheesy grin, "That would be super swell, Gretchen." I might have even swung my arm around.
"That's the spirit." We laughed about this, well, she giggled more than laughed.
***
Church on Sunday, and the next thing I knew, it was Monday, and I was off to work again. I won't bore you with the details. I'm sure some of you have had experiences in the retail industry. The rest aren't missing anything.
I wore the tulip skirt again, this time with a pair of wedge sandals. I wore a black turtleneck on top, though, since I think the poncho thing would be way too revealing for work. I was walking out the door when I realized it had been more than four weeks since I got my ears pierced. The earrings seemed a part of me, and I almost felt bad about it. I changed them for a pair of Gretchen's studs. I could still wear the others on more "Formal" occasions.
My ear's felt light without the earrings, but I would not miss getting pink hair stuck in them for the time being. I wondered if I shouldn't get a longer haired look. Unfortunately, how do you go from having an A-line cut to long hair overnight without people knowing it's a wig.
More signatures today. People have heard that I work here, so I am being inundated by requests. Apparently Yancey is happy with it, especially since we started carrying the knockoff Desdemona earrings. Apparently sales are up almost 20% over this time last year. Not sure it that's god or not. Like I said, she's happy.
So, I'm signing #67, trying to decide how to avoid #69 when I get a call from Richard.
"Spotlight wants to meet with you and the band. They really want to meet with you and the band."
"Ok, well, I get off here at 6:30. . ."
"No, you don't understand Desi. They have rescheduled other clients, and have an opening for you in about forty minutes."
That was barely enough time to get there from here. Barely.
"Yance, I gotta run. Apparently I have a meeting with Spotlight Studios."
"Go, then. Go. This is more important that my store."
I gaped at her.
"You may have noticed that I actually only have you in here for publicity. You are extra to what we need."
I had wondered why there seemed to be an extra person in the store.
"I love ya, Desi, but this is your time. Go, before I fire you," she said with a wink.
I went out the back and hopped in Gretchen's car. I drove up to the building where Spotlight was located in Salt Lake. Luckily, there was a parking garage around the corner. I took of my wedges and ran barefoot with them in my hand. No nylons or tights today.
I entered the front door, and for the second time in my life, the larger than life Spotlight logo was in front of me. It reminded me a bit of the 20th Century Fox movie logo, but it was just against a cloudy sky. That and there was only one of the spotlights, not two.
Richard, Guthrie and Davey were waiting for me in the lobby. A man I had never met before was there as well.
"Desdemona, meet Lance Praetor."
"Nice of you to make it, Desdemona."
I glanced at my watch and noticed that I was about ten minutes late.
"Traffic was backed up a bit, and I was in Provo when I got the call."
"Excuses have no place in this business."
"Look, Mr. Praetor, I appreciate that you took the time to meet with me this afternoon, I really do, but I have a life which precluded me from sitting around on my butt all day waiting for you to call me."
"You said she had spunk, Richard. I see you were right. If you'll all follow me?"
I blinked a couple of times and then followed the guys back into the inner sanctum of Spotlight.
In contrast with the other studios I'd visited recently, this was a multi-storey affair, with offices on the ground floor and the recording studios above. He led us into a conference room. He shut the door behind us.
"Desdemona, I'm about to tell you something that I didn't tell Richard on the phone. We know that you're Keith Robison."
"Mr. Praetor, let me. . ."
"Wait a moment, Keith, I'm the one needing to explain. We kept a recording of your demo tape. I had the voice print analyzed against your new songs. I thought that your situation was poorly handled in the past, since I am sure we could have, I mean I am sure we can market you as a soprano male singer. Sure, it's different, it's weird, but so are you. In a good way."
I was completely stunned into silence by this. Was all of this I had gone through pointless? Who was he to the company?
"I'm sorry, Mr. Praetor, but do you have that much pull?"
"Oh, I'm sorry, let me properly introduce myself. Hi, I'm Lance Praetor, CEO of Spotlight Productions."
I sat down, hard. I think Davey fainted. I couldn't see him from where I was sitting, but I heard a quiet thump. "What are you saying, Mr. Praetor," asked Guthrie, who was the first one to find his voice.
"What I'm saying is this: We say that Desdemona was a Ziggy Stardust persona of Keith Robison. He used it to introduce people not only to his singing, but his acting talent. Spotlight also has a movie production company called Spotlight Films.
"You would be the star of the hour, Keith. You have passed as female in the midst of other people, not only that, you passed as a specific female. I also know that you've done it before on stage, and that you generally get leading roles when you try out."
"Have you been stalking me?"
"In the industry it's called scouting."
I had no idea what to say. I really didn't.
I put my head in my hands, and my elbows on the table.
"And that's how I knew you were acting. You let the persona drop, and we get Keith in a dress. No self respecting girl would sit like that."
I sat up straighter immediately, and put my knees together.
"And just like that back in character. You're the closest to a natural born actor I have ever met."
I had felt so much pressure to conform, was that all this was. My friends wanted to succeed, but one had abandoned me, and the other was in jail. Should I give this up? Should I just go back to being Keith?
"Keith, before you tell me anything, let me make one thing absolutely clear. We want you no matter the terms. If that means we only get Desdemona the singer, then ok. If we get Desdemona as a singer and an actress, that's fine too.
"Personally, I hope we get Keith, since there is so much more possibility there."
"How much time do I have to decide?"
I could tell he was a bit shocked. I guess for most guys it would have been an easy decision. Most guys would never have had to make it in the first place. Well, it was becoming obvious that I wasn't most guys. I still thought of myself as male however, and wondered at my reticence.
"Mr. Praetor, I have my girlfriend to consider. She was the one who suggested this, and partially I keep dressing this way for her. I don't personally know how I feel about it, but I want to talk to her before I come to any decisions regarding my future. I need to know I'm making the right choice."
"You seem very adult for a sixteen year old, Keith."
"Well, Lance, he is emancipated."
"Ok, now I have to have you even more. Really. I hate dealing with children, mostly because of their parents. You tell a parent their child is a star, and most of them think they've won the lottery, and start placing undue stress on their kids. Then they get burnt-out, and they usually never transition into an adult star.
"Ok, sorry, babbling. Let me leave you here for a bit. I have some other things I can take care of. I'll be back in thirty minutes to an hour. Will that be enough time?"
"If it's not, then the answer will be a no, but I think I will be able to figure something out. I owe these guys."
He walked out and I called Gretchen.
"Etch, I have some weird news."
"Did you sign with Spotlight, Desi?"
"That's the weird news, they want to sign Keith." It sounded like the line went dead. "Etch?"
"I'm still here. Just waiting for the punch line."
"No, it's true. They want to sign me as a singer, and want to also employ me as an actor."
"Just Keith?"
"Or Desdemona, or both. They want me to make a decision."
"Do you get to be an Actress if you're Desdemona?"
"Yep."
"Wow, I don't know what to say."
I could hear the disappointment in her voice. I had to ask it, "Etch, do you like me better as Desdemona?"
"Keith! How can you ask that?"
"Etch, I love you no matter what. I need to know, though. Do you like me better as Desdemona?"
"Well, it's not that simple. I mean. . ."
"Etch, just yes or no please."
"I can't. . ."
"Etch, yes or no!"
"Yes, damn it. I like you as Keith, but I love you as Desdemona. I love the thought of taking off your clothing and finding a boy underneath. I like the way you look in makeup, and the way you make me feel when you look at me in those clothes. Keith would never have kissed me, because he was too scared."
"I'm the same person, Etch."
"No, you're not. Not to me."
"Etch, stop and listen to me a moment." I could hear her sobbing into the phone. This hurt me. What could I tell her. How did I tell her that. . .but that's not true is it. I really didn't mind wearing this clothing, or this hair. It'd always loved wearing makeup. I loved putting on new roles with a few swishes of a brush.
I loved being anyone but me.
"I love you. I don't know how healthy it is, but I'll be Desdemona for you always. She is simply girl me, though, and always has been. I have no change in personality. I would have kissed you as Keith, it just would have taken me longer."
"I'm sorry I said that, Keith. You pushed it out of me. I love Keith too. I really want you to take me right now. I like kissing Desdemona, but when you are with me, physically, I want it to be Keith, always. If that means you need to sign the contract as Keith, do that for both our sakes."
"Thanks, Etch. That helps clarify things for me."
I was crying a bit when I hung up, but I was not sad. I knew what I needed in my life.
I'd told a slight lie to Gretchen. I knew I probably never would have kissed her without Desdemona. It was the look of hunger in her eyes that pushed me over the edge, and Keith never got that.
I had told her the truth though, when I said Desdemona was me. It wasn't like any other role I'd ever played. I didn't need to remember lines. I just spoke as myself, just a little more feminine.
The last thing I needed to consider however, was more serious. Would Keith disappear if I kept presenting to people as Desdemona? I know that I never worried about Desdemona disappearing. She was always there for me to put on. Would Keith become the same, only in reverse? Would Desdemona become the default, with Keith a role I played occasionally?
Was a role more than the clothing that you wore, or the gender that you presented?
Sitting demurely, I turned to the other three in the room, "What do you guys think?"
"Frankly, Scarlett, I don't give a damn."
We laughed for a moment at Davey's quote, and I had to put in my two cents, "The line is 'my dear,' not 'Scarlett.'"
"Never watched that one. I prefer how Tim Curry said the line to Clark Gable anyway, so I quoted the movie I saw."
"What?"
"Clue."
I still didn't have one but let it drop.
"All kidding aside, I don't care. You're talented, and I will play drums for you as long as you let me."
"I agree with Davey."
"It's really your decision, but as your agent, I have to say it would be easier for you to sign as Keith. Less stress."
But it was fun too. I loved playing with male fantasies. It was empowering in a way. I knew I was a boy, and they didn't. Did that make me a tease? Did I really care?
I loved the way that Jake's eyes would glaze over at the thought of Desdemona and Gretchen making out. It made me feel sexy and wanted, and that made me want Gretchen, strangely enough.
I had made it this far without a major crisis of faith, but would it continue?
"I need a paper and pen, now."
It took me thirty minutes to write.
I looked over the lines of my new song, and realized that I was not writing songs for a boy to sing. I was writing songs for Desdemona to sing.
Mr. Praetor walked in at that moment.
"So, have you made a decision?"
"We can reserve bringing Keith out into the world for when people discover my secret. It will happen eventually. Until then, I want to perform as Desdemona alone."
"And Acting?"
"No one ever said that Desdemona couldn't act." I tossed on a southern belle accent for the fun of it, "Why, Mr. Praetor, I do believe that we have some business to conclude."
"I thought you'd say that, and I brought two contracts for you. The first says we are signing Desdemona as a singer and occasional actress. The second states that Desdemona is an Alias of one Keith Robison and that Spotlight signed him to play the role of Desdemona on stage."
"You sneaky bastard. You knew I would decide this way all along."
"Nope. I have a third contract in here for just Keith alone. I covered my bases."
We all laughed at this. Then the three of us signed contracts with Spotlight Productions. Just like that, Up In Flames was represented.
"So, what's first? A local concert?"
"Actually, we have you booked for Saturday Night Live on, you guessed it, Saturday."
"No way!"
"Dude. . ."
"What!?"
Guthrie, Davey, and I all answered simultaneously. I was the incredulous one. It was Davey's dude of course.
"How did you know we would call you?"
"Actually, I called Richard on Saturday telling him that we were interested in signing Up In Flames and had already booked you for SNL. If you'd watched you would have seen yourselves announced as the band."
I looked at Gretchen's uncle and wanted to strangle him.
"I thought you'd enjoy the surprise."
"Ok, I enjoy the surprise. Tell me about it beforehand next time."
We all laughed at the irony of that statement.
"Richard faxed me the terms of your use contracts for 'Bodies,' 'Just a Girl,' 'You an Your Hand,' and 'Stupid Girl.' We'll renegotiate for 'Bodies,' but the rest will let you record with us. So, with those four, and the four songs Keith wrote. . ."
"Um, well, it is four, but were not including 'Don't Blame the Girls.'"
"What?"
"I wrote another song while waiting for you to get down here."
"Ok. We can release a light first album with that, unless you can get another few songs written and recorded in the next week. We want to be able to get the CDs into production as soon as possible, so we want to get all eight songs recorded before Thursday."
"Why Thursday?"
"You fly out Thursday morning for New York. So we have til Wednesday night."
"Yes, but why Thursday?"
"You have a sound check on Friday morning, so we wanted you to get there on Thursday, and the best fare is if you leave Thursday morning."
Three days to get eight songs perfect for an album. I suddenly felt under the gun. It was Monday already. Our other recordings were a bit amateur. These would need to be as good as we could make them, and we needed to learn 'Stupid Girl,' 'What You See (Is What You Get)' and 'I'm My Own,' and they needed to learn 'Just a Girl,' and 'Bodies.'
"You have a studio for us already?"
"Yep, and a producer and sound tech."
"Let's get to it then. . .oh crap, my 12 string."
"We have one for you here. It is in the studio already, and tuned to your preference."
Any minute now I was going to wake up and this would be a dream. Any moment. Sure, long dream sequence for me, but it had to be a dream, right? Nothing like this ever happens to me.
We went up into the studio. The sound tech came in and adjusted our microphones and positioned my stool. We each put on a pair of headphones, which he would use to communicate with us. The producer took the microphone in the control booth and addressed us. "My name's Brad. We have a ton to do and no time to do it in. I've heard good things about you three, so let's see if it plays out. Any preference on what we hit first?"
"Well, they need to learn a couple of songs still."
"Well, hopefully this doesn't turn into a shambles then. Well, get to it. Learn your little songs while losing the company money."
Ok, that was a relief. This would likely be real then, since this guy was turning into a real pain in my. . .
"Ok, let's go through the new one, 'What You See.'"
It was almost pop, but with a darker undertone. The first half of the verse was Major key, and then the second repeated in a Minor key tossing a surreal bent to the lyrics and sound. Then there was a sort of reboot into the chorus, and a repeat for the second verse. Then we go into the chorus a second time, and finally, end with the first part of the first verse repeated into obscurity.
It was like nothing I remember hearing, and sort of sounded like a calliope in need of a backup generator. The first part runs smooth, and then the batteries run down a little as it becomes too much to bear to show this happy persona to the world, even while saying that there is nothing underneath.
We practiced it for over two hours, and something just didn't feel right about it. Something was off.
"Guys, this isn't working for me. I like the lyrics, the tune is just too weird."
"Wait, one more go, I have an idea."
I described it to the sound tech, and the producer said we could give it a go. We ran through it. This time, the sound tech started with generic vinyl sounds. The hiss and pop of the needle. The played the song slower and then faster in time with the hiss, as it went up and down a bit as if the record could not keep speed. We played normal through the first half of the first verse, and then slowed down with the minor key change.
We adjusted the overall tune to more of a Jazz or Big bands flavor, with an adjustment to the speed.
We played it back, and I got chills. I seemed a ghost of myself, singing from before I was born. It was the weirdest sounding song I had ever heard, I. . .
"Ok, I've changed my mind. You are good. That has to be one of the best ghost stories I have ever heard, and the words aren't even that scary. That song might just give me nightmares."
I realized that was the case. The song was a bit of pop fluff about dancing and wearing hot club clothes. A DJ mix with it would make it perfect. . .but it wasn't played with a dance beat.
The anachronism made it stick to your mind like peanut butter, and you worried it until it broke free, taking a chunk of your sanity with it. It was going to be one of those songs that people either loved or hated. You would not be able to find a middle ground. It was also us in a nutshell.
We went through it three more times, but the first time was the best. I had a feeling it is a song we'd never be able to do justice to live. . .unless. . .I could see the stage setting for it. But that would wait for another day.
"Ok, we spent a lot of time on that. Let's go with 'Stupid Girl' next. I have sheet music for you on the stand. Let's run through it a couple of times. Desi, you'll have to figure an extension on the 6 string part for that one."
This one took a lot less time. We had the beginnings of it in half an hour, and then over the next hour we worked out the kinks.
"Desi, a little less base at that part. Davey, you were a bit behind at the second chorus. Guthrie, come on, get it together. You should be able to at least sight read your music."
"I thought he did pretty well."
"I happen to know he has perfect pitch, so pretty well for the rest of us is not even trying for him."
We did it again. And again. And Again.
"People, you did better an hour ago. What's wrong with you."
"We need a break."
"You can rest when you're dead. And I see three breathers in there, so you're not dead yet."
All three of us busted up laughing at his unintentional almost quote.
That broke the tension, and we got it in another two runs.
"Ok, now that ones in the can, let's do Me an my big mouth."
I think he'd latched onto something. Get us enjoying ourselves, and we would get this done faster.
I considered, briefly, writing some off the cuff lyrics for Me an My Big Mouth. We sang "You an Your Hand" instead.
It seemed that the other two picked things up faster when I already knew my part. My voice cracked in the midst of one of our run throughs.
"Wait a moment, Desi. We've been doing this for about five hours straight. I'll have a gopher get you some water. Any preference?"
"Cold."
"That I can do. Take five."
The three of us collapsed on the couch on one side of the room. I felt a cold plastic bottle shoved into my hand, and looked up to see a pretty brunette walking out the door. I slowly drank the water, and felt a little better, and more ready to go on.
I think I was glistening, since I was in girl mode, but the other two were drenched in sweat. I noticed they both had water as well. We finished them off, and I felt a little better.
We finished it within another half an hour to the producers satisfaction.
"Ok, I'd like to get one more done tonight, then we can go for four tomorrow, and that leaves us Wednesday for touchups and going back over the songs. Since we seem to be on a theme right now, let's hit 'Just a Girl.'"
I had fun with it. It was either that or cry. The song was a romp. Really. It was fun to play and fun to sing. Doing both together was nice.
We worked our way through playing and then I added in the lyrics. We made it through and got done in a very short period of time. I think he was surprised.
"Hey, now if only we could do all the other songs this quickly."
"The other songs we've spent more time practicing. Especially 'My life with you is Hell,' and 'Black Flag.'"
"Maybe. . ."
Three "no"s met his suggestion. "Brad, we're tired, I'm sung out, and we have two days to finish in. If tomorrows a short day, all the better for the three of us. We have a concert to give on Saturday, or the next best thing."
"Ok, get some rest. Please be here at eight." We would have to be back at the studio in just over nine hours. I decided to stay the night in a motel in Salt Lake. The guys lived here.
We got out and something occurred to me. I called Yancey. "So, they signed us, and I have to spend the rest of the week recording an album, and then flying to New York."
"What's in New York?"
"SNL"
"Snails Not Liver? So Not Leaving? Some Norwegian Logger?"
"Saturday Night Live." I sniggered at her.
"Going to a show?"
"Going to be the show."
"You're book for SNL?"
"That's what I said."
"Congratulations. Well, it was fun while it lasted. If the music ever falls through, look me up again."
"Wait. . ."
"You are in the big leagues, or will be soon. And the way you manage your money? I doubt you will want for anything even if you should lose the career."
"Yance."
"Don't Yance me. You're still a great guy. Make sure to invite me to the wedding."
"You know, when you and Gretchen get married. I expect it to be sooner than later."
"I'm only sixteen."
"Could have foooooled me."
"John Barrowman you ain't"
"Still, I expect the announcement sometime in the next year."
"Announcement maybe. I don't plan to get married before I'm 18."
"It's only, what, two weeks before your birthday?"
"Yeah."
"And you'll be sending out invitations one and a half to two months before you get married?"
"Um. . ."
"So, that means you will send out invitations in less than a year if you get married on your birthday."
Crap, now she's put the idea in my head. How do I get it out.
"Talk at you later, Yance."
I called Gretchen next. "I have to be in Salt Lake at eight tomorrow morning, so I'm planning on staying up here, if that's alright."
"You didn't wreck my baby and are just using this as an excuse are you?"
"Nope, we're recording an album."
"That's great!"
"I think so. Anyway. I'll be staying at the best western up here. I will call you when I get to my room."
I drove the three blocks to the motel, and checked myself in. It was not bad for being a chain establishment. It seemed clean at least. I stripped, and cleaned my clothes as best as I could in the shower and sink. I used up most of the shampoo and soap doing that, but at least my clothing would be almost clean. I hung it up to dry and called Gretchen with the motel phone.
"So, guess what?"
"What?"
"All my clothing is drip drying in the bathroom."
"You tease. You'd never be naked in a motel room."
I considered taking a picture of myself, but thought better of it. I was underage, and she was not. It would be considered child porn. Stupid laws.
"I would send you proof, but I don't think you could handle it."
She giggled at that.
We talked until she fell asleep. I hung up and did the same.
Tomorrow, we still had to complete recording on four songs, and I only hope we could finish before something bad happened. We had gotten this far without any serious mishaps, but we would have to wait to see what tomorrow brought. And I was naked, sleeping in a motel room. I only hope that there wasn't a fire or other emergency during the night.
I've signed a contract with Spotlight Studios and now I'm in the midst of recording a CD. I have to finish it in two days since I have to be in New York for a performance on Saturday. I've quit my old job, and left Gretchen at home. What new does this day have in store for me?
At 3 am I was awakened by my phone playing "My life with you is Hell." It incorporated itself into my dreams, and I only woke up as it stopped ringing. I looked at my phone to see who'd called me. The number was blocked. I figured it must have been a telemarketer or something, so I want back to sleep.
It rang again at 4 am. I woke up faster this time and answered.
"Hello?" I said drowsily. I wasn't fully awake, but I hadn't gotten fully to sleep either. I was sort of in a half state. No one responded. I looked at the phone and it said it was till connected. "Look, if anyone's there, you'll have to try back later. I can't hear you."
I lay back down, and slowly drifted off again.
It rang again at 5am. I was getting a little irritated now. "Who is this?"
"Hi Desdemona. I called back like you asked." Something in the voice creeped me out a bit. I hung up.
I was fully awake now, so I checked my clothing and it was almost dry. I put it on damp. I checked my face in the mirror, thanking my ancestry for the fact I didn't need to shave today. With my plucked eyebrows, I could at least pass without makeup. I adjusted my wig, pinning it in place again, and was walking out to watch some TV when I heard a knock at the front door.
I looked out through the spy hole, but didn't see anyone. I opened the door and there was a bouquet of black roses. Attached to one of those ubiquitous plastic stand thingies there was a black card with gold writing on it. I picked up the card and opened it: I know your secret, Desdemona. Don't worry. I won't tell anyone. They wouldn't understand. I just wanted to let you know that I know, and understand. Your secret is something we share.
Ok, this was getting a little weird. I dumped the flowers in the trash and followed by the note, which I tore up. I didn't know what to make of it, but it made me fell a little uncomfortable.
My phone rang at 6 am. The number was blocked again. I picked up, but didn't say anything.
"That's good, Desdemona, you never know who could be calling you. I see you got my gift. I hope you like it. Good luck at the studio today."
He hung up. No one but the band knew my schedule today, so it must be a prank. Should I talk to them about it? Or should I just ignore it and figure if they got no reaction they'd stop without me saying anything?
I sat back on the bed to watch some TV. At 7, I got another call. This one to Keith from Gretchen. "Hey babe."
"Hey, Keith. Whatcha doin?"
"Watching TV."
"What are you doing up already? I was planning on giving you a wake-up call."
"I couldn't sleep." I briefly considered telling her about the calls, but she might be in on it. Nope, no satisfaction on this one. I'd just have to plan my revenge and let it sit until I figured out who'd come up with this idea.
"Poor baby. Miss me in your bed?"
"Definitely."
I looked at the time. Well, I needed to get going. Sure, it was close, but I didn't want to be late like yesterday.
When I walked into the building, the guard behind the desk said, "Ms. Desdemona?"
"Yes."
"Brad said to tell you that you're in the same room as yesterday. You can go on up."
I walked up the stairs this morning, since I needed all the exercise I could get. I was the first one there, except for the sound tech. I waved to him and went into the Studio. I started warming up, both on my instrument and my voice. I wanted to be loose today. The sound tech's voice came over the studio speakers. "Can I get you anything, Desdemona?"
"Some water for later would be nice."
"Ok, I'll get them to send a case up."
"Thank you. I really appreciate that."
I smiled and he went back to whatever he was doing on the board. "Where would you like it, Ma'am?"
The brunette from yesterday was there with the case. She didn't seem to be straining under it, but I got up anyway. "I can take that the rest of the way."
"It's my job. So where?"
"Next to the couch is fine. Thanks."
"No problem."
I gave her a smile and she walked out in a swish of layered ankle length skirts. I'm not sure I was man enough to wear something like that. They seemed a bit heavy, and I wondered why she wore them to work.
The guys came in at almost the same time as Brad. They were a couple of minutes before 8 am. "Glad that at least one of us could get here with time to get ready. Let's get started as soon as you're all ready."
Guthrie and Davey got ready, and I ran through a couple more vocal exercises before stopping for a drink. My throat was starting to feel a bit sore. I figured it was just dry. I drank more water than I planned initially. We had a case after all.
"Ok, since you have had it the longest, and since the guys already know it, let's start out with 'My life with you is Hell.'"
I shrugged and we started into the opening riff. The bass duel ended up with a more mellow tone when I played it across from Guthrie. It was almost as if we were dancing more than fighting, and the challenge at the end ended up being more a bow between partners. The feel of the song had subtly changed with the new players.
I sang through the song, putting myself into it. We played the key changes and everything seemed to come together, but when we played it back, it sounded a bit flat. Not out of tune, just. . .lifeless.
"You guys need to step it up a bit. Get some feeling into it. Do it like you mean it."
We played through it again, and again, it was lifeless. "Damnit, guys. What the hell is wrong with you this morning? This is an easy song, and you two are screwing it up."
"You're the one sounding like a limp rag."
I had no idea how you 'sounded' like a limp rag, and I just started laughing. Eventually Guthrie and Davey joined in.
This time we had it. We got the interplay right at the beginning, and everything flowed from there. I hadn't realized how much the beginning pumped us up for the rest of the song, but I could see it now. This would be a challenging song live, with one chance to get it right. Definitely not something we wanted to come at cold, even if I'd done it cold in Vegas.
Well, not cold exactly. We'd had the other acts to get us ready for it.
"Finally. Let's get 'Black Flag' while we're on a roll."
We lit through "Blag flag" and it only took us two passes before we were through.
"Bodies" was a real romp. It was a pointless song when you got right down to it, and it took itself way too seriously. It took us longer than "Black Flag" to get down, but we eventually got it.
At this point, my throat was really starting to bother me. I coughed a couple of times, then drank some more water, but it didn't seem to help. We had one more song, though, and I just wanted to get it done.
We muddled through "My Own Person" a couple of times. I wasn't feeling it, and neither was the band. I took a deep breath, and started speaking to them.
"Look, guys, I know this is a bit out there compared to the last three songs we did, but this song is a lot like 'Just a Girl.' It is pushing against expectations. To really get the feel of it, we need to ignore who we are for the moment. We need to look into ourselves and find the independent individual that wants to break free of all of our limitations. It should be a bit ragged. The instruments fighting a bit for supremacy. But it should be a unified raggedness. Know what I mean?"
"Why don't we try this, Desi: Guthrie, you start playing something, same key, but not the song. Preferably something that you wrote yourself. You've got something right?"
"Yeah, Davey."
"I'm going to play a bit of 'Distracting Trash.' at varying tempos. After we have been going for about thirty seconds, use the song to gather us back in, Desi."
It was a bit strange, but I figured it was worth a try. They began, and it was cacophony. The percussion interrupting the bass line. The notes moving from base to treble and back. I felt my moment and joined in. First, I wrestled with the bass, fighting to get it into position, finally, Guthrie started playing a sullen version of the bass line. Next, I had a shooting war with the percussion. In the middle Guthrie tried to escape, but I reigned him in, and pointed him at the percussion. With two against one, we quickly subjugated Guthrie. Then, I shifted into the verse and we were off.
I sang with feeling, every once in a while snarling as I had to reign in either the percussion or the bass. Finally, we got to the end and we all broke apart in shattered sound.
"Ok, well, that's a wrap."
"Can we get a playback?"
"Sure, but we're not doing it again. Don't know if we can beat this one. I want it to be the first song on the album."
It was played back, and I sat there in rapt attention. It was, to say a word, perfect. It was exactly who I saw us to be, and from the looks on their faces, I could tell that the other two felt the same way. This was an opener. It gave us time to work out kinks, and have a bit of Jazz style fun. There was improvisation everywhere in it, and it would never play the same way twice, but that was fine by me. This song was. . .perfect.
"Thanks, Brad." I said, but he didn't respond other than to motion at me to come into the control room, as he was on the phone. I walked into the control room just as he was finishing up.
“Ok, I’ll let her know.” He closed his phone and looked up at me. “Ok, Desi, we need you in LA for a screen test.”
“Um. . .”
“I know that your manager would normally be booking things like this for you, but at Spotlight we’re trying to get back to the good ole days of having a stable of stars. We will try internally for parts, first, and then farm out. On the flip side, we promise to offer you parts first, but will not prevent you from going elsewhere.”
“Ok, kind of a best of both worlds, huh?”
“Yep, something like that.”
“Ok, will you guys be flying me, or should I get there myself?”
“We have a private jet. It is leaving in thirty minutes from the airport. Can you be there?”
I was so going to need to shop for clothing in LA, once I had a moment. I nodded.
“Ok, they can’t hold the plane for you, since the flight plan is already filed. You’ll simply be hitching a ride with some of the studio execs.”
“Alright.” I ran out to my car, and drove it out to the airport. I had ten minutes to spare when I got there and out to the private field.
“No luggage I see, Ms. Desdemona,” said Mr. Praetor as I climbed aboard.
“No time to get any. I stayed up here in Salt Lake last night, and had to hand wash my clothing in the motel.”
“Well, how frugal of you.” It could have been an insult, but his smile took any possible bite out of the remark.
“One does what one must.” I said, putting the back of my hand to my forehead. He broke out in laughter.
“Well, you won’t be doing anything quite that melodramatic, but I would like you to read for the part of the female lead for a new movie we’re producing.”
“Am I going to have time for this? Where is it filming?”
“Utah, actually. It’s a bit of a sci-fi piece, and they need a barren alien wasteland. Like usual, we are using Goblin Valley.”
I shook my head and chuckled. “Don’t people get bored of alien wastelands that all look like they have red rocks and mounds?”
“We’re using a new technique that will automatically change the color of the rocks. We’ll be able to shift it to anything we want. We’re going with a sort of purple hue for most of it, with some blues and greens interspersed.”
“I guess I’ll have to see it. Do I get to read the screen play before I audition?”
“Nope, we want everyone coming to this cold. The screenwriter tells me we have several directions that we can take the female role, and he wants to see what interpretations people bring to the lines.”
“Fine, I’m going to get some more sleep then.”
I went over to a couch against the side of the plane and lay down. I fell asleep quickly. Some one was shaking my shoulder. “Desi, it’s time to land. Return to your seat please.”
It was the flight attendant, male strangely enough. I returned to my seat and buckled myself in. We landed, and I was about to head to the terminal to rent a car when I heard Mr. Praetor clear his throat, “Desi, you can ride with me to the studio. I wouldn’t normally offer, but we gave you no advance warning on this one.”
I shrugged and we walked to the gate where a limo was awaiting him. It may have been my heightened sense of paranoia, but this seemed a bit off.
“Mr. Praetor, you sure it’s alright?”
“I understand your concern, Desi, and trust me, I don’t normally offer this sort of thing. It just happens that the two of us are heading in the same direction. The director thinks he’s found the next Brad Pitt, and I want to see what he’s gushing about. That means I had to use my jet to get out here today, and since I wanted you to read anyway, it worked out perfectly.”
“Ok. . .”
“Look, I know you have a girlfriend, and trust me when I say I’m happily married. Beyond that, I’ve always preferred more mature women. My wife is ten years older than I am.”
I still didn’t know if I believed him, but any time he made the moves on me, it would be obvious he’d been lying. Wait, what am I saying. He knows I’m a boy, and told me that he prefers. . .ok, this whole line of thought it totally convoluted. Somewhere in there it’s obvious to me that he only see’s me as a girl, no matter what he “knows”. I’m subtly disturbed by all of this.
We arrive at the studio, and he helps me to my feet. I walk about five feet apart from him so the paparazzi, real this time, don’t get the wrong impression. I’m definitely looking a little rumpled next to the big shot CEO in his silk suit.
We get inside, and there are a few girls sitting around with sheaves of paper. “You here to read for Liza?” said a woman with a nasal twang and a headset.
“Yes, she is.”
“Oh, Mr. Praetor, I didn’t see you there. Take these. You’re number eighteen.”
I looked at the papers and cringed. Who writes this crap.
Luke: Liza, we need to find some shelter before nightfall
Liza: But where can we find it on this desolate moon.
Luke: I won’t let anything happen to you, Liza.
Liza: I feel so safe with you. Do you think we’ll ever get rescued?
Luke: I don’t know, babe, but even if we don’t we still have each other.
Liza: What’s that?
(Luke and Liza look camera left. Monster will be generated post production)
Liza: Eeek. Save me.
(Luke reaches for his hip. gun missing)
Luke: I must have lost my laser blaster while we were climbing the cliff. Run Liza!
(Liza begins to run, but collapses on her bad ankle)
Liza: Oh! Luke, save yourself.
Luke: I’m not going anywhere without you.
. . .
And on and on. After the first page I wanted to strangle Liza myself. I noticed a clip board and a pencil.
Well, if this was the script, then I didn’t want the part, but maybe I could improve it a bit. Luke’s lines would have to remain the same, but what could I do to Liza. . .
"Number four?"
Ok, so this was going to take a while. A raven haired beauty got up in front of the camera and ran through her lines. She tried to do it serious, and she got a few chuckles out of the people running the equipment. This script was that bad.
"Number five?" No one got up, so after a moment, the nasal voice called out, "Number six?"
This was a bottle blond, who proceeded to toss a valley girl accent into the whole thing. Ditz, like, totally.
The lines seemed written for her, and I knew there was no way I would watch this movie if she was in it.
"Number seven? Number eight? Number nine?"
Nine was another ditz, but a brunette trying to pull it off.
"Number ten?"
Two in a row, I might actually faint from surprise. She tried to pull lovesick teen out of it, and almost got it to work. It was funny watching her hang onto the guy they had playing Luke.
"Number eleven? Num. . ."
"Wait, I'm here. Number eleven."
"Miss, you need to be here and ready when we call your name. Behavior like that is unacceptable."
"Sorry."
She walked up and sat down. She stuttered her lines. If she was acting, it was a good job, and one of the better ways that they could have been played as written. It made her seem shy and naive.
"Number twelve?"
Ok, what in the heck. This girl made Buffy seem petite. She made the guy seem petite. The chair creaked when she sat down. I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing every time she opened her mouth. Her voice was this squeaky little Betty Boop thing, and coming out of that body. . .well, you get the picture. I know it wasn't kind, but it was what it was.
I could see her on the big screen in some space opera outfit, and it would almost make the movie Cult Worthy.
"Number thirteen?"
She tripped over the camera cable. "Sorry." The light went off. A couple of techs looked at the camera while she sat there, beet red, trying to hide in her chair while the guy tried to chat her up.
When she finally got the opportunity to say her lines, she mumbled and then ran out halfway through in tears. I felt sorry for her.
"Number fourteen? Number fifteen? Number sixteen? Number seventeen?"
I guess no one wanted to read for this mess.
Another blond, this one just hammed it up. Melodrama to the hilt and beyond. It was almost entertaining.
“Number eighteen?”
I walked up to the chair in front of the camera. A nice looking guy was sitting there. Look, just because I love women doesn’t mean I can’t tell which guys look good.
“Hi, I’m Jeff.”
“Desdemona”
“Like the rocker?”
“Yes, like the rocker.”
I’d begun to feel a little bad for what I was about to do to this guy. . .until he opened his mouth.
“Liza, we need to find some shelter before nightfall.”
“Luke, I realize your need to overcompensate for your lacking manhood, but if you hadn’t dropped me, I wouldn’t have a hurt ankle.”
There were some chuckles from the tech crew. Jeff blushed, paused a moment, and then glanced at the director and then his sheet.
“Jeff, keep going!”
“I won’t let anything happen to you, Liza.”
“I don’t trust your ability to lead us out of a paper bag, Luke. I mean, do you really think we'll find any shelter around here?”
“I don’t know, babe, but even if we don’t we still have each other.”
One of the techs laughed for a moment before he stifled it.
“Luke, I’m sorry, but I don’t feel that way about you,” a couple of the techs, and the camera man, laughed at this, “What in the heck?!” I pointed off camera right. I looked intense and, while Jeff was looking a bit surprised.
“Luke, your gun. Hurry!”
“I must have lost my laser blaster while we were climbing the cliff. Run Liza!”
“Damn you, Luke, I can’t run. My ankle, remember? Maybe you should feed yourself to that thing to give me a head start?”
The laughter of everyone in the studio almost drowned out Jeff’s next line.
“I'm not going anywhere without you.”
“Cut!! What was that? Who told you that you could rewrite my script?”
A short guy with glasses stormed past the director and walked over to me.
“Look, your writing sucked. It was over the top, and straight out of the 50’s. It was derivative and trite and pointless. If it’s going to be like it was, I don’t even want the part. So, since I need to be here contractually, I figured I’d at least improve it a bit.”
He opened and closed his mouth, but no sound came out. He looked like a huge fish out of water.
“Stop teasing the poor man, Desi. Just because he couldn't write a screenplay to save his life is no reason to torment him."
Mr. Praetor had walked up.
"Mr. Praetor, you don't understand. . ."
"Your vision? This is supposed to be a space opera, not some grand sweeping artistic vision. The concept you pitched me was very good. Then I get this drivel. The fact that a sixteen year old came in and jotted down some lines that run circles around yours only makes it worse."
"Mr. Praetor, you can't expect. . ."
"You to do your job? Apparently not. You're fired William. Escort him off the premises please."
Mr. Praetor walked over to the director. "Oscar, I'm sorry, but I'm less impressed with Jeff than I thought I'd be. He can't ad lib to save his life. He was given a prime opportunity with Desdemona's new lines, but she ran him into the punch line and he never saw it coming."
"Mr. Praetor. . ."
"Why do people keep invoking my name like some sort of supplication to the gods? Look, Oscar, the guy looks good on film, sure, but he can't act. I need a male lead who can act, or anything I put Desdemona into will just make everyone else look bad. You saw her up there, with her own lines, and no direction."
Oscar simply nodded.
"Think how she could be with a decent writer, and your direction."
Oscar was looking into the distance, and then a smile appeared on his face. "Mind if I make you the bad guy?"
"Not at all, Oscar, that's part of my job."
"Jeff?"
The guy looked up from his flirting with thirteen.
"I'm sorry, but Mr. Praetor says no. Thanks for your time."
Jeff shrugged and went back to flirting. Well, I guess you could tell what his priorities were.
Mr. Praetor turned to me. "Thanks for the help, Desi, you were more helpful than even I imagined. I do have a screen test I want you to sit for, but it won't be til tomorrow. I've got to head back. Will you be good out here until tomorrow?"
"Why did you do this, Mr. Praetor? I feel a bit used."
"Well, I knew that you wouldn't stand for this drivel, so yes, I did use you. Look, I'm not here to make friends. I was hired by the board to clear out the deadwood. It's what I do. I come into a company, make it profitable, and move on. The longest I've been in any company so far is about six months. It has made me a very rich man, though. That was my personal Jet we took to get here. Look, can we talk somewhere more private?"
I shrugged, and we went into one of the back rooms. I wondered where this was going.
"Look, Desi, I understand that what I do can be distasteful to some people. It is a job, and I'm good at it. I use people in the role they are best suited for. with your help, as Keith, not as Desdemona, we could make this studio into a niche one. We could cover the topics, in a tasteful light, that plague this society right now. Strangely, your being turned down by the last CEO prompted the board to hire me, and told me that my job was to make the company more conscious of societal pressures. You could be our poster girl/boy."
"I just want to have a music career, Mr. Praetor."
"I appreciate that. You could have so much more. You could support the cause for so many young people."
"Look, I don't think you even believe what you're saying, Mr. Praetor."
"Truthfully? No, but it's what the board wants, and that's what I do believe in. They want this company to go in a specific direction. I see you as someone who could help that, but only if you want to. I will not force you into that direction. I figure that, eventually, when it comes out that you were Keith all along, you'll be in that role for the company anyway."
"But. . ."
He smiled at me, a kindly fatherly smile. "I know that you think this is something that will never happen, but you've told too many people already. The time that a secret stays kept is inversely proportional to the square of the number of people who know it. Sooner or later, your secret will get out. It's going to happen. If you were simply a girl playing a part onstage, it would blow over in no time. This is going to be bigger, however. It's not simply going to go away."
"Mr. Praetor. this isn't what I signed up for. I can't be anyone's example."
"You may not have any choice in the matter."
"Sir. . ."
"No, Desi. You need to get to the point where you're ok with this. I may not be with the company at that point, but realize this: You are going to be used as an example, good or bad, by a lot of people. You will be hounded by religious groups who think you're evil. You will be supported by fringe groups who will see you as a shining example. You're music will be lauded and vilified. You will be famous and infamous at the same time."
"You can't know that, Mr. Praetor. No one can know that."
"Think about some of the more outrageous musicians. Take Prince for example. He changed his name to a symbol because he broke contract and the studio owned his name. The move, without all the facts, was considered to be huge, and a solidarity with issues of slavery and choice. When he got his name back, he faded into the woodwork. Sure, people still listen to his music, but he lost some of his fame.
"While his name was a symbol, he became the punch line to jokes everywhere from sitcoms, to animated cartoons. I even read an online comic that used this as the basis for a story line. You weren't allowed to play Chess in public because it was obscene. A bard, whose name was a symbol 'to represent the loss of freedom in society' sang a song called, 'Let's talk about Chess.'"
I looked at him blankly for a moment, and then a light dawned, "but that isn't even a Prince song."
"And that's not the point. They included two controversial items to show the absurdity of the controversy. It's called satire.
"You are going to find yourself in the same position. You will be a joke told everywhere. Now, like Prince, you can ride that train for a little while, until the reality hits people and you fade away, or you can use it to the advantage of people in similar situations."
I was about to spout off something, but I stopped to think. There were people in my life who were living with what I only dabbled. They had lives that were difficult because of the perceptions of society. They were already jokes in a lot of popular culture. I'd caught some episodes of a sitcom on reruns a couple of years ago. The title character's brother was obviously a man in a dress. He didn't pass, and wasn't supposed to. I don't know if he was supposed to be transgendered or a transvestite or what, but he was supposed to be laughed at.
I couldn't be said to be a boy in a dress. I'd passed in public so far. Public? I'd just passed in a closed environment where people were looking at every move I made.
I made a decision right there. I would push Desdemona as far as she could go. When I was revealed, I would keep pushing for acceptance as Desdemona. I think that was the moment where I realized that I would be living as a transvestite for a long time. Could I really live with that? I thought so at the time, and even now I'm pretty sure of it. Who are we really? Are we the person that the world sees, or are we the person that he hide inside ourselves. We all have secrets that we never share.
"Yes, Sir, in answer to your earlier question, I'll be fine. Back in here tomorrow then?"
"Yes."
I left the studio, making sure I knew which building it was, and went out to the gate.
I walked out to the guard shack. "So, if I leave, will you let me back in tomorrow?"
"Of course, Miss. I'll let you back in. Your name?"
"Desdemona."
"No, I meant your real name, not who you're pretending to be for some movie. Although, come to think of it, isn't she a little too new to already have a story about her life made?"
"Um, actually, I'm that Desdemona." I showed my ID to him.
"So sorry, Ms. Desdemona. I just thought. . .well I already told you what I thought."
"Look, it's fine. I don't think anyone should bow to me or anything. I'm just a g. . .irl like anyone else."
"Well, my son doesn't think so."
"What's with guys in uniform and their sons who listen to my music?"
"Well, according to him, you're hot. A little young for my tastes though."
I blushed. That reminded me that I needed some makeup and. . .I needed to go shopping. By myself. As Desdemona. . .in LA. This would be fun.
"Anything the matter, Desdemona?"
"Friends can call me Desi, or pretty much anyone who doesn't like to use that mouthful I guess."
"You went pale for a moment, Desi. Something wrong?"
I looked at the plump guard for a moment, and then thought 'what the hell.'
"I didn't have time to pack a bag before I got whisked into the whirlwind I'm currently in. I need to buy some essentials, like a change of clothes and makeup and. . .well you don't care about that. I just have no idea where to go out here."
"Well, although a date with you would make his day, I'm not going to thrust my son on you. I will, however, offer the services of my daughter, if she is up for it. She'll probably be delighted to spend someone else's money while shopping, so I can pretty much guarantee she'd be up for it."
"Are you sure? I don't want to be a bother."
"You're a nice kid, Desi, and I wouldn't want my own sixteen year old daughter unaccompanied out here. Where are your parents by the way?"
I chuckled a bit at that. . .and turned it into a giggle about halfway though. I needed to work on that. "My Mom disowned me just before I started my music career and I haven't seen my Dad in a few years. Last I heard he was in Seattle. I am emancipated, so I can legally look after myself." I said this last with a sour smile. Just because I could, didn't mean I wouldn't have loved to have one of my parents, or even Gretchen, or anyone else with me right now.
"Ok, well, emancipated or not, I'd love for you to stay with me and my family while you're in LA."
"But, I couldn't impose. I mean, you don't know me, and I don't know you."
"I've listened to your songs, Desi. I do that for all music I allow into my home. I want to know what my kids are actually listening to. Now, all this black and sadness you're into isn't for me, but I don't get the sense that you'd be a bad influence on my family. Do you disagree with me? Would you be a bad influence?"
Could I pass in a family situation? Did I want to? If I told another person about my secret, it would get out faster. It was also possible that telling him would get him to remove the invitation. I stood there for a moment and thought while he looked at me. In the end I realized that lying to him by not telling him would be worse on me if my secret came out later. The only choice I had was to turn down his offer, or tell him the truth.
“Look, if you’re uncomfortable, we could always discuss it after you’ve spent some time with my girl.”
“That’s not it. I’m considering the ramifications. You see, I have a secret. If I stay with your family, I’d need to tell you, since I really couldn’t consider myself a proper guest by keeping it from you. If I do tell you, and it gets out, it could hurt me. It will get out eventually, probably, but I’m not ready for it yet.”
He looked at me, considering for a moment. “Will this secret hurt my family, whether or not you tell me?”
“I’m not a murderer or anything like that. It’s just. . .”
“Is there something about this that would be impossible to keep if you stayed with us?”
“Yes.”
“And you’d be willing to tell me instead of simply staying in a motel and muddling on through?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You’re not a boy or something are you.” I looked at him with shock, “wait, you’re a boy? Crap. I meant that as a joke. Look, sorry I brought it up.”
“I understand, sir, if. . .”
“Now, hold on a minute here, Desi, I never said anything about retracting the offer. You’re not going to be a danger to my daughter are you. . .I mean you like girls?”
“I have a girlfriend, if that’s what you’re asking. Her father trusts me to do nothing, and I live under their roof. Actually, here.”
I dialed Tom up. “Tom? Yes, could you talk to someone for me? He has some questions about me. Yes, he knows.”
I handed my phone to the guard, who I realized I had never asked the name of, and they talked for a couple of minutes. I looked around at the road, wondering if I’d done the right thing. Sure, I hadn’t specifically told him my secret, but I’d told him I had a secret, and he accidentally worked it out. I needed to work on my poker face. In the future I would assume no one knew, and treat comments like that one just made like a joke. I would have just given my secret away to anyone in a situation like this, and it could have been a bigger audience that I gave it away to.
He handed my phone back to me.
“Well, Tom certainly gives you high praise, and I can tell that he trusts you with his daughter, whom you love, so I think I can trust you with my daughter whom you don’t even know.”
“Thanks, sir.”
“No sirs with me, Desi. Call me Urban.”
I blinked at him, “Urban?”
“Yep, I’m Urban Planning. My parents had a bit of a sense of humor. I passed it on to my first born. His name is Public.”
I laughed. “Really?”
“Yep, well, his middle name. We considered having his first name Department, but were kind and called him Joe.”
Wait, so he’s Joe Public, or Public Planning?” I died laughing. Urban joined in.
A thought occurred to me, "Why are you so ready to accept my secret, sir? I meant, Urban?"
"Well, Desi, you seem like a pleasant enough young lady. You have good manners and a good sense of humor. Whatever the truth may be, you are a good person in my book."
"But you don't know Tom either."
"If you had the forethought to prepare a character witness for someone you didn't plan to meet, for a situation that shouldn't have come up, then you are more organized than most adults, let alone a sixteen year old. You could have kept your secret from me. I can't see someone as beautiful as you seem to be lying about that, and if you told the truth about that, the reason for lying about a character witness just becomes mind bogglingly complicated."
I giggled a bit at this.
"Let me call my daughter." He picked up the phone and called someone, "Malenka? Yes, it's your Dad. I met someone who needs to go shopping, and I thought you could show her the local scene. Yes, she has money. Yes, she's at least a little famous. No, but your brother will be jealous. Ok. Love you."
"Malenka is a strange name."
"Well, it fits the rest of my family."
I looked at him blankly.
"It's from a Russian word: malyenkii. It means small or little."
I groaned.
"Just cause I said I followed my parent's version for my first born, doesn't mean I didn't change it for the rest of my family."
"True. Does your daughter know where her name comes from?"
"Yep," he said with an evil grin.
We talked a bit more while we waited for his daughter. I thought of something right before she arrived.
"So, are you planning on telling your family about me?"
"Nah, I'll just put you in the guest room. That should be enough."
His daughter arrived in a beetle. No, not the new flashy ones, the original ones. It was a hard top, of course. The base was white, and the top was black. It was shiny though, so I thought it was cool.
She hopped out and ran to her Dad, and then stopped, looked at me, and her mouth dropped open.
"Desdemona?"
"Hi." I gave her a finger wave.
"This is a put on, isn't it."
"Nope, hon, it's not. This is the real Desdemona. She has ID to prove it."
"Joe's so gonna freak"
"She needs to go shopping."
"Let me do this, Urban. Malenka, wanna go shopping?" I had a grin on my face.
She squealed. I joined in. It was kind of fun actually.
"Desi's staying with us tonight, Malenka, so bring her to our house when you're done."
"You mean if we're done, don't you?" I had no idea where that came from. I said it, but I still was a little shocked by it.
This set off giggles, and Urban just rolled his eyes.
"Have fun you two."
We got in her car, and she turned to me with her hand out, "My friends call me Molly."
"Desi."
"So, I take it this is your first time to LA?"
"Yep, mostly gone back east when I've traveled." Listen to me act the sophisticate. I'd only ever been to one place.
Well, that and Las Vegas, but everyone's been to Las Vegas.
I had no reference to tell where we were exactly, so I can't even say which mall type edifice we ended up with.
"Let's go shopping!"
"You are way too chipper, Molly."
"And you are way too Goth. Lighten up."
I snorted at this. "Ok, yay, let's go shopping," I said without any enthusiasm, playing Goth to the hilt. She giggled at this and I couldn't resist joining in
I'm glad that I pin the wig in place, or I would have lost it after the first time that she pulled my hair away from my ears to try different earrings against my face. She was a very touchy person, and I just went with it. We looked at jewelry first, and I have to say that I really had no clue what I was doing here. I had my Bleach bracelet on and a pair of stud earrings. We tried tons of things.
"I love the way these silver and blue dangles look with your pink hair."
"Aren't these bracelets sooo cute."
"Look at this necklace." Here's something I never expected to find at a department store jewelry counter. It was a little dusty, like it had been sitting there for a long time, undisturbed, and I almost felt like an archaeologist, especially with what it was. It was an ankh in platinum and gold. The boundary between the platinum and the gold was sinuous. It wasn't a big one either. It seemed to scream feminine, while at the same time it was individual. You know, it was like a girls fashion cross for Goth's. It was only the second piece of jewelry that had screamed "Desdemona" at me. The first were the earrings of course. It was on a fine chain of alternating platinum and gold links.
"Where's a saleswoman when you need one."
"I was mostly kidding, Desi. Look at the price. You can't seriously be considering buying it."
"Well, first I want to see how it looks on me." I said with a big evil smile.
Molly just looked at me. "What?" I said.
"It's so expensive. I usually only get to look at stuff here."
I realized something in that moment. My bracelet had cost twice as much as the necklace, and the necklace was one of the more expensive pieces here. This was bargain jewelry, and Molly wasn't able to purchase it.
What did I do? I needed to buy stuff, and realized that my tastes, which I thought conservative, were kind of expensive. Something dawned on me.
"You really like those earrings, don't you?"
She blushed but nodded. "Wait here a moment."
I wandered around the store until I found an employee. He stared at my legs. Better than my fake boobs I guess. "I need some assistance at the jewelry counter, so unless you want to help me, could you get someone who should be there?"
"They're having a meeting of some sort." He sneered at me. I blinked at him.
"Excuse me?"
"You can do your window shopping later. I need to watch the entire store and can't go back there."
He'd glanced at the employees only entrance while he said this. "Thanks for pointing the way."
"Wait, you can't go back there."
"Stop me."
I walked into the back and followed the sound of voices. Apparently they were talking about improving their customer service skills. I almost laughed out loud at this, but kept myself in check until I got to the room.
"So, anyone have any suggestions what we can do to improve are relationship with customers?"
"First off, you can hold these meetings at times when the store's not busy. There are about fifty people out there, and all of your real sales staff are back here."
"Who are you? What are you doing back here?"
"Well, the only person you apparently left out there decided that I was here to window shop. I don't know, must have been the pink hair or shoes. I know you don't sell pink shoes, but I do buy jewelry whenever I find something I like."
"You have no business. . ."
"Shut up, Carl. I thought this meeting was a waste of time anyway. Desdemona, if you'll wait outside, I'll join you in a minute."
I didn't know what was going on here, but some voices became raised, and a couple of cell phones were brought out. I walked out to the jewelry counter and waited with molly while we looked at some things. I was a bit surprised that some of the items were left out when everyone was in the back.
I could tell what Molly was looking at, and I had a plan. The woman finally came out about five or ten minutes later. "Thanks for waiting. Hello, Molly, seems you found a new friend to shop with."
"Hey, Stacy. It's a favor for my Dad. Desi is in town for the day and needed some essential shopping."
"Desi?"
"Anyone who knows me calls me Desi." I smiled at her and she smiled back. I liked this woman. She had a real strength of character.
"And you brought her here," she asked, turning back to Molly.
"Well, I always stop here when I'm at the mall."
"Ok, first, I'd like to take a look at the ankh."
She seemed a bit surprised by my request, "But no one. . .never mind."
"Look, Stacy? Yes, well look, Stacy, I have a tendency of taking things that 'no one would buy/wear' and making them popular. Me, I just wear what I like. I've never seen anything like it."
"Well, it's not one of a kind, like your famous skull earrings, but we haven't sold a single one of these. Apparently the owner's daughter wanted one, but then decided against it when it got here. Here it's sat since then."
She'd gotten it out while she talked, and brushed the dust off with a cloth. The cuts in the metal made it glitter like diamonds. I put it on and looked at myself in the mirror there. "Wow, it's so you."
"Can I wear it out of the store when I buy it?"
Molly looked at me. I pulled out my Desdemona card and handed it to her. Somewhere in here I forgot to mention I added Desdemona as another person on my account. I did it the week after school got out.
"Of course you can."
"Well, I have some other purchases to make. You hold on to that, and we'll walk around the store a bit while we find out if there's anything else we would like. Oh, and Molly wants those earrings."
"I couldn't"
"Molly, they're a gift from me. Please take them?"
It didn't take long for her to give in. I helped her to put them in, and she smiled. A really big smile. "You're scaring me, Molly."
"Thank you sooo much, Desi. You're my new best friend." We giggled, and I said, "I certainly hope not."
"I'm kidding of course. Can't buy my love." She was looking in the mirror while she said this.
"I need a bit of everything while I'm here. Especially lingerie."
Molly and I walked over to clothing. "Here," she said, thrusting some bras at me. "I know my size, Molly."
"It's obvious that someone else has gone shopping for you, then. A girl needs to try on a bra to figure out if it has just the right fit. The right fit is heaven. The wrong fit and you'll be adjusting your top all the time, like I've seen you do, trying to get it to fit right."
How did I tell her I kept adjusting when I thought no one was looking because my false breasts were moving all over the place. There had to be a better way to keep them in place. Hmm. maybe we'd have to stop by a costume supply store and get some liquid latex. This was LA after all. Hollywood was a hop, skip, and a jump from here.
I think so anyway.
I tried on the bras. . .and then suddenly I knew what she was talking about. The third bra just fit. Sure, I couldn't feel it around the fake things, but I could tell that everything was securely in place. Maybe no glue would be necessary. I twisted and moved a bit, and nothing shifted. Well, much. When I went back to my normal standing position, it settled back into place.
It was pink with a bit of black lace over the front of the cup, and I thought it looked perfectly me. I mean Desdemona. You know what I mean.
I took off the tag and put my turtleneck back on. When I got out of the changing room, Stacy was standing there. I handed her the tag.
"I never knew how good a properly fitting bra could feel," I said with a little grin.
Stacy looked at me.
"I usually just grabbed something and used it. I was more worried about the overwear than the underwear."
Molly and I giggled about this.
The wig was getting a little hot, and it had been hard to get my turtleneck on and off. I had a weird notion. A really weird notion. I sat down, hard. My hair in front was chin length, just like my Desdemona wig. It had always been a matter of taking off the wig, and I was back to being Keith. Could I give that up? Should I?
Who was I? Did hair change who I was?
Over the past few days, I'd spent a lot more time as Desdemona than I'd spent as Keith. I knew who I was inside, and I saw that me as male. Would I be changing my hair for convenience, or would I be letting Desdemona take control? Was Desdemona someone other than me?
"Desi, are you Ok?"
"Sorry, I have a lot on my mind. That and I haven't eaten since a little continental breakfast this morning in Salt Lake." I noticed that my throat was a bit scratchy again, but I put it out of my mind.
We grabbed some more bras and some panties. I kept them as dark as I could, but Molly grabbed some pastels as well. I laughed at this, but didn't make her put them back. I was wearing the necklace on top of the turtleneck when I left the store, and the gold and silver popped on the black background.
We walked around the mall. Ok, we shopped around the mall. Sometimes we bought. Usually we just tried stuff on. I did buy a huge black purse the size of a minivan that doubled as a tent and a life raft.
Ok, it wasn't that big. It was, however, big enough to act as an overnight bag, and would fit a couple of changes of clothes, my makeup, some underwear, and all of the other essentials a girl needed. I was black with pink piping and a pink logo.
Black and pink must be popular in LA.
While Molly was trying on clothing at one store, I called Gretchen.
"Hey, hon."
"Where are you?"
"LA. I got roped into a couple of screen tests. They need me here until tomorrow."
"Ok, but you don't have any clothing."
"That's why I'm shopping.."
"Without me?"
"I know. It's not the same. I've even been trying on bras. You'd love the one I'm wearing." I described it to her.
"I'd love to take it off you, you mean."
"That too, but not this week."
"You're a spoil sport."
"I know."
"So, the reason I called. . .Um, well, do you thing I should get my hair styled like the wig? Pink and all?"
"I don't know, Keith. It would mean a big change in your life."
"Etch, Desdemona is already a big change. I play this role most of the time. I only figure it would be easier if I really had the hair, and it wasn't a wig."
"I remember when you first talked about this. You wouldn't cut or dye your hair like Desdemona's."
"Right now, I'm Desdemona more than not. When I go back to school, I can shave most of it and make it black again. Until then. . ."
"I can see your point. I did tell you I loved that wig, right? I always thought it was a really sexy hairstyle, which is why I got the wig."
"Who are you talking to?" Molly had just come back
"My girlfriend."
"Who was that, Keith?"
"Molly. We're out shopping together. I met her father after the screen test, and he offered her to help me out."
"Ok, just so long as you don't go getting any ideas."
"You know I only have eyes for you, Etch."
"Love you."
"Love you too."
Molly was looking at me a little strangely. "That's too bad about you having a girlfriend. My bro's going to be crushed. So, what was that all about?"
"I was asking my girlfriend if it was ok if I came home with pink hair."
Molly began laughing before she realized it wasn't a joke. "Um. . .don't you already have pink hair?"
"Wig."
"Ah. . .so, hmmm. I don't know where you can get a dye job like that."
I looked down, disappointed that I couldn't get this taken care of. Wait, disappointed? Did I want it this much?
"Wait, I know who can tell us." Molly pulled out her phone, and dialed a number. "Heather? Hey, it's Molly. Where did your sister get her hair done? Yeah, when she got it dyed blue. . .really? I thought. . .oh, that make sense. Bye."
She hung up her phone and looked at me. "Apparently, the salon here in the mall does weird hair colors as well. . .not to say that pink is. . ."
"Don't worry about it, Molly, pink is a weird hair color."
We giggled and went off down the mall. I'd pick up some toiletries on the way over to Molly's house. We'd pretty much exhausted all of the shops here for what we needed, wanted, or plain had to have. I'd even picked up a couple of new things for Molly.
We walked into the hair salon.
"There's currently a ten minute wait, how can I help you ladies."
"I need a trim and a dye please."
She looked up and down and said, "Trying to look like that Desdemona chick, I see."
Molly started to say something, but I gave her a look. "Don't you think I can pull it off?"
"Well, your hair and shoes are right, but I think she has a little more body."
"Well, I thought of that, but then, don't the cameras tend to put on fifteen pounds?"
"I'd say it was more like thirty in her case, and I'm not sure going behind the camera takes it off, but ya know."
I pulled out my credit card and put in on her podium. "So, do I pay in advance?"
"Not at all Miss. . .um" She'd looked at my card to see the name so she could use it. Common retail trick. Too bad for her it said Desdemona on the card.
"I'm so sorry, I didn't know. . ."
"Your store is very lucky today. I need my hair done, and I don't know of anywhere else to get it done in LA at the moment. In the future, though, I'd suggest you treat my fans like you now want to treat me."
"Yes, ma'am."
"There are no ma'ams with me. It's either Desdemona, or Desi if you like, okay" I beamed a smile at her. She mutely nodded.
"Thanks."
Molly and I sat down to read the magazines. I grabbed the closest beauty one, since I had to act the part. I was surprised to find that there were actually some good articles in it. Before I knew it I heard someone call out, "Desi?"
I stood up and followed the woman into the back room. Apparently, this was a private salon. Each of the stations was separated from the others. I couldn't imagine why they would do that.
"What can we do for you today, Miss?"
"I do prefer Ms, actually, and I am tired of my wig." I smiled as I said this and unpinned it at the same time.
I revealed my matted hair. I ran my fingers through it a bit to loosen it up.
"you have nice hair, why did you hide it under this wig?"
"Long story. Short answer is that sometimes I needed to shift from me to Desdemona quickly, and the wig seemed the way to go. As I'm going to be Desdemona more than myself for a few months, I figure I need the actual styling."
"Ok, but so you know, this won't be an easy dye job. We need to strip the black a bit, and then go pink. We could be looking at four or five dyes to get it to the right color.
"Ok, I have the funds for it."
"Let's get to it then."
She washed my hair first. There is something soothing about having someone wash your hair. I'd suggest even the men in the audience try it sometime. "Now, you want your hair cut in the same style?"
"Yes please."
"Ok, let's get it cut, and then we'll start with the dye."
I relaxed and let her cut my hair. She talked to me about numerous things and I responded where I felt comfortable. We finished with the cutting, and my head felt so different. I was used to keeping my hair a bit longer, but it was short in back, letting air cool my neck, where the front still framed my face. Using the wig as a guide, she mixed some batches of hair color. First, she ran a blond to bleach out some of the black. Then she started working on the pink. It was a heavy dye, but even so it required a number of applications before it got to the cotton candy I was used to.
When she was done, and I was looking in the mirror, there was a subtle difference to my hair. It was more me, even though the style was the same, and the color was close. I ran my fingers through my hair, and felt it along my scalp. I felt the bottom drop out of my stomach, and for a moment I thought I'd done something wrong.
"Something the matter, Desi? We need to change anything?"
That question was enough for me to get past myself. I smiled a huge and bright smile. "It's perfect. Just jitters is all."
"If you're sure?"
I kept my marker on me always. I'd been signing things yesterday I figured now was a good time to do another. #68Thanks for the hair, Desdemona.
I left a lipstick kiss with this one as well.
I put it as high as I could reach on the mirror, and put the kiss with me on tip toes. The stylist was smiling when I finished. "That's so cool. No one's ever signed my mirror before."
"Well, hope it brings you luck."
I went out and paid, and left a good tip. These ladies deserved it.
Molly put down her magazine and we went out to her car. We stopped by a grocery store on the way to her house, and I got the essentials: razors, shampoo, deodorant. I made sure they were all girl brands. On a whim I picked up a box of tampons. I checked the sizes and picked regular.
I paid for my purchases and we finished our drive to her house.
We pulled into the driveway and went inside.
"Hey Molly, Mom says you went to help out a. . .um. . ."
"You must be, Joe." I said putting out my hand.
He swallowed and nodded.
"I'm staying at your house today."
He smiled at me, and I knew this was going to be a fun night, for all definitions of the word.
So, I'm staying at the house of Urban Planning, a guard at the studio where I'm doing a screen test tomorrow. He knows my secret, but none of the rest of the family does. Tonight and tomorrow will be a real test of my acting skills as I try to pass myself in a family setting. . .Wait, what's that. The story's over for this week.
My phone begins to ring, and it's playing "My life with you is Hell."
Bruno the Bandit is copyright Ian McDonald. It is mentioned obliquely. The link to the specific story mentioned is http://www.brunothebandit.com/d/19990719.html. The idea of a CEO reading a web comic is not impossible, since I know a lot of people who read Bruno, some of them with multiple doctorate degrees. And User Friendly is read by thousands of IT professionals.
I looked at the caller ID on my phone. It said Out of Area. I thought about it a moment, and then answered the phone.
"Desi, where are you?"
"Richard?"
"Who else?"
"I'm in LA. Mr. Praetor booked me for a screen test here tomorrow, and I came out today to help him sack a screenwriter"
"Ok, well, I wanted to know where you were, as he told me about the screen test tomorrow, and I was beginning to get a bit panicked since your phone has been unreachable all day long."
"Oh."
"Don't worry about it, Desi. Just let me know next time something like this happens."
"Ok, Richard. I'll do my best. Wait, why didn't you call Gretchen and ask her about this."
"I assumed that she was with you, wherever she was. Tom hasn't seen her today. He's worried that she's gone out so soon after her surgery."
I was beginning to get a bit worried myself. "Isn't she answering her phone? I talked to her no more than an hour ago."
"You called her?"
"Yes."
"We've all tried calling her, and you're the only one who's reached her so far."
"Give me a moment and I'll try to call her again."
I ended the call and dialed Gretchen's number. It went to her voicemail, but not to her voice.
"I assume that by now you've discovered my little secret. I have your Treasure, and she's quite the lovely one, isn't she. I can see what you see in her. She's my Treasure for now. When she's gone you and I can be together like we were meant to be."
It beeped and waited for my message.
"Don't you dare hurt her. I don't care where you are, or who you are, but if you hurt her, then nothing will save you from me."
I was angry and scared and a thousand other emotions all at once. I needed to be doing something, but I was in LA and they were back in Utah. What in the world was I going to be able to do from here to resolve this issue.
Molly put her hand on my shoulder, "Desi, are you alright?"
"My girlfriend's been kidnapped by a stalker. I don't know. . .what am I going to do?"
Joe walked over to us, "Is there anything I can do for you?" He looked so sincere and all I could do was laugh. Then it became hysterical and I couldn't stop. I just laughed until I couldn't breathe, and then started up again. Fear gripped me, and I just couldn't stop laughing. I laughed because at that moment I couldn't cry. I held myself and laughed.
"Shh, it's alright, Desi, relax. There are people out there to help. You're not alone. You need to calm yourself."
I finally calmed down enough that I could cry and the floodgates opened. "But it's all my fault, Molly. I didn't tell anyone that I had a stalker, and now Gretchen has been kidnapped. I assumed that someone was playing a joke. I didn't take it seriously, because who else could have known my schedule but my friends?"
I just sobbed there on the sidewalk in front of their door until Mrs. Planning came out to see what the commotion was about. "Come inside you three, and let's get Desdemona all cleaned up."
"People she knows call her Desi, Mom," Molly said.
I gave her a weak smile, but didn't say anything in reply.
"Ok, Desi, dear. Why don't you come up to the bathroom with me and we'll get you freshened up."
I went up to the master bathroom with Mrs. Planning. It was huge. There was a jetted tub big enough for two people in the corner, and a lot of floor space around it.
"Take off your shirt, dear, it got a little dirty from the sidewalk."
I blushed, but didn't make a move.
"Urban called me before you got here, dear. I know everything so you don't have to worry."
I removed my necklace and then the turtleneck. I almost forgot I'd been wearing the bra. The pink peaking through the black lace was very pretty. The slight shifting when I moved was the only tactile reminder that I was wearing breast forms at all. For a moment I wondered what it would be like to have real breasts, but then pushed that thought aside. I could go that route, like Gretchen did, but I didn't really feel like it was the right one for me. I still didn't know what life would have in store for me, but I knew it wouldn't be that.
Mrs. Planning came back in and handed me one of the shirts that I'd bought today. It was black and had pink sequined hearts on it. Like I said, LA seemed to have a thing with black and pink right now. Or maybe it was just the stores I went to.
I put it on, and only then realized how deep the neck line was. Some of my bra peaked out, let alone my fake breasts.
"No, that won't do. Here, Let me help you a bit. Take off the shirt and your bra."
I did so, and took the breast forms off with it.
"Well, looks like we get to start from the basics. Lucky for you I had a mastectomy."
I looked at her chest, and couldn't see anything out of the ordinary. She had. . .I blushed, realizing what I'd been doing, and looked away.
"It was the left one, and I attach the breast form because it gives me a much more natural feel. Now, these aren't exactly your skin tone, so we're going to have to do a little blending afterward, but it should be okay. They're close enough. Well, let's get the girls attached, shall we?"
"How permanent is this?"
"Not at all. You can peel them off, and it isn't strong enough to let you go braless, but they will move like they're a part of you, and we can use a bit of concealer to blend them into your skin tone."
She glued them in place. "Now, they will stay there, just not if you get too active."
I put on my bra and then she went to work with the concealer. I watched what she did in the mirror. In a couple of seconds, the line between my skin and the forms faded. It still wasn't perfect, but that would have to wait for new breast forms that were made for me. I put the shirt back on, and I was amazed. I actually had breasts. It was the weirdest thing I'd ever seen, and made me uncomfortable.
I took a deep breath, and decided to go with it. I fixed my makeup and hair. My hair. It was so weird having the pink be me, but at least I'd gotten rid of the wig temporarily. Ok, a little more than temporarily.
It suddenly occurred to me that I was feeling better and Gretchen was still missing. I'd completely forgotten about her for a few minutes. "I'm a horrible person."
"What's that, Dear?"
"I'm terrible. Here I was worrying about my appearance when Gretchen has been kidnapped." I started to collapse in on myself, and Mrs. Planning put her hand on my back.
"Desi, there is nothing that you can do for her right now. I'm sure the police are doing everything that they can. . ."
"Wait, there is something that I can do." I pulled out my phone and called Richard. "Richard, I have a stalker, and she, or he, took Gretchen. They delivered some flowers to my room in Salt Lake. I'm sure the room has been cleaned out, but maybe the police can find something there."
I gave him the motel and the room number.
"Thanks, Desi. We'll get that to the police."
"One more thing, Richard, the person who was stalking me knew my schedule yesterday. That means that they probably work for Spotlight."
"Ok, I'll pass that on. Are you coming back?"
"I want to, Richard, but a smart woman out here pointed out to me that there's nothing there I could do. I could be out there pacing and worrying, or I could occupy my time with work. I'm figuring that I need this right now to keep from completely falling apart."
"Ok, Desi. Good luck tomorrow."
"Find her for me, Richard. I can't live without her."
"We'll do what we can. Night, Keith."
We hung up and I wiped away a tear from my eye. Looking in the mirror made me feel better for some reason. "But this isn't me. . ."
"For now, it is, Desi. I know that you're an actress, I mean actor, right?"
"In addition to everything else, yeah."
"You put on the role of Desdemona. She is person that is growing the more that you play the role. Personally, I worry for you, Desi. The longer you stay in role, the more that is going to bleed into your normal life. With something this consuming, you need to decide what parts of the character are your real life, and which parts are only Desdemona."
"My real name is Keith."
"And I'm Candi."
"Candi Planning? Doesn't seem to have the feel of the rest of the group."
"My maiden name is Stripe."
"Is everyone out here insane?"
"There are lots of parents out there with sick senses of humor. I even know a Door and Ding Bell."
I groaned.
"Keith, you're a singer I assume?"
I chuckled at this, "Yes, and my normal range caused the problems I am having."
I gave her a short sample of my range. I had sung since this morning at the studio, but I'd started to miss it all the same. Singing made me feel so alive.
"That's amazingly high for a man. How old are you?"
"Sixteen."
"You seemed older to me."
"Yeah, a lot of my friends would agree with you. I'm legally emancipated."
"Sorry to hear that."
"Why would you say that?"
"Well, I know what a strength family can be to people. I'm sorry that you're on your own."
"I'm not alone. I have Gretchen and her family. I also have my own extended family, who are kind of pissed at my mom right now."
"What about your dad?"
"I have no idea. He ran away with his boyfriend years ago and I haven't heard anything from him recently."
She smiled kindly at me before continuing, "As I was saying, Keith, decide which parts of you are Desdemona. She has your voice, and your body. What parts of her character are you?"
"Her sense of humor is all me. I loved the irony of being Keith, pretending to be Desdemona, singing 'Just a Girl' and 'You an Your Hand.'"
Candi chuckled at this and shook her head. "Ok, what else?"
"I love jewelry. I always have. Usually I get more masculine styles, but some of it worked with either me or Desi."
"That necklace is definitely not masculine."
"No, but it is like some jewelry that I've seen in the past. I really liked it, but I'd never be able to wear it. A lot of it I bought for Gretchen, so at least I got to wear it second hand, but this time I thought 'why not.'"
I picked up the necklace and looked at it for a moment or two before putting it back on. It slipped between my breasts snd lay there against my skin. I gave a little smile at the image.
"What else is you?"
I looked at Candi's image in the mirror. "The stage makeup, but not the everyday makeup. The clothing is definitely her."
"I assume the hair is her as well?"
"Yes." I was a little worried about the hair. Apparently it had been the stalker, and not Gretchen who'd thought it was a good idea.
"You can always change it later, Keith. Ok, now, let's make you presentable and go downstairs to dinner."
I touched up my makeup and hair. I could do this. Desdemona was an act that I could put on, or take off. It was time to get my own breast forms, though. I needed something that matched my skin tone a little better.
We went downstairs, where Urban, Joe, and Molly had already set the table. It was a different environment than I'd experienced before. There was a sort of friendly competition going on in their words and actions. Nothing unkind, but they all seemed to be trying to get the last word in. . .no that's not exactly it. It was a wordplay. Each person added to it in their own way. There was a lot of laughter and more smiles than I was used to.
I pitched in where I could, but I was way out of my league.
After dinner, I helped Candi in the kitchen. We cleaned and put away the dishes, and before I knew it, I was on my way up to the guest room and to bed.
This definitely wasn't the house that I expected a security guard to live in, but I was too embarrassed to ask. I locked the door and carefully peeled off the 'girls' as Candi had called them. There was still some of the adhesive on my chest, but it rubbed off easily enough. I'd cleaned off my makeup in the bathroom.
I dreamt that night of some faceless shadow chasing me. It was always right behind me. No matter where I went, it would be right there. Eventually I went to the airport and flew away. The shadow told me as it was going out of sight, "I can always find a new playmate if you won't play with me."
I woke up in a cold sweat. Looking at my cell I noticed that it was a couple of minutes after 3 am. My phone was silent. Yesterday the calls had started at three. I tried to go back to sleep, but I just couldn't. I felt words rattling about in my head, and I was about to go out into the house when I realized I was naked from the waist up. I put on one of my new bras and put in the girls, then found a tee shirt that would cover them up. I went in search of a paper and pencil, as the words began to swirl around me. I lost track of time as I wrote down the words that came to me, and it wasn't until Candi came into the dining room at six that I was really aware of my surroundings. It wasn't like my normal compositions. this one wasn't so much a song, as a primal scream. It had no coherent thought to it, which is probably why I hadn't ever finished. The words weren't following me around anymore either.
I went upstairs and put it into my bag, and packed up my clothing and such. I found a bottle of the adhesive in my bag, as well as the concealer that Candi had used last night. I decided that it might be fun to show off a little today at the studio, so I attached my breast forms and then put on a clean bra. I carefully applied the concealer like Candi had the night before. I picked a top that wasn't quite as revealing as the one last night, but you could still see a bit of my cleavage.
I put on my necklace, and called Richard.
"Any news?"
"They've focused on an employee that walked out yesterday. Her address was fake. She was using a stolen identity, so they're only a little closer to figuring out who she really was. Apparently she put surveillance equipment in your room at the motel. They're tracking the purchase of that down as well."
"Thanks, Richard. Call me if anything comes up?"
"Will do, and Keith? Be careful. Whoever this is broke into your motel room, likely while you were there."
"I will, thanks." The thought of this person being so close to me without my even being aware of it sent chills down my back. I decided that it was probably time to get going so I went downstairs.
Urban and Candi were the only ones up. We ate a quick breakfast and Urban drove me to the studio. I left the bag with my clothing in it at his guard post and walked to the building we'd been in yesterday.
Everything inside looked much like it had yesterday, except for the people waiting read. There were a lot of masculine looking women, as well as some young men who I was sure were in drag. What in the world had I gotten myself into this time.
The same woman from yesterday walked up to me. "Desdemona, so nice to see you again. So, Mr. Praetor roped you into this as well?"
"Yes, but this one is supposed to be more of a straight forward reading. No getting anyone fired that I know of. What's your name? If it was mentioned yesterday, I was a bit too distracted to remember, I'm sorry."
"That's perfectly fine, and I'm Wendy. Ok, take these. Unless they are really switching things around on us, you'll be reading the part of Cory."
I looked at her a bit blankly, and something seemed to click in her head. "You have no idea what you're reading for, do you?"
"Is it bad?"
"Depends on your definition of bad. Think of it as a sort of teenage 'Crying Game'."
I had no idea what she was talking about. My continued blank look must have made that clear. She took a deep breath and tried again.
"Ok, so maybe that is a bit dated. Cory is a guy who has been dressing as a girl and going to high school. He's fallen in love with of the guys that he. . ."
"Stop just a minute. Is Cory transgendered or a transvestite."
"Does it make a difference?"
"Of course it makes a difference. A transvestite is a boy in drag. If it's the other, then Cory is a girl trapped in a boy's body."
The woman blinked at me a couple times and then smiled. "I can see why Mr. Praetor picked you. You understand the issues more than most of these girls. Let me go ask the writer and see if he can give me any more information."
I stood there and looked over the lines. At least they seemed a little better than yesterday's. I would be playing the scene where Cory revealed him/her self to the male lead, Mike. Knowing the motivations of the character were even more important than I thought.
A twenty-something man walked over to me with Wendy in tow. He reached his hand out toward me as he approached.
"Alan Braithwate. Even if you weren't famous, I'd like to come over and meet you. You are the first person who actually thought to ask that question. I can tell that really well with all of the transvestites we have to read the role. Cory is transgendered."
"Is she a lesbian, or straight?"
"You really do understand the situation, don't you?"
"Let's just say that I have some friends in the community."
"Who'd have thought? Cory is straight, and really likes this guy. What worries her is that she's found out, in a previous scene, that Mike is a bit of a homophobe."
"Is Cory taking hormones?"
"That's actually a good question, one that I don't have the answer to. I guess she could be getting them illegally."
"Or even legally. Given the right psychologist."
"That's something I didn't even consider. I think you can tell that I don't really have a good grasp of the situation. I'm trying to tell a specific story, but there are parts I simply don't understand. I hope you can at least consult if you don't get the role."
"There are people much more qualified. . ."
"But without the insight into it that you might have. Is it you or someone you know."
Wendi looked completely shocked, and I blushed bright red.
"Female to male then?"
I felt my confidence returning. He hadn't really suspected anything. "No, not me. It's someone else's story to tell, which is why I blushed."
He looked at me quizzically, but let it drop. "This is going to be a long day, and we may need you to read a couple of times. We are trying to cast both roles today, or in the next couple of days at least."
I really hoped it wouldn't take a couple of days for the police to find Etch, but I would be busy if it did. I said a little prayer there, in the middle of the studio, asking that she be returned to me safe and sound.
I was still pleading with my maker when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I turned to see Wendy standing there.
"Alan wants you to read first. He'd like for someone to set the tone he is looking for."
"Okay. Do I have to sit down for this?"
"Not if you don't want to. They usually like to have people who are reading for a role sit in camera, though. You know, zoomed headshots and all."
"Okay."
I walked over to the chairs in front of the camera and sat down in one of them. I glanced over the paper and prepared myself as best I could.
One of the guys came and sat down next to me, and the way he was looking at me really made me uncomfortable. He'd be making eye contact if my eyes were on my chest. Then something dawned on me and I smirked. He was staring at fake breasts. And he didn't even know it.
"Hi, I'm Desdemona."
"Paul." He said absently. This had to stop. "Look, Paul, I know that you'd like a pair of your very own, but it's embarrassing the way you are staring at them."
He blushed bright crimson and quickly looked up into my face and then away. He took a few calming breaths and then looked back at me.
"Start whenever you're ready."
Paul took a deep breath and then started reading. "Cory, I think. . .I mean I know. . .This is not coming out right."
"Take your time, Mike." I smiled a comforting smile. I could see this situation playing itself out. I'd been on the other end of a not dissimilar situation. I remembered when Etch had told me.
"Cory, we've been dating. . .okay. Look. I love you Cory Matthews."
The smile went away. Sure it was in my role, but his words also pulled me from my reverie of times past. And Cory did like Mike, but was unsure of where this was supposed to be going.
"Mike. . ."
"No, hear me out. You are a special person to me. You've always been special to me. I knew I wanted to be with you from the moment that you first walked into that classroom."
"Mike, I can't. . ."
"I know your parents don't like me, but that can change. I'm willing to help them like me. They don't really know me."
How would I put the next line? It needed some sort of feeling. And confusion was working for me.
"Mike, I really like you. I do. It's just that I'm not ready for this."
"Ready for what? It's not like I'm asking you to have sex with me."
I let my jaw drop a bit, and then closed it with a snap. "That's just it, Mike. There are things you don't know about me. Things you should before anything else happens."
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about Billy, Mike."
"What does that faggot have to do with us?"
"Everything!"
"You don't like him, do you? He's not even into girls!"
"I'm not a girl!"
Mike stopped in confusion, opened his mouth to speak, stopped again. "Wait, what?"
I turned away from him and tilted my head down. If I still had my longer hair I could have hit my face in it. As it was, all I got was a little half veil. A pink half veil.
"Cory, what are you saying?"
"I'm not real. I thought I could do this, be this, for myself, but I'm not real. I want to be, but I'm faking it in front of everyone. I was born a boy, Mike."
"What the hell is this? You think this is some kind of joke? Do you!?"
I began to cry. It was all acting, but my emotions were really high with all that had happened to me in the last couple of months, and I channeled those feelings into it. Friends in the hospital. Gretchen missing. What was I going to do about that?
"I tried to tell you so many times. I really like you Mike. I do."
I turned toward the actor next to me and reached out my hand. "Don't touch me you faggot. You're a queer just like Billy."
"Mike, please. I'm nothing like him. I've felt like a girl my entire life."
"You're just a pansy then. Get out."
"But Mike, I love you."
"Get the hell out of my house!"
I took a deep breath to cleanse all of that emotion I had been channeling. This was going to be a very long day.
One of the people behind the camera said thanks to us, and I got up and went to the bathroom. I really hoped that Paul got the role, because he'd be fun to work with. Sure he had a tendency to stare at my chest, but when we started reading lines he focused on my face. I had my hand on the door when I paused to think about the thought I'd just had and snorted. They hadn't even offered me the job yet.
I entered the women's bathroom and went to the mirror. I checked the blending on my breasts first, and then spent time touching up my makeup. It had run a little from my tears, but not bad. I was just turning to leave when one of the prettier girls who had been waiting to read came in.
"Are you Okay?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine. I've been in too many situations like this recently and it just got to me a little."
"I know auditions can be tough, but you just have to move through it."
"Not that. I have a number of friends in the transgender community."
She blinked at me a couple of times. "Oh. . .So you meant telling your boyfriend that you're not really a girl. . ."
"No, that was my girlfriend telling me she was born a boy. Another friend I know got beat up by her boyfriend when she wanted him to wait until after her surgery before they did anything."
Her mouth dropped open on the first part, and then snapped shut for the second. "I was going to say that I didn't really believe that anyone as pretty as you could have ever been a boy."
I smiled at this. I'd never carried a wallet, and so my information was loose in the purse I had almost forgotten I was carrying. I had to look around a bit before I found a photo of Gretchen.
"This is my girlfriend."
"Wow. . .she's even prettier than you are. And she used to be. . ."
"Yes. I'd appreciate it if you could keep this to yourself. I probably shouldn't have even told you. . ."
"Don't worry about it. Call me Gem. What's your name?"
I shook my head a little bit and then laughed. Apparently there were still people out there who hadn't heard of me. It was a little refreshing actually.
"I'm Desdemona."
"Your name is even weirder than mine. That's so cool."
We hugged. "You don't think it's weird hugging a. . .someone who is dating a girl?"
"I hug guys all the time. It's more fun hugging you, but you're taken." I did a double take and she continued, "Yes, I'm a lesbian." We both smiled at this.
I giggled and we left the bathroom to go wait our turns. About half of the guys in drag had apparently walked out, and some of the more butch women had as well.
The girl who was auditioning was trying to sound more manly. I couldn't believe it. This wasn't farce. This guy didn't know that his girlfriend was anything other than the girl she appeared to be. And yet someone was trying to turn it into something ridiculous.
The rest of the day progressed with more of the same. I would spend hours watching people read in front of the camera, and then be called back to read with a couple of people, and then spend more time waiting again. I spent some time talking to Gem, and really hoped that she got the role. She was celled back about twice as often as I was.
I cried when I felt like it. I allowed the other person to influence how I read my lines. It was some of the most fun that I had ever had. It was only when my phone rang that evening that I even remembered what had happened.
"Desi, they found her. Gretchen is safe."
I was glad that I was sitting down, because I'm not sure that I would have been able to stand.
"Desi, are you still there?"
"I'm here, Richard. She's okay?"
"Well. . ."
"What aren't you telling me?"
"Some of her sutures tore, and she lost a bit of blood."
Someone in the room called out "Desdemona?"
"They're calling my name, Richard. I've got to go."
I had no idea how I was going to be able to focus. How had I focused at all the rest of the day? Where had the day gone even? I looked at my phone and saw that it was already six o'clock pacific time.
They called my name again.
"Here," I replied.
"Could we get you to read once more for us?"
I turned to walk back up to the front of the room and promptly tripped over my feet.
There's a game that my friends and I occasionally play. You talk about which celebrities you would go gay for. You know, if they asked you and so on. Ok, so it's kind of a silly game.
It was more a case of an 'if I have to pick' sort of thing for me, since I really couldn't see myself with any guy. Gretchen was the only person I had ever looked at with anything resembling desire.
Until I saw him.
He was the most beautiful man I had simply ever seen. I began to get a little uncomfortable down below as things began to pull, so I began to think about the problems that I'd put Gretchen through the past day or so, and didn't dare look at those lips, or. . .
I blushed a bit and then went and sat down next to him. I had repeated the reading often enough that I didn't need to read from the page any more. The next few moments went by in a dream. I'm not sure what exactly I did, but even after those few lines I felt drained completely, and spontaneous applause erupted from the crew. I looked around surprised at that, since my surroundings had melted away, and it was only in that moment that I realized where I was again.
A lot of the girls and boys who were also reading for the parts clapped as well. Gem was beaming a smile at me. I looked at the boy next to me, and he looked at me with wide eyes. "That was the best acting I've ever seen."
I whispered back to him, "I have no idea what I just did."
"Well, I sure hope you can remember, because they're probably going to give you the role."
I groaned at that, but then the guy chuckled. "Hey, it's not all bad. You'll get to work with me. They told me I got the part about an hour ago. I'm Owen, by the way."
"Desdemona."
"I know. I saw you in Vegas a few weeks ago."
"A lot of people saw the MTV broadcast, but it's good to hear anyway."
"Nah, I saw you perform live. I'm the lead singer of Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools."
Ok, What?! My mind automatically exchanged 'The Bloody Pips,' for my version of their band name 'Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools.' I gave my head a little shake. Who cared what the real name of his band was called. It was not like I was trying to date him or anything.
"So, you're the competition, then, huh?"
"Compared to you, I'm just a poseur. You're the one with talent."
I don't know why this made me blush. I really had to get away from this place, and this person. I needed perspective and some time with Gretchen.
"If I could have everyone's attention please," said the person I assumed was the director, "We're done here for the day, and will be having callbacks next week."
Finally. Now I could, I hoped, get back to Utah and my girlfriend. "Desdemona, could I speak to you for a moment?"
I went over to the director and watched everyone leave for a moment or two while he collected his notes. "To be honest, you're not what we were looking for when we started this process. You seemed a little cold to most of the guys that you were reading with. Sure, there was passion in your voice, but it just didn't read well on the camera.
"With Owen, however, that seemed to change for the better. If you'd like, we want to offer you the role of the leading lady. You don't have to tell us right now, but we need an answer before Sunday evening."
What in the world was I going to do? I didn't want to be an actor.
Or did I? I really didn't know right now.
"Talk it over with your family. Get back to us. I can be reached at the number on the card," and so saying he handed me his business card.
"I understand your hesitation, as this role could cause some serious problems for a beautiful girl like you. . ."
I started to laugh at his assumption. "I'm sorry. I have no problems with the role. I just don't know if I want to be an actress. My contract obligates me to be here."
"Oh, I see. . .well, you're really good at it. Acting I mean."
"Are you sure? That last reading, I wasn't even in the same zipcode. Completely on auto-pilot."
"Then maybe that's all you need, to stop worrying about the role and just do it."
"Thanks for the advice, sir."
"You're welcome, Desdemona."
I went out to the security shack to say good bye to Urban. There was a limo waiting there. When I approached, the back door opened and I saw Mr. Praetor inside. "It seems I can give you a ride to the airport, again, Desdemona."
"Just let me pick up my stuff."
I walked over to the guard shack. "Thank you for everything, Urban."
He handed the bag containing my clothing to me, "I hope they find your girlfriend soon, Desi."
"They found her already. She's okay, so make sure to let Candi know."
"I will."
"Oh, Urban, before I go, can I get your phone number? I really do appreciate what you all did for me, and would love to visit you again the next time I'm in LA."
"Sure, but it may be a while before you get out this way again."
"They offered me the part."
"They did? That's great. Well until next time then. Take care of yourself, Desi."
"You too, Urban."
I waved good bye and climbed into the limo. "Mr. Praetor, a girl could get the wrong impression, the way you keep driving me to the airport."
He smiled, but didn't say anything until the door was closed. "I wanted to make sure that you didn't hold Spotlight responsible for the stalking."
"Why would I. . .what aren't you telling me?"
"The police believe that we were negligent in not reporting another stalking of one of our other clients."
"But why. . .they think it was the same person. They think that I was stalked by the same person that stalked your other client." My mind was reeling. Could they have been responsible for Gretchen getting hurt? "Are you responsible? Do you think it was your fault?"
"That's not what I was asking."
"Yes, but it's what's important."
"No, I don't. We told our other client that she should report this to the police. We thought it was her responsibility, but she's a shy girl, who hasn't been able to actually get on stage and play a venue. She was barely able to record. Beautiful voice, though, so we keep trying with her. A friend of hers sent in her original tape. The stalking really didn't help her confidence."
"Mr. Praetor, you could be telling me anything to get me to believe you. I don't really care either way, though. You didn't stalk me."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Mr. Praetor said with a smirk. "I hear congratulations are in order."
I had a sudden thought, "Did you have something to do with this? If so, I don't need your pity."
"I had nothing to do with it, Keith. Nothing at all. I was actually a bit surprised that you got offered the role."
"I'm that bad an actor?" I asked with some indignation.
"Not at all. I just really didn't think you had it in you to make love to someone on screen."
"But we didn't. . ."
"Sorry, poor choice of words. What I meant was the meaning of the phrase in a simpler age. The ability to make the audience believe that you are really in love with the person opposite you in a scene. To draw them into the moment and not let them go until the final closing of the credits. I knew you would be good, I just never thought you could be great."
Even though he had both complimented me and insulted me in the same breath, I couldn't help but be flattered. I'd never before thought about being an actor, and especially not an actress, but in this moment it was something that seemed to be pulling me.
Music was my life until that moment in time. Sure, I was a good singer. Better than that? Who was I to say. I was just a sixteen year old. I knew what I liked, and I could be mistaken about my own talent.
But this. . .someone was actually saying that I was better than good at something. "Mr. Praetor, do you think that I sing well? Or should I focus. . ."
"Keith, you're sixteen. You have your entire life to decide what you really want to do. For now, do what you want. If the music works, great. If acting works, great. We're here to help you succeed."
"It sounds like you are my manager or something."
"Look, Keith. Let me explain something to you. As far as we're concerned, your manager is only there to get you the best contract with us that he can. After that, it's our responsibility to make you successful. We need to make back whatever signing money that we gave you."
"Signing money. . ."
"Talk to your manager," he replied with a smirk.
I dialed up Richard. "How is Gretchen doing." No preamble, the first words that came out of my mouth. I needed her to be ok.
"She is better than they thought at first. She had almost asphyxiated in the room, and she tore the sutures a little bit, like I said before. I apparently looked worse than it actually was. In fact, she will still be able to go with you to New York, as long as she takes it easy."
"That's great news. Is she there? Can I speak with her?"
"She's still sleeping. They expect her to be up and alert within the next couple of hours."
"Good. So, Mr. Praetor says that there was some sort of a signing bonus. . .?"
Richard laughed. "The man is a shark. Yes, there was a ten thousand dollar bonus that I took my cut out of and put the rest into your band's account."
Compared to what we'd made already, ten thousand seemed like a pittance. I laughed aloud. "That made my day, Richard, thanks. We're on the way to the airport right now. I'll see you in a couple of hours."
"You made me think that you'd actually given us a real sum of money."
"It was ten thousand dollars."
"Sir, I'd almost saved up ten thousand dollars before I sold my first song, Mr. Praetor. While we may not have millions, my band was doing well before we signed with you. We wanted an album, so we signed. That was the extent of the interest on our part."
"You are a lot more mature than I gave you credit for, aren't you. Most kids I know would never have been able to save up one thousand dollars, let alone ten."
"Well, you know how it is. Some things make you take on more responsibility than you would normally."
We arrived at the airport, and for the second time this week I boarded the corporate jet. I'd flown commercial before, and I have to say that the one thing I might be willing to waste more money than it was probably worth on would be a private jet. I relaxed into the leather seats in an environment even more luxurious than I imagined first class to be, and fell asleep.
I woke up when the wheels touched down in Salt Lake.
Richard was there to meet me at the airport and drove me back to the Spotlight Entertainment building so I could pick up Gretchen's car. I drove over to the hospital, and got directions to her room.
"What did you do to your hair?"
"Etch, I missed you so much."
She giggled a bit, and then asked her question again, "What did you do to your hair?"
"Well, I called you to ask you about it. It was noisy where I called you from. I got her, and I could barely hear, but I thought she was you. . .I'm so sorry I didn't notice something was off sooner. I'm so sorry. This happened to you because of me." I began to cry a bit.
Gretchen held her arms out to me and we both sat there and cried. "It's not your fault, Keith. It's nobody's but that psycho's fault."
"Can you never leave my side again? Can we stay together forever?"
"Forever's a long time."
"Are you having second thoughts about me?"
"No, but I worry about my mother, and think that someday you might have second thoughts about me."
"Never babe. I'll never have second thoughts about you."
"I like your breasts by the way." She said, pointedly looking down my shirt. I glanced down myself and realized for the first time that leaning the way I was, my shirt displayed me all the way to my navel.
My hand shot to the neckline of my shirt and I held it to my chest. "How do you girls stand it?"
"Stand what?"
"Revealing yourselves like that? Even though it was just you, I feel so embarrassed."
"You learn not to reveal yourself." She said with a smile. "May I?" She reached her hand toward the neckline of my shirt.
I nodded numbly. Even though it wasn't me that she was reaching for, I felt myself reacting to the idea of her touch. I felt as her fingers played from one side of the line and then the absence of touch, but the feeling of pressure as she ran her fingers over the breast form. My breathing began to speed up a bit, and she took her hand away. "Sorry, I didn't mean to tease you like that. You did a real good job with that concealer."
"Someone in LA showed me how to do it."
"Should I be jealous?"
"No, she's old enough to be my mother." Thinking about age, something else struck me. "Do you regret being with me? I'm so much younger than you are."
"Two years isn't all that much."
"It is right now. Sure when we're both graduated from college, but you're going to college, and I'm about to become a junior in high school. What will your friends think?"
"I'm leaving my friends behind, well except for you. Besides, I'll just tell them that you're a famous rock star."
"And when they meet me? Or will they be meeting Desdemona instead."
"Is there a problem with that?"
"Are you with me because I'm Keith, or because I'm Desdemona."
"Where is this coming from, Keith? You know I love you."
"Gretchen, you wouldn't be caught dead in the halls with me before I became Desdemona. You were the one complaining about my age. Now. . ."
"Are you this insecure, Keith? I have always liked you."
"Really? Because up until a few months ago you really had a weird way of showing it. I was cool enough to hang around with at your house or mine, but never where anyone could see us."
"Please, Keith, stop it."
"Etch, I'm just afraid that I'm not good enough. Someone's going to find out I'm a fraud. Someone's going to really listen to my music, or see me on the big screen, and that's going to be it. A flash in the pan. That's All I'm ever going to be. In five years I'll be a has been before I ever was."
"Keith. . ."
"I couldn't tell that it wasn't you. I have spent the last three years trying to be a part of your life and I couldn't even tell that it wasn't you. I know the sound of your voice, and I hear it in my head. It helps me to write my music. And I couldn't even tell it wasn't you.
"I'm a fraud, Etch. All this build up, and what is it worth? A lot of nothing. I'm going to be nothing more than a joke, and a pathetic one at that."
"Come on, you're not. . ."
"I am not. My mom was right about me all along." I got up to leave. "I'm sorry that I got you hurt."
"Stop, Keith. Wait!" She reached her hand for me and I snapped a little.
"Don't touch me. You're working with her, aren't you. This was a set up. You set me up." The room began to spin a little bit, and then it began to get really, really hot. If only I could get out of this clothing I'd feel a lot better. I began to lift up my shirt.
"Desi, what are you doing."
"Need to be cool. Mhmm. Need. . .air." It was all so clear. I just needed to. . .to. I needed something. Too hot to think. "Why is it so hot in here?"
A nurse rushed into the room, "What's wrong, Miss?"
"I think my friend's been drugged."
"Not drugs. Never take drugs."
Have you ever been truly delirious? I mean to the point that waking and sleeping are exactly the same. I remember once having a dream that we were being attacked by criminals in wrinkled clothing. I bolted from my bed and ran upstairs to secure the locks. My mom startled me in her bathrobe, wondering why I was making all of the noise. Her robe was wrinkled and I really freaked out then.
Ok, so it wasn't a perfect example, but it meant something to me. Your brain controls perception and perception leads thought. Thought leads to action. Nothing I'd said was something I hadn't thought. Usually, however, I was able to keep control over my reactions. I control everything I do. I have to. So much I need to present to the world every minute of every day. When I'm Keith or when I'm Desdemona or any time in between, I control how I am perceived.
Something broke in me. In that moment I had to let everyone know how I felt. It was more a matter of revealing all of my insecurities than hiding them. I just couldn't stop.
"Desdemona, you need to calm down."
"Not Desdemona. You're Desdemona."
"Desi. . ."
"My name is not DESDEMONA!!!!!"
"Ma'am. I'm going to have to ask you to calm down." The nurse was making calming motions in my direction, but I was having none of it.
"Desi. . ."
"Stop calling me that."
"Fine, what should I call you then."
I'm not sure we'll ever know what I was about to say, because I collapsed to the ground. I didn't pass out, not yet, but I'd lost all control over my body. I couldn't speak, or move. I just lay there listening.
I couldn't understand what was being said. It seemed so distant. Richard came in halfway through it. They just let me lie there on the floor. Why didn't they notice there was something wrong? They were stepping over me and moving around me, but no one was looking at me.
I began to hear a mechanical whine that seemed to be coming from Richard's mouth and I realized at that moment that I was dreaming. The jet had just taken off and what I was hearing was the retracting of the landing gear. I sat up and looked around me. It was a little cool in the cabin, so I wrapped my arms around my chest. . .and realized I was only in my bra.
I let out a little shriek of surprise.
"Your shirt is on the floor next to you. I've never known someone to get undressed while asleep before."
I turned toward Mr. Praetor with a biting retort that died before it crossed my lips. He was sitting with his back to me, and doing his best not to look in my direction. It was possible that he was even more embarrassed than I was. I retrieved my shirt and quickly put it on.
"I'm so sorry about that, Sir."
"Don't worry about it. While I may think of you a bit like the daughter I never had, disrobing in front of me still gets and unwanted reaction on my part."
"But, I'm not a girl."
"Desi, it doesn't matter what you are or aren't. You look like a very beautiful young woman right now. Completely like one. I would appreciate some restraint on your part in the future. . .?"
Again an angry reply died before it could emerge. He had a half smile on his face that sort of said, 'I don't mean half of what I'm saying right now.'
"I think I'm partially to blame anyway. I had the flight attendant put a blanket on you when I noticed you were asleep. It was only after that when you started taking off your shirt. I have to ask, though, are they real?"
"No," I said with a smirk, "They're not real. They're silicone that has been glued to my chest and blended using concealer."
"Glued?!"
I chuckled at his tone, "It is a light adhesive that peels off. It's just there to keep them from moving. If I took off my bra, they'd likely fall off on their own."
He laughed at this. "You are full of surprises, Keith. You really are. One moment, I have trouble seeing you as anything but a beautiful girl. The next I can see that the girl is just an elaborate disguise. Can I be honest for a moment?"
I was a little worried at his tone, and let my nervousness show in my tone when I said, "Okay. . .?"
"You aren't the best singer I have ever heard. You have a tendency to go a bit sharp at the end of your phrases, and you occasionally get a little nasal," He put a hand up to stop a response on my part, "I'm not saying you're bad. You're better than most pop starts by far. You could do with some real voice training, though, before you could be considered really great at it.
"Where you shine, however, is your presence. It is this act you put on when you begin to sing. This feeling in someone watching you that this is your whole world. You transform your mistakes into character. They enhance the message you are trying to get across. You are an actor. That is what you really, and truly, are. It's only when you take a step back and start describing the pieces of your character that I even see the lines between Keith and Desdemona.
"I have to say truthfully, though, that this worries me a little. You are in real danger of losing yourself to Desdemona, especially going almost twenty-four seven like you have been."
"I thought you liked the concept."
"Having you be Desi on stage, and Keith everywhere else is fine with me. In fact, I really think that it might enhance your reputation as an actor."
"But I want to be a singer, primarily."
"I know. Really I do. Just keep an open mind, and realize that life doesn't always give us what we want."
LA to salt lake isn't a long flight, and I spent the rest of it looking out the window and thinking about what he'd said. Life had changed for me in a very short period of time. I'd originally done all of this for Jake and Bobby. Now, Bobby was in jail, and Jake had abandoned me. Why had I continued with the farce after that?
Did I enjoy being Desdemona that much?
It was a pain, sometimes literally, dressing like a girl all the time. But I really liked the attention that Desdemona got. I LOVED signing autographs. Seeing the look on people's faces when they saw the little personal touches that I'd given them. Could I really be that comfortable doing the same thing as Keith?"
I looked at the long nails on my right hand. There were a couple of chips in the polish, and I needed to fill in the back a bit. Would I have to cut the nails to be in the movie? What would I do to go perform if I did cut my nails. I could always go back to finger picks, but that would destroy part of the image that people had of Desdemona.
Was fame more important to me than my own sanity?
I was still deep in thought when the plane landed. "Can I give you a ride to the hospital, Keith?"
"I need to pick up my car. . ."
"Your manager already took care of that. We agreed that you'd probably be dying to see your girlfriend was alright as soon as you landed."
"Mr. Praetor, I know that you don't do this for your other clients, so why are you doing it for me?"
He said nothing, so I figured I might as well disembark and head to the waiting limo. When we were settled and moving, he began to speak.
"How old do you think I am?"
"Are you about the reveal that you're a five hundred year old vampire whose only been looking for love your entire life?"
He chuckled at this and shook his head, "No, nothing so silly as that. I'm fifty three years old."
I blinked. "Wait, what?" He didn't look much older than my mother or Tom. I'd thought he was middle to late thirties, maybe early forties at the latest.
"The grey hair would give it away, but I color it. It pays for people to underestimate you in this business. Thinking you are too young for your position works in your favor most of the time.
"Thirty-five years ago, my wife and I had a son. There were complications with the birth, and my wife couldn't have any more children. We loved our son and tried to give him everything he could want or need."
"You're not going to tell me that he was transgendered or anything. . ."
Mr. Praetor laughed. "No, he was a heterosexual man. Just a regular guy, except when he got on stage. Then he was transformed. He could have been great."
"What happened?"
"Leukemia. He died when he was sixteen. I know that my memories of him might be tainted by the filter of memory, but he's the reason that I want to support people who have real talent. You remind me of him. Not in your personality or how you look or anything like that. In your drive and the way you transform whenever you get up on stage."
"Look, Mr. Praetor. I can't replace your son. I can't act as a surrogate for you."
"I don't want a replacement son. I want you to be you. The best you."
"I'll try."
"That's all I ask."
We got to the hospital without any more deep discussion, and went up to Gretchen's room. She was sleeping when we arrived so I sat down in a chair next to her bed and held her hand. I know I could never live without this woman, and wondered at the dream that I'd had on the plane.
"I love you so much, Etch."
Would it be such a bad thing to spend the last two years of high school married to her? Could I really handle it?
Before she'd suggested the idea, I never would have considered it, but now. . .
"Please wake up, beautiful. I need you in my life."
Her eyes fluttered and opened. "Keith!"
"Hello. How are you?"
"I've been better. It looks like I'm going to have a longer recuperation that we figured."
"It's okay, babe."
"But, I want to be a perfect girl for you."
"You already are. You have always been perfect to me."
She blushed crimson and smiled a shy little smile. "You always know how to cheer me up, Keith."
"I know that it's probably not the time, but I had a weird dream and it brought a question to my mind."
"Okay. . ." There was a confused look on her face.
"Why did you wait so long to date me?"
She laughed a short laugh and smiled, "That's what you're so worried about? Keith, I've always liked you as a friend"
"Yeah, but. . ."
"It was partially Desdemona that made me look at you as something other than the thirteen year old with a crush."
"You still thought of me as thirteen?"
"You were really cute at thirteen."
I smiled at her grin.
"The problem was you were always there. You supported me in anything that I wanted to do, and helped pick up the pieces when I failed. I never realized it, but you gave me the strength to be myself, even when that meant that I spent most of my time with other people. When I saw you dressed as Desdemona for the first time, something I'd done myself in the past, I knew everything you'd done. I knew that without you, my life would be hollow."
"Wow, I never knew you felt that way," I said. There were some tears in my eyes, and I just smiled at her.
"I know. I tried to let you know how I felt thought other means, and sometimes it got a little out of hand."
"Yes, but it left me worried that you only loved me as Desdemona."
"You know I'm not into girls, Keith. Sure, I love a guy in drag, but I think it's more the knowledge of the deception that gets me going more than the image of a woman."
"Babe. . ."
"Just kiss me."
So I did. It was a gentle kiss, without any need for anything more. Just the kiss. We hugged for a bit after then, and I got up to go. "So, you going to be able to come to New York with me?"
"The doctors say I can get out of here tomorrow morning. I may not be able to meet you until Thursday night or Friday morning though, and I know you need to be there Thursday morning. . ."
"It will work out. I need to get some sleep before tomorrow, babe." We kissed our goodbyes and I went out to get her car. It was a short drive home and I went to my room and went to sleep.
Life comes at you fast and hard sometimes. In the past week I've signed a contract with Spotlight Productions, recorded an entire album, gotten a stalker who kidnapped Gretchen, tried out for, and got, a part in a movie, visited LA, come home. Gretchen was rescued by the police.
All in all a very busy week, and it was about to continue with more of the same.
I got up at three to get ready. I was tired of the skirt I had been wearing a lot this week. I wanted to feel a little more like Keith than Desdemona. That gave me an idea. I grabbed one of my nicer button shirts and my boy jeans. I glued the girls in place and grabbed one of my plainer bras. Since the jeans and shirt were both black, I went with red polish on my nails. I went with some, mostly regular, makeup. I had to shave this morning. I threw it all together with the pink combat boots. Without the need to put on the wig, I was all ready to go. This time I was taking two suitcases with me. If I had to dress like a girl most of the time, I might as well have some options.
I stopped by the Hansen household on my way out of town. I hadn't seen Buffy in a little while, and I felt the loss in my life.
"Keith?" Suzy was half asleep when she answered the door. It was barely six in the morning after all.
"Sorry for stopping by so early, Sooz. I've been on the run all week and wanted to see you and Buffy before I headed out of town again."
"Buffy and I were just getting up anyway. She hasn't slept too well the past couple of days, so we've been trying to keep each other company, and keep her mind off the past."
"I can leave if you like. . ."
"No, I'm sure she'd love to see you."
The healing of the human body is amazing all things considered. There were still some scabs on her face but fewer than I'd thought there would be when I found her in the desert. She wasn't the same girl that I'd known. Sure, without the makeup she's always looked a bit like her male self, but she'd had a practiced hand, and knew all the tricks. None of that was necessary any more.
Her breasts were the same C cup that they'd been before, so her body hadn't changed, but the face now matched the body. She was beautiful. Her father's money had paid for the best, it seems.
Her jaw was still wired shut, so she still had the keyboard to speak with.
:Keith:
"Hey, Buffy. I wanted to check in on you before heading out to New York."
:New York?:
"No one told you? Up in Flames are appearing on the Saturday Night Live show this weekend."
:Really? I'm so happy for you! When do you leave?:
"Right now, actually. Hence the reason that I am here so early in the morning. Sorry for waking you up."
"Like I told you earlier, we were both up, Keith. I'm glad you stopped by."
:So am I.:
The smile on their faces would have told me, if her words hadn't.
"Gretchen sends her love. We'll try to stop by after we get back."
:Gretchen gets to go with you? I'm so envious.:
The look on my face must have let more than I'd intended slip, since both of them looked suddenly worried.
"What's wrong, Keith?"
"Gretchen was kidnapped by a psycho, and we kinda want to stay close to each other for the next couple of days."
"You can't just leave it like that. . ."
:yeah:
"Sorry, guys, I want to tell you all the details, but I have a flight to catch in three hours."
"Sorry, You're right. We can get all the details from Gretchen before she heads out to meet you. I assume she's leaving on a later flight?"
"Yep. She is. I love you guys."
:Love you too:
There were hugs all around and I was out the door. I got to the airport with time to spare. I checked my bags and went to the terminal to wait for my flight. Guthrie and Davey were already waiting for me.
"You guys just love getting here before me, don't you?"
"Of course, Boss-lady. We love to prepare the way for you amidst the screaming masses."
"What he said."
"No quote for us today?"
"You. . .should. . .have. . .bought. . .a. . .squirrel?"
Davey started laughing, but I just gave both of them a blank stare.
"She really is young, isn't she?"
"Hey, at least I wasn't quoting 'It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World.'"
"Thank goodness for small favors."
"What are you guys talking about?"
"Rat Race. It was inspired by the other one, although it isn't a direct remake of it."
"Oookay."
"Don't worry about it." Guthrie said dismissively.
We joked and played for the next hour in the first class lounge before they started boarding First Class passengers. Richard had gotten us First Class tickets this time, and I wasn't complaining.
The seats in First Class were worth the price difference alone, in my opinion. I melted into the seat and just relaxed as the other passengers filed past into the back of the plane. I signed some autographs, something I hadn't done in a couple of days, and was glad for the marker in my purse. By the time I was done I'd given out signature #75, and it was only then that I realized I hadn't even noticed when I'd written signature #69. All that worry for nothing.
Apparently both Davey and Guthrie were over 21, since as soon as we were in the air they ordered alcohol. I didn't even want to try. I needed all of my faculties with me all of the time. Keeping myself straight was a full time occupation.
I had my own personal screen and was able to pick my own movie out of five offered. I finally saw A-Team like I'd wanted weeks ago with Gretchen, and it was worth the wait. I'd only seen one or two episodes of the original as re-runs, but I really liked the movie. After the movie, I became aware of a slight argument going on in the galley behind me.
"You ask her."
"You're the one with the question, you ask her. You saw her giving out autographs."
I turned around and looked at the young flight attendants who were obviously, I thought, talking about me. They saw me turn around and one of them cringed.
The other stood up a little taller. "Excuse me, but you're Desdemona, right?"
I smiled and answered, "Yes."
"You have a girlfriend right? I mean you're into girls?"
"Yes," I said with a little less confidence.
"Well, Katie has never been with a girl, and wanted to know if you'd sign her. . ."
"Julie!"
I went bright red. The reaction Katie had given suggested that they were looking for something a little more intimate than signing a breast.
"You know I'm only sixteen, right? Even if I wasn't in a committed relationship."
"You're. . .sixteen?"
I smiled sweetly at her. "Yep. Well, to be truthful, my birthday is on the first of July, and I'll be seventeen."
"Oh, god." Katie looked mortified.
Even Julie had lost some of the humor in her tone. "I'm so sorry. I should never have suggested. . ."
"Trust me, I've heard worse this month."
"Still, we shouldn't have propositioned you like that. It's just that Katie really likes you."
"I'm flattered, and Katie, you're really pretty. I'm mostly just spoken for right now. I could sign something else for you. . ."
She didn't look at me as she handed her purse to me. It was a light blue cloth bag, mostly. I signed it. #76Because there's someone out there for everyone, just not always the one we think at first. Desdemona.
"We're so sorry about this." Julie looked abashed at her actions, and Katie looked very embarrassed.
"Look, Ladies, don't worry about it. I understand why you did it, at least I think I do, and you don't have to be embarrassed."
"But I should have known. . ." Katie began before I stopped her.
"Do I look like I'm sixteen? Do I sound sixteen?"
"Well, no. That's the reason that. . ."
"Right. As long as you recognize that a sixteen year old isn't what you're looking for."
They both giggled at this.
"So, why not the two of you? Why don't you two date?"
They looked at each other, as if for the first time, and both of them blushed. "Julie isn't interested. . ."
"Katie, I think you'd be surprised. They way that she looked when she made the suggestion of where I should sign you suggests to me that she might not have been entirely truthful to you in the past."
"Wait, what?"
Julie blushed profusely, and then turned away. Katie looked at her in shock for a moment and then exclaimed, "You little minx."
"I think the two of you have something to talk about it seems."
I turned around with a smile on my face. I always like getting people together, especially when they were obviously interested in each other the way that those two were.
I relaxed for the rest of the trip, just mentally preparing myself for anything that could happen once we arrived in New York. We landed before I'd even really begun.
There was a limo at the airport to take us to the studio. Since we weren't performing, Guthrie and Davey imbibed some more, but I have no idea what it was.
"Should you guys really be drinking?"
"It's all fine, Desi. Don't worry about us. They mostly need to get your vocals all toned in. We're just there to look good."
"I thought it was my job to look good." I said with a little smirk.
They both laughed at this, but both of them stopped drinking shortly afterward. Look, I'm not a prude or a teetotaler or anything. I just feel that there are some things that are just not done. Working drunk is one of those.
I felt that I'd have to explain myself.
"Look, I understand you guys are adults. Choosing your beverages is something that you should be able to do. I get it. Just remember that we're getting paid for this." I smiled at the two of them.
Davey looked a bit abashed and Guthrie just looked uncomfortable at the scrutiny.
"It's really easy to forget that you're still a kid, Boss-lady."
"Yeah. I'm sorry that we've been drinking in front of you."
"Guys, don't worry about it. Like I said, I don't begrudge you your choices."
"See, that's what makes us feel guilty about drinking in front of you, Boss-lady. The fact that you would do nothing to us if we did."
I looked confused at them for a moment.
"We shouldn't be drinking in front of you. You're a minor, after all, and you're right, we are working. I don't know how to explain it better. . .Davey? A little help?"
"Guthrie and I have talked a lot since we met at your place, Boss-lady. You might even say we've kind of become friends. Both of us figure that you're our only chance at making it anywhere in this industry, since you're the only one willing to work with us."
"Guys. . ." I was getting a little choked up over this. These were two of the sweetest guys I'd ever dealt with, and apparently I was the only one who got that.
"Really, Desi. We mean it. We're not always going to see eye to eye with each other, or with you, but as long as you'll have us, we'll do what it takes not to piss you off."
"What bean-pole over here means, Boss-lady, is that we've got your back. If you really feel we shouldn't drink on the job, we respect you enough not to drink."
"What he said."
I was crying happy tears at this. "Thanks guys."
"You sure you're not really a girl?"
"Oh hush."
Guys and girls are really under a different set of pressures in our society. A guy crying in happiness is seen, by many, as weakness, and the rest just figure it shouldn't happen. It's fine if a woman does it however.
Here I was crying, 'like a girl,' and for once happy about it. While playing Desdemona I was more able to let my emotions out. They really were my emotions, but I was less inclined to hide them away from the world.
My reverie was interrupted by the limo coming to a complete stop. The door was opened and we got out in front of 30 Rockefeller Plaza. It didn't seem like a studio to me. It seemed more like an office building than anything else. After crossing the lobby we waited for the elevator and all of us piled inside. We got off on the 8th floor and were escorted to the studio.
We were ushered to a middle aged man with long black hair wearing a headset and holding a clip board. His back was to us when as we approached, and our guide had to tap him on the shoulder.
"Just a minute, Jimmy," He said to our guide and then continued to what I had to assume was someone else with a headset as well. "Up in Flames is going to be here any minute for their sound check, Brian, and we will need to have their instruments in place before that happens. . .I don't care, find them. . .Yes, I know that the guitar is actually signed. . .Yes, and who signed it. . .just get it on the stage three hours ago, Brian."
Jimmy tapped him on the shoulder again.
"What is it, Jimmy, can't you see I'm in the middle of a crisis?"
"It just got worse, Frankie. Up in Flames is here."
The man whispered something under his breath that sounded like excrement, and then began to turn around, "Hi, my name is Frank Robison, welcome. . ."
"DAD!?"
"I assure you, Miss, that my only child is a seventeen year old boy, which you're obviously not. Besides, I'm sure that I'd remember having a child as beautiful as you."
I was pissed. Really pissed. I was livid. I was molten lava waiting for an escape. I wanted to knock him on his ass and scream at him until I lost my voice. I wanted to know why.
I think Davey caught part of this, and opened his mouth to say something. I caught his eye and shook my head before he could say more than, "Mr. Robison. . ."
"I'm sorry, Sir, but I must have mistaken you for someone I once thought I knew. You see, my Dad ran out on my mom and me years ago. I've often wondered what I'd say to him if I ever saw him again. I guess this helped me to mistake you for him. Look, I'm sure you're good at your job, Sir, but I'm not sure if I can handle working with you. Like I said, it's not you. Jimmy, and my band mates can attest to that."
It took everything I had in me to keep calm and say this as simply as I did. Who did this man think he was to so casually drop out of my life. I wanted to deck him, or claw his eyes out, or something. Anything other than putting a pleasant smile on my face and talking to him like he was just anyone else in the world.
That's why they call it acting, folks.
He looked taken aback for a moment, and then something sort of dawned on him. He opened his mouth to speak, shut it, and then opened it again. A glow seemed to have lit up his face.
"Jimmy, could you clear the greenroom, please?"
"Frankie?"
"I need a moment with the band alone, please. I need to explain how things work here. If they still want me to get them someone else to work with them afterwards, then I'm fine with that."
I looked curiously at Davey and Guthrie as we followed after my father. At this point all I wanted was to have nothing further to do with him.
We entered the greenroom and Frankie shut the door behind us. The sounds of the studio shut off and we were there alone.
"Let me get a look at you. . .now aren't you the cutest thing I've ever seen in my life. Keith, you are the best looking drag queen I have ever seen, and believe me, I've seen a lot of them."
"Wha. .?" What was happening here? I couldn't get my mind to engage.
"I didn't recognize you until you started talking, but to tell you the truth, your mom hasn't sent me any recent photos. I hope you don't mind that I jumped the gun about your seventeenth birthday, but I knew it was almost here."
"How?" Who was this man, and what had he done with the uncaring father that I was sure that I had?
"I celebrate your birthday every year, silly. Didn't you read any of my letters? At all?"
"Letters? I thought you were in Seattle." Sure he was sending me letters. Him and every other father who wanted to get back together with his estranged child. It seemed so. . .fake.
"Why would I go some stuffy old place like that?"
"Mom said. . ."
"She told you I was in Seattle?"
"Yeah." It really sounded lame when he put it that way.
"But the letters would have all been post marked New York."
"There weren't any letters." And Mom has been working afternoons for the past three years. I've gotten all the mail in that period, and there wasn't a single letter in that entire time.
"Your mom gave me your email address three years ago. . .she never actually gave me your address did she?"
Damn you wannabe super Dad and your skill at logic.
"Why. . .?"
"Probably to keep you from turning out just like me, but it seems we showed her, huh?"
"Dad, I'm not like you, I'm not. . ."
"Gay?"
"My girlfriend would definitely have a problem with it if I were." I felt myself relaxing as the conversation went on. He seemed like a normal sort of a guy.
"Oh, but I thought. . ."
"Have you ever heard Desdemona sing?"
"Well, no. . ."
I began to sing My Own Person and my Dad's eyes got big. "You sound so. . ."
"Girly?"
"Well, not exactly what I was thinking, but yeah. You didn't. . ." He looked toward my crotch. Yeah, there's that awkwardness again.
"No, I'm intact down there." If you've never had your gay absentee father looking at your crotch, then let me tell you it's an experience worth missing.
He raised an eyebrow at me. They were tight jeans and I was tucked away.
"Dad, I have to look the part, don't I?"
"Doesn't that get. . .uncomfortable?"
"If you do it wrong. . .or become aroused, then yeah, it can get uncomfortable."
The other three guys in the room shifted a bit uncomfortably. See, I still think of myself as male. Score one for the home team.
"To change the subject," Dad said to general chuckles, "I'm sure that Orion would love to see you while you're in the City. As long, that is, as you can get away from your mom long enough?"
"I'm emancipated, Dad. I'm in charge of who I see or where."
"That's a story I have to hear. But later. So, after sound check, could you stop by my place with me? Orion should be getting home about that time, and I've told him so much about you. . .well, as much as I knew," he finished, eyeing me up and down once more.
"You pull off this butch chic look very well."
"Yeah, well, I wanted to be a bit more Keith today, so I'm wearing my regular clothes with some Desdemona flourishes."
"Like I said: it looks good on you."
"Thanks, Dad." I blushed a little.
"So, do you mind it when people call you beautiful?"
"Not as long as I'm being Desdemona, no." The question he wasn't asking, but the one I was asking myself, was whether I minded when he did it. Unfortunately, that wasn't a question I was prepared to answer yet.
"Then you're beautiful, Desdemona."
"She prefers Desi, Frankie"
"I stand corrected, Davey. Like I was saying: Tonight, you, me, Orion, my place?"
"Sorry, Dad, but I'd prefer not. I mean, Gretchen would never forgive me if I went to your place without her, and since she plans to be here tonight or tomorrow. . ."
My Dad's expression fell when he heard what I'd started saying, but by the time I finished he was beaming a smile at me.
"Gretchen is your girl, I assume?"
"Yep."
"Then, by all means. Bring her. We'll meet tomorrow evening then. Let me give you my address."
I wrote it in my phone, and then the four of us headed out to the stage. I would have to talk this over with Gretchen. Hopefully I could find some way to gracefully back out of this. I didn't trust the guy, and knew that Etch would likely be tired after her flight.
Dad began talking into his headset as he lead us onward, "Brian, their instruments better be there by the time we arrive."
We turned a corner and saw Brian respond.
"Just finishing up now, Frankie."
"Good man. I found out today that Desdemona is a niece I never knew I had. So we better treat her extra special, got it?"
"Sure think, Frankie. You're the boss."
"No, I am, but I let Frankie run things for me in the pits. Glad you could join us, Desdemona. My name is Rhoda Coolidge."
After I got over my initial moment of shock, I smiled at him and took his hand. "Hi, Mr. Coolidge, thanks for having us. It's such an honor to appear before your audience." It was as if he'd materialized out of thin air. I could see why he was the boss.
"Most people call me Rhodie because of how I got my start in this business. It's me who should be grateful that you agreed to be on my show. You are infamous right now. You ruined what should have been a slam dunk for Bloody Pips, called out the entire shock media crowd, and are just plain beautiful to boot."
That was the second time in as many days that my internal monologue had not edited out the name of Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools.
"She's also only sixteen, Rhodie."
His eyes got wide, and his mouth dropped open. Then a smile spread across his face. "Frankie. . ."
"Oh no, Rhodie. Not again."
"Come on, it would be perfect. We can even change our TV spots. It will bring in numbers like we haven't seen in years."
"No way. . ."
"What are you guys talking about?"
"Well, I was thinking. . ."
Dad cut him off. "Mr. Coolidge wants to start billing you as 'Teen Sensation Desdemona'."
"But the band is called Up in Flames."
"Then 'Teen Sensation Desdemona of Up in Flames'."
"Why does he have that glint in his eye?"
"Because everyone will want to know: A why we changed our spot, B if it's true, and C how we knew and no one else thought to even ask."
"Don't forget that an entertainment program is about to scoop every media outlet in the country."
"It's perfect."
"Except for one thing. She's a singer, not an actress, and she's not the special guest. The last time we did this type of thing was with the guest star."
"I'm sure that the guest star won't mind, since he is in the same industry after all. We could build up the rivalry."
Something started to dawn on me. I figured I knew the answer, but I had to ask anyway, "Who's the guest star?"
"Owen Emerson, Lead singer of Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools."
The universe hates me. It really does.
I groaned, "Why couldn't it have been anyone but him?"
"Wait, you know Owen?"
"I met him at a screen test for a movie yesterday."
Ok, there must be something really wrong with me. Here I was telling everyone that I'd only just met Owen, when in actuality I'd only just noticed him.
To tell the truth, I actually met him in Las Vegas. We were both in the same greenroom for most of the show, but I'd spent the evening ripping on the other bands there, and generally having a good time with my friends. Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools had been more subdued, even though they'd had twice as many people as we did.
I think that even then they knew that the three of us outclassed them.
It's a weird feeling. . .
"Hey, Desi. Long time no see."
Wait, what was I thinking?
"Not into boys, huh," Frank's comment jump-started my brain and I just got mad. I let it show this time.
"Look, Frank, we don't have the sort of relationship where you get to tease me about things that are really none of your business. Sure, Owen is about the prettiest boy I've ever seen, no offense Owen."
He had a really weird smile on his face, but his reply was simply, "None taken."
I continued, "but that doesn't mean I want to have his babies or anything of the like."
"Look, I'm sorry, Desi, I didn't mean anything by it. Really."
"Look, can I discuss this wild idea that you're all getting into with Owen for a moment? Alone?"
I walked into the greenroom and Owen followed me. How to explain. . .
Owen wrapped his arms around me and went in for a kiss. I shoved him away.
"Dude, really, I'm not into you."
"But, I thought. . ."
"I know what you thought, but I needed a moment alone so I could explain something to you that most people don't know about me. This is especially important if the two of us are going to be working together in close proximity since I can tell you're attracted to me."
"You said. . ."
"Ok, let's start this over. Owen, you know how I said yesterday that I didn't even remember what I'd done in my reading with you?"
"Yeah. . ."
"Part of that is because the only part of my performance that was acting was being in love with you."
"Ok. That makes. . .wait, what?!"
"Yeah, exactly."
I think I broke his brain. His head cocked to the side and he gave a little shudder. "Dude, thanks for preventing me from kissing you."
I laughed. "Now, I have to hope that you won't use what you know against me."
"I'm just glad you told me so that I don't make a fool of myself."
I felt much easier in his presence. Something began to dawn on me. I liked to be desired, and Owen had really. . .desired me. More than that, I needed to be desired. I had been drawn to the way he was looking at me more than I was drawn to him.
It was the reason I'd kissed Gretchen. I'd loved her before that moment, but I was always too scared to kiss her. Her desire for me in that moment had broken through.
"Thanks, Owen."
"For what?"
"For helping me to realize something about myself in a situation where I wasn't going to get myself into any really deep trouble."
"You're welcome. . .I think."
"Don't worry about it." I gave him a quick hug.
"You don't feel like a guy."
"Padding."
"Why do you do this?"
"You've heard me sing. You tell me."
"Ok, you've got a point there. So, what's your real name?"
"Owen, without my name, anything you tell the press is an unsubstantiated rumor. Sure, it makes life a bit more difficult for me for a while, but it could blow over. With my name, it gets blown wide open as soon as anyone starts digging."
"Got it. Trust me, but only so far." Owen laughed at me, and had a huge smile plastered across his face.
"You are such a dork."
"Look, Desi, someday I hope that you'll trust me enough to show me who you really are. Until then, we can at least work together, right?"
"So, how in the heck did you get the guest star spot on SNL this early into your career?"
"My manager knows a guy who knows a guy. You know how it is, I'm sure."
"Sometimes I wish I didn't. Want to fuel some spurious rumors?" I had an evil grin on my face.
"Um. . .not really."
"Ok." I laughed as I left the room.
There were some knowing smiles as I left the room. I was about to say something when Owen spoke up.
"Guys, nothing happened. Desdemona let me know she was a little attracted to me, but didn't want it to affect our work. I told her that she's really not my type."
"Apparently a woman with brains is too much for him."
"Watch it, Desi. I happen to think that it takes brains to chew gum at the same time as doing your nails."
Everyone laughed at this.
"No offense?" There was very little of the earlier fire in his eyes, but this moth no longer felt compelled to leap into his arms.
"None taken. What's the plan here?"
"We'll have to change some of the sketches, or write new ones, to include both Owen and Desi."
"Won't this be lessening Owen's impact on the show?"
"Look, Desi, I don't mind sharing the limelight with you. I liked acting opposite you yesterday."
"Wait, if you were preparing to be on SNL on Saturday, why were you in LA yesterday?"
"We'd already practiced all of the sketches that they had prepared for me, so I flew out for my screen test, and flew back here last night."
That was way too plausible for me.
"Why don't we have both bands perform on the same stage?" Rhodie was quick to jump into the first moment of silence he could find.
"You want Up in Flames and Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools to perform on the same stage?"
Everyone was staring at me when I finished. It suddenly occurred to me what I'd just said. "Um. . ."
"Meaningless Death Imagery? That is the coolest Goth band name I've ever heard." Owen was smiling broadly as he said this, and Davey and Guthrie were laughing.
I'm not sure how it happened, but an entire sketch got centered around my statement. Rhodie went off to talk to the writing team, and Up in Flames finally took the stage for our sound check.
We performed 'My Own Person' and 'What You See'. After a couple of adjustments they asked us to do 'What You See' a second time. They seemed happy with our sound, so I sought out my Dad to find out what their plan was for us.
"Desi, they want you back here tomorrow morning at seven to run through lines and practice a couple of sketches. We won't need any of you guys for the rest of the day. Make sure that Guthrie and Davey know we will need them after noon tomorrow."
"Ok, I'll head out then."
I passed on the information to Davey and Guthrie and then gave Gretchen a call.
"Hello, Beautiful Lady."
"Hello yourself, Etch." I said with a smile. "So, when do you get to come out here?"
"The doctor wants to keep me for observation one more night, but he thinks I should be able to fly out tomorrow morning sometime."
"Already have your ticket, I hope?"
"Yep, Richard picked one up using the band account. Figured it would fit into general band expenses."
"I can agree to that. So, you alright then? Healing up nicely?"
"Yes, and I can probably show you when I get there."
"Gretchen!"
"It's not like I'd let it get any further than looking right now. My doctor told me that I'd want to wait at least another two months at this point to prevent anything down there from tearing."
"Still. Aren't you afraid of tempting fate?"
"Not with you. I ever tell you how much I appreciate your strength?"
"Not that I recall."
"Well, I do. I appreciate your ability to tell me no under the most trying of circumstances."
"Thanks, I think"
We both laughed at this.
"What time's your flight tomorrow?"
"I arrive in New Your about 4 your time."
"Well, there goes one excuse."
"Excuse? For what?"
"My Dad works for NBC apparently."
"Okay. . ."
"He asked me over to dinner, and in trying to put it off, I suggested that I would prefer to have you there with me. You'll be getting in at about the time he wanted all of us to get together tomorrow."
"That sounds great!"
"You're not really helping me much, Etch."
"Keith, get over it. I'd give anything to spend some more time with my Mom. Well, almost anything, since there was always one thing I could have done. My Mom wouldn't accept me for who I am, and that hurts. Your Dad wants to see you, however you present yourself. How can you say no to that?"
"But he left me, Etch."
"Everyone makes mistakes, Keith. Everyone. So, accept his apology, and take me out to meet him tomorrow."
"Yes, Boss-lady." I said this in a fair approximation of Davey's ever ebullient tone.
"You better believe it."
"I love you, Etch."
"I love you too."
I started wandering though the city, vaguely aware that New York wasn't anywhere near as safe a place as Provo, and just looking at the world around me. I was stopped to give my autograph a couple of times, but nowhere near as many as in Utah. Desdemona fever hasn't really spread out this far I guess.
When I hit Central Park, I decided to make a left. Sure, I was wandering around New York alone, but I wasn't sure that I was ready to 'brave' Central Park yet.
I got to the corner of the park, and I saw something I'd wondered about, but never really cared to look up. About a block away I saw a street sign that said 'Broadway.'
With a smile on my face I headed in that direction, and then set my feet on Broadway.
Yes, it was a little cheesy.
I walked down Broadway, looking at the buildings and people. It seems there were more people here just doing the same, because I signed a lot of autographs. I looked down a crossroad and saw a sign. I hadn't been looking for it, but there it was: Juilliard.
I had nothing else to do, so I went down the block and walked in.
For the most prestigious music school in the country, it seemed more like an office building to me. I wandered around for a bit, just getting the feel of the place.
"We don't serve your kind here."
There was a clean cut young couple walking in my direction.
"I was just looking around."
"Don't mind Blake. He thinks being here entitles him to a certain level of snobbery. I'm Hannah. You looking for anything in particular?"
"Not really. I was in the area, and thought I'd take a look. I have some people telling me I should try out here."
"Who? Your Aunt Nana?"
His continued attitude really grated on me. I had to do something to shut him up. "No, my manager."
"Don't you mean pimp?"
His comment was so ridiculous that I did the only thing I could; I laughed.
"You have no idea at all who I am, do you?"
The blank looks on their faces was enough to set me off again. "I'm Desdemona. And some people think I'm a bit of a rock star. Me, I think I just love music."
"Yeah, well, rock isn't really something we do here."
"Blake!"
"It isn't."
"I prefer playing jazz." I said to head the two of them off, "but I've been known to play some classical, including an arrangement for 12-string, Bass, and Percussion of Vivaldi."
"Prove it."
"Huh?"
"Forgive my companion, Desdemona. He has about a thousand dollars riding on the fact that the Four Seasons for 12-string, Bass, and Behemoth is all done in post production."
"Um, but I only do the 12-string. Wait, how have you heard about that at all?"
Hannah smiled at my confusion, "Apparently Bobby wanted a showcase of his new instrument, so he posted it to youTube with a link to a website where he describes construction of his Behemoth. Most people here think he is a bit insane, but the three of these guys wanted to try it out, and who was I to complain. I transcribed music as well as I could off the broadcast, but we ran into a snag with the 12-string. Blake doesn't think a 12-string can be played like that."
"Well, lead me to a 12-string and we'll go from there."
They lead me to a studio where a reasonable approximation of the Behemoth had been put together. More specifically, it looked as if it was reconstructed by someone with too much time on their hands and a very good understanding of percussive sounds. In some regards it put Bobby's version to shame.
There were two boys already in the room chatting, they looked up when we entered. Both of them were blond with similar features and I figured they were probably related. The taller one spoke first,
"thought we were taking a break from this, Blake?"
"Desdemona here thinks she can play better than I can."
"Well, I'm game to let anyone that. . .flamboyant. . .put her money where her mouth is."
I walked over to the guitar and tested each string. "Well, here's your first problem, guys. I play with two sets of octaves."
I re-tuned the guitar, and then ran a couple of arpeggios. After a calming breath I launched into Vivaldi.
It was only a couple of seconds later that the other two joined in. We played through Fall, and were just entering Winter, when Blake stormed out of the theater.
The percussionist walked over to me offering his hand, "Never thought I'd see someone show Blake up on his own instrument. I'm Mark, by the way."
I reached out to shake his hand, and he lifted it to get a better look at my nails.
"I guess these are your secret weapon, huh?"
"Yep, they are."
"So, you just here to show up Blake, or you here for another reason?"
"No real reason, actually. Although, my manager wants me to audition for the pre-college course here."
The wheels started turning in his head, and he looked at my hair and boots. Something seemed to click behind his eyes and he was really looking at me for the first time.
"If you really are who I think you are, play Don't Blame the Girls."
The smile left my face. "I am not some windup toy for your entertainment. That song has a special meaning for me that will not be. . ."
"Woah, calm down. Yep. You're who I thought you were. My girlfriend bought six copies of the song when she found out that money was being donated to her charity."
A small smile came back to my face, "That's actually all the money the band makes on that video."
"Band?" Hannah rejoined the conversation.
"You are looking at the one and only Desdemona. Singer for Up in Flames. Overnight sensation. Guest musical act for Saturday Night Live this week, and apparently classical music enthusiast."
"I prefer Jazz. Bobby wanted to do Vivaldi as sort of a proof of concept for his Behemoth."
A moment later Blake stormed back into the room. "The bet's not over. I bet that if I couldn't do it, it wasn't possible. It wasn't whether or not someone else could do it."
"You lost man."
"No he hasn't. He just had his instrument tuned wrong." I smiled as I handed his guitar off to him.
Blake mouthed a "Thank you" at me and took his guitar.
It wasn't perfect, and there were definitely some spots he needed some pointers on, but he played Spring. Hannah and I clapped for him when he was done. There was a look of triumph in his eye.
"Um, Mark, I think we just lost the bet," the other blond piped in for the first time.
"I think you're right, Sam."
There was general laughter. "So, Desdemona, you want to join us for dinner?" Mark was looking at me in an appraising manner.
"I'm only sixteen, Mark." I'd said that phrase a lot today. Mark looked a little downcast.
"Then you're perfect for me, Baby. I just turned seventeen," Sam said with an exaggerated leer.
Everyone laughed at this.
"You can take that up with my girlfriend," I replied.
"You're out of your league, Sam. Collect your brother and all five of us can head over to the cafeteria." Hannah held out her hand to me, and I figured I might as well take it.
"Hannah?"
"Oh hush, Blake. You know I love you. I'm just keeping Desdemona safe from male depredations right now."
There was some more general laughter at this.
"You know, guys, calling me by my full name all night is going to get tedious. My friends call me Desi."
"I think we can swing that."
After getting through the shell of aloofness that Blake had constructed, I found him to be a really neat guy. We talked about the guitar for about three hours before the other three decided it was time for a change of topic.
"So, Desi, have you given any serious thought about coming here?"
"It would mean that I would have to move out here, and I'm not sure if I like the idea."
"Your parents wouldn't go for it?"
"I'm a legally emancipated minor, so that wouldn't be a problem. No, my girlfriend will be going to college in Utah and I don't think I want to live that far away from her."
"You keep mentioning this mythical girlfriend."
"Yep, Gretchen." I pulled out my phone and showed them the pictures of Gretchen that I had saved in there.
"She's very pretty," Hannah said.
"She's special to me. It's not about the way she looks, but more the way she looks at me. I love her compassion for others and her drive to succeed."
"Maybe we'll have to meet her after you get accepted."
It was a nice thought, but I realized that I had been acting like Keith, but looking like Desdemona. If I were accepted here, I wanted to be accepted as Keith.
"Desi, is there something wrong?"
I gave a slight smile and shook my head. "Nothing really. The job is just getting to me. Even when you're as relatively unknown as I am, it can all get to you."
"Then quit," Blake replied.
I gave a little laugh at this, "Currently the benefits outweigh the costs. If that ever begins to change, then I'll drop it in a second."
"I think we girls need to freshen up a bit." It was only in that moment that I realized I was crying.
Hannah dragged me into the girls bathroom, which I only momentarily hesitated to enter. "You know, it's only going to be a couple of days at most before the others clue in to who you really are, Keith."
"Wait, how do you know my name?"
"The recording we saw online listed your names. Since you played the 12-string, that meant you had to be Keith. If you were trying to hide, you shouldn't have played Vivaldi."
"Oh crap."
"You don't much look like a Keith to me, by the way."
Everything was unravelling. I was nowhere near as careful as I thought I was. I wondered for a moment how superheroes did it. I tried to force a smile, but I just didn't have the heart for it right now.
"So, why the getup?"
"It's hard to be a rock star as a countertenor, so I put on the 'getup' to be a soprano."
"You're a real male soprano?"
I smiled and sang. Nothing with words, just a heartfelt note. The highest that I could hit. Her eyes widened a bit.
"You weren't kidding."
"Usually not, no."
"Well, I think the two of us have been here long enough. Let's get your makeup fixed and rejoin the boys."
I began to worry immediately. Too many people knew my secret already. Many of them weren't people who I could trust to keep it forever.
I took a deep breath, held it, and then slowly let it out.
The smile I showed was genuine as we rejoined the boys at the table.
I mean the other boys. Crap. Who am I anymore?
"Guys, Desdemona won't be able to join us here."
"At least not for a couple more years."
"That's not what she meant. Desdemona is only an act I play on stage. I would be coming here as myself."
"That's fine with us, Desi. My brother just got accepted to the Pre-college program, so at least you'll have a familiar face if you come." Mark looked sincere, and I figured that he was still holding out some hope that in a year or two I might come to his side of the tracks.
"Look, I've already told too many people this weekend, but this is me. I'm still in costume because I had no real time after my sound check to go get changed at the hotel before I started walking around the city."
I handed them my driver's license. No, not the Desdemona one, my real one.
It felt as if I was finally admitting something when I did it. I was admitting something. Desdemona wasn't really me. I'd spent the past couple of months trying to convince myself that I could do this, could be Desdemona, but I couldn't.
It had been fun while it lasted. . .
"This is so AWESOME!!!!" Sam was practically crowing. "Let me guess, countertenor?"
"Well, yeah."
"Man, you look good in that getup. Wig?"
"Used to be. I was spending so much time 'in costume' this week that I figured it would be easier to just get my hair styled this way."
"You have bigger balls than I do, my man."
I looked at Blake a little strangely at his comment.
"I'd never be caught dead with a haircut like that, and that dress in the 'Bodies' video? Yeouch."
Hannah punched him in the arm, "You knew who he was all along?"
"I knew that he was Desdemona, yes, but I was so pissed that I couldn't get that piece of music right. Sorry about my behavior earlier. Friends?"
I was completely taken aback. What was with people?
I must have nodded yes, because they continued their excited talking, but I wasn't really following it anymore. Here, I'd figured that I was going to be outed before the whole country even before I released my CD, and they just thought it was a cool bit of trivia.
"Desi?"
How in the world did I fall in with the people who seemed to want to make it all work out for the better. I'd read a couple of years ago about the concept of Karma. Could it actually be that there was a cosmic balance to all things? All of the years I'd spent trying to be the best person I could be finally paying off?
"Desi?"
Something had allowed me to get with Gretchen, but was it just her finally giving in, or was there a deeper. . .
"Keith!"
"Wait, what?"
"You were zoning out there," Hannah said with an apologetic smile. "The guys think that they have the perfect idea."
"Well, it's more Sam's idea than anything. We set up a Keith Robison fan site, and we include your Vivaldi, and anything else specifically Keith we can find."
"There are some images on the schools website from when I played Ophelia."
They looked at me strangely.
"The drama teacher came up with this idea to do Hamlet in reverse. Start at the end, and go till you get to the beginning. She didn't end there. She had all of the boys play girl roles, and all the girls play boy roles. It was really weird, but I had a lot of fun."
"Desdemona is a regular renaissance woman."
"Acting. . .I need to call my agent about something."
I called Richard while everyone watched me. I squirmed a bit as the phone rang. "Richard?"
"Keith, so nice of you to call. I have some questions I need to ask you."
"Ok, great. First, if they still want me to do the role, could you tell whomever needs to know that I want to play Cory in 'When you love somebody'?"
"Okay. . .are you sure?"
"Acting is about what I do everyday anyway."
"Great. I got a strange call from Juilliard today."
I looked over at the people sitting around the table. "What did you do?" I said in a stage whisper. They were all suddenly looking in any direction but at me.
"I am sitting in the cafeteria attached to the dorms at Juilliard."
"Okay, well that explains half of it. Did you play. . ."
"Vivaldi? Yes. The first three movements of the Four Seasons."
"On guitar?"
"Yes, I was proving to someone here that it was possible."
"Well, apparently they were recording at the time because it was a class project. They have you on video tuning, and playing, the twelve string. They'd like a more formal audition, but said that your performance was enough that they are willing to waive the normal deadlines for this fall for their Pre-college course."
"But, my hair, my clothing, What am I going to do? I would want to go as Keith, not Desdemona."
Hannah was smirking in my direction. "Stop whining, it's not ladylike."
I glared at her. "You knew about this?"
"We figured out who you were the second you started playing. Blake left after we had enough to call our instructor to look at the tape."
"Keith!" I heard Richard calling from my phone.
"Yes?"
"The school knows that Desdemona is your persona on stage, and wants you to decide who you will be attending as. It will have to be one or the other, so as not to disrupt the other students."
"Wait a minute. How did they know to call you?"
"Keith, I've been your agent for two months, at least give me some credit. I've registered contact information with all of the necessary agencies. Signed you up for the necessary organizations. I do my job well, so you only have to worry about getting on stage and performing your heart out."
I gave a little giggle, and then looked around the table at the people who'd set me up, in a manner of speaking. "One last thing, Richard, do you set up my audition time with Juilliard, or do I?"
They gave a small cheer, and I shook my head.
"I can do that for you, since I've already had contact with them. I'm really glad you decided to at least try this. I'll get back to you with the information."
"Since I'm scheduled to fly out Monday evening, see if it's possible to get it done before then. Later, future-uncle-in-law."
He chuckled and replied, "bye, future-niece-in-law," before hanging up.
"Why did you all go to the trouble? How did you even get anyone to seriously consider it? This is all so overwhelming."
There were general chuckles as Hannah replied for all of them, "We have some excellent teachers here. They truly want talented people to reach their potential whenever possible. Well, that and the enrollment for the Pre-college program is a bit down this year. Apparently they've had fewer qualified people apply than spots available for new students."
"Well, that explains it."
"You're also really good. You've obviously spent a lot of time playing the guitar." Sam was still looking a bit star struck, and I now recognized it for what it was. There wasn't any of the need that I saw in Gretchen, or Owen before I'd told him the truth.
"Thanks for a wonderful day, guys, but I have to get up early. They want me back in the studio early tomorrow."
We exchanged contact information and I went out to catch a cab. I'd called just before I left the group, and Sam escorted me out of the building.
"I was mostly kidding earlier, but if you'd like to. . ." He blushed bright red, "Look, I know it's only skin deep, but you're a beautiful woman. It sort of messes with my head. If you're ever interested. . .date or something" He sort of trailed off.
"That's probably the best offer I've ever received, to tell the truth, from anyone, male or female. Thing is, Sam, there is only one person that I've ever truly loved. I'm sorry."
He brightened at my words. "I had to try, but to tell the truth I dreaded a yes almost as much as a no."
We both laughed at this, and on a strange impulse I kissed him on the cheek. "You're really sweet, Sam. There's a girl out there for you. One who will love you for the person you are."
"You're sweet." He smiled at me.
My cab arrived and took me to the hotel. As soon as I stepped foot into the lobby, a man walked up to me. "Ms. Desdemona?"
"Yes?"
"Your bags have already been taken up to your room, and we have a key for you at the front desk. My name is Ran, and if you need anything at all, I'm at your service."
"Ran is a strange name."
"It's the only shortening of Randal that I like." He said with a bit of a strained smile.
"I'm sorry. I really didn't mean anything by it." I think my look of horror mollified him a bit.
"I'm sorry, it's my fault. I get a lot of people through here every day who seem to think that they own me. The pitfall of working in a hotel I guess. Your statement struck a raw nerve, as one of those type of regulars is currently staying in the hotel."
"I'm so sorry for you. Well, rest assured that I hope to never be 'one of those' myself. If I ever start moving in that direction, PLEASE call me on it."
"Yes, Ms. Desdemona," he replied in mock severity. He gave a slight bow with a flourish.
"My friends get to call me Desi."
The smile on his face told me I'd scored some points, for which I was glad. Truth be told I never did want to be one of those celebrities that everyone hated in real life.
I was escorted to the front desk where I had my credit card swiped and was given my key, which was another card. Richard had told me earlier that he preferred to have his talent use their own credit cards at hotels and then reimburse them for the cost of the suite from their expense account. It tended to prevent the type of activity that made the tabloids if they knew that everything except for the room would be coming out of their own pockets.
We rode up to the twentieth floor, and I was led to my room. If I hadn't known that I was only about halfway up this hotel, I'd have sworn that they were showing me into one of their best rooms in the hotel. It was a suite overlooking Central Park. I wondered for a moment what this was costing me.
"Thanks Ran. I'm sorry I don't carry cash on me. Is it possible to just bill a fifty dollar tip to my room?"
"Not unheard of, certainly. Have a good night, Desi."
I found a change of clothing already put away in the drawers, and went in to take a long, hot, shower. I had my head in the shower, and so missed the first couple of calls, but then it dawned on me that my phone was ringing.
I got out and answered. It was my Keith ring tone.
"Keith here."
A female voice answered me. "And here I thought you'd learned to simply listen when I called. For shame. How did you enjoy your time away from me? The authorities simply don't understand the bond that we have so I had to play a little trick on them. I know what you see in your little toy now, so I've decided to give her back to you. No plaything could ever come between us. Desdemona, so I decided to be the bigger person in this relationship."
The shock was almost more than I could bear. I sank into the chair next to the table where I'd left my phone. My arm went slack, but it felt as if my phone was welded in place.
"Are you there, Desdemona?"
"I'm here you sick twisted freak."
"I am twisted, but I'm truly in the best of health. I'm tying up a few loose ends here, cutting away some dead weight as it were, and then I'll be free to join you in New York."
"Bye." I hung up with no further reply. I called Gretchen. Sure the person had said that he or she wouldn't attack Gretchen any more, but could I really trust him or her?
"Hello?"
"Thank god you're safe. The person who kidnapped you isn't in police custody."
"What?!" I heard the phone clatter to the ground. "Etch!"
"I'm here. I was just startled. What should I do?"
"Where are you?"
"Still at the hospital."
"Stay there and call your Dad. I'll let Richard know, and hopefully one of us can get in touch with the police. Why won't this freak leave me alone?"
I heard her sobbing on the other end of the phone. "Etch, I'm sorry, it's my fault this happened to us. If I'd never become Desdemona. . ."
"You stop right there Keith Robison. Desdemona is the best thing that ever happened to you."
"No, Gretchen, you are. Look. I know what I said about waiting to get married. In a normal world we could just wait the year until I was eighteen, and live happily ever after. This world, for us, is far from normal. I don't know what the next year, or two, or even five will bring, but I know that I want you in it. Even if we are apart, I want to know you are connected to me, and me to you."
"Keith. . ."
"This is not how I wanted to ask you. This is not the emotion I wanted to be present. I've realized over the past week that without you I'm nothing. You're the reason I get on stage, and the reason I get up in the morning. You're the last thing I think about at night, and the first in the mornings."
"Keith." I could hear the smile in her voice, even if I could tell she was still crying.
"If you were a goddess I would be your prime acolyte, and spread the glory of you to the entire world."
I heard her laugh on the other end of the phone.
"Marry me, Gretchen. Let's give your parents their day, and we'll get married in September, but marry me and make me the happiest person in the entire world."
I heard her intake of breath. Sure, it was obvious where I'd been going but it still seemed the shock of me saying the words was enough to take her breath away.
"I told you that you'd know when I asked you to marry me."
She giggled, "wow, Keith. I don't know what to say."
I was getting a little worried, but did my best not to let it show in my words, "Yes is the normally expected response."
"Of course, Yes, you goof. No, I mean that your words took my breath away. That's the most romantic thing anyone's ever said to me, if not in the most romantic manner."
"Sorry about that."
"Don't be. Never be sorry that you asked me to marry you."
"Never, beautiful."
"I'll call my Dad and let him know you finally formally asked me to marry you, and then get his butt out here to protect me while you can't."
"I love you, Etch. Always."
"I love you, Keith. Forever."
I hung up the phone.
There was a lot to do in the next twenty-four hours, not the least of which was to let the police know that they had the wrong person. Suddenly getting into Juilliard and appearing on SNL seemed small potatoes, as I would be marrying Gretchen within the next few months. So little time to get everything sorted. So much time before I would be joined to her forever.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips. Thank you for all of your help with this episode.
Once again I allow myself to become complacent then the world throws me another curve. The stalker I had believed to be in police custody is not. I am again away from Gretchen when she could be in danger, and. . .oh crap.
Somewhere in my phone I had entered Mr. Praetor's phone number. It took me less than thirty seconds to find it. I dialed the number before I even looked at the time. The bedside clock said that it was shortly before midnight my time, so I was calling at ten Utah time. I hoped that he was either there, or further west.
It went to voice mail.
I dialed Richard. He picked up on the third ring. "It's a little late to be calling, Keith."
"Shut up and listen for a moment. Mr. Praetor mentioned that there was another client of Spotlight that had been stalked by the same person who stalked me."
"But that person is in jail so. . ."
"She's not in jail. She was never caught. She called me tonight saying that she is finishing up with her previous business and then coming out here to New York. The other girl is in trouble right now!"
"Oh crap."
"I figure you know who was in charge of the investigation, so you give them a call. I'll try Mr. Praetor again, unless you know someone better at Spotlight to call. . ."
"His personal assistant, Ashley, would be the best one to call."
He gave me the number and I called. A man's voice answered the phone. "This is Ashley."
"This is Desdemona. The person who was stalking me apparently eluded police custody and just told me that she was going to 'take care of' the person she was stalking before."
"If this is some kind of joke. . ."
"Mr. Praetor told me that someone else there was being stalked. Talk to him. He can call me for details. Just hurry. We've already called the police, but we just want to make sure that all bases are covered."
"I'll give him a call. He has your number?"
"You have no idea who I am, do you?"
"Should I?"
"Depends on how seriously you take your job."
"Are you threatening me?"
"Nope." I hung up.
I couldn't understand people asking me stupid questions over the phone. Didn't they understand that time was of the essence? It was as if they were falling into the trap of continuing a conversation long after it has served all usefulness.
Irony noted. Ok, just let me have my moment and we'll move on.
I was bouncing off the walls, trying to figure out exactly what I should be doing when the phone rang.
I answered but said nothing.
"Keith?"
"Gretchen. Are you safe?"
"My dad is on the way. Did you really mean what you said?"
I couldn't help smiling. In the midst of this crisis, we had found our own sanctuary. With her beside me, I would be able to face anything.
"Of course I did. I want to marry you, Gretchen. I want you to be my wife, and I will be your husband."
She squealed. "I love you Keith. I really do."
"I know. I love you too. I hope you don't expect me to wear a wedding dress on my wedding day though."
There was no sound on the other end of the phone.
"Etch?"
Still no sound. I was beginning to be a bit worried.
"Etch!?"
"Sorry, the idea of the two of us in white dresses just sort of got to me for a moment."
"Like I said. No."
"Awww. But it would be so cute."
"Then we can do it for a music video, probably for 'My Own Person' if nothing else."
"I don't think I've heard that one."
"Well, it talks about the difficulty of being yourself in the midst of people. It also speaks about how being a part of something doesn't mean that you lose your identity. I figure that marriage applies in that regard, and thought it might be a striking image."
"I can see that."
"I'll just sing it for you."
I sang it over the phone. It wasn't high quality, and I felt a little self conscious, but I got through it.
"I love it. and I can see where the wedding dresses fit in. It would be awesome getting married in the music video. Two brides would really counterpoint the tone."
"I thought so too."
"You know what they say about great minds."
"Yep. I do. Love you, Etch, but I should go. Someone is trying to reach me. Someone less important than you, of course."
"Of course. See you tomorrow, Keith. Night."
I picked up the other line. "Keith, it's Mr. Praetor."
"Apparently Ashley has no idea who I am. Besides that, the stalker was not stopped. She called me earlier and said she was cutting off dead weight and tying up loose ends. I might have overreacted thinking she was talking about her previous victim. . ."
"And then again, you might not. I'll let the police know."
"Richard should already have done that, Sir. I wanted to let you know what was up so you could try to let your other client know that he or she is in danger."
"Thank you, Keith. I'll pass that along."
"Good night, Sir."
"Night Keith."
For the first time tonight, someone hung up on me. I lay down on the bed and was almost instantly asleep. Next thing I knew, the phone on the bedside was ringing.
"Hello?"
"Good morning, Ma'am. This is the wake-up call that you requested for this morning. Your car will be around to pick you up in thirty minutes."
"Thanks."
I hung up and hopped through the shower again. It had been so long since I'd had short hair that I forgot what a convenience that it could be. I didn't even mind the girly haircut this morning since I had so much to do to get ready, and only half an hour to do it. I was clothed, had the girls in place, and was out the door with only seconds to spare.
I was back at Rockefeller center only a few minutes later than they wanted me.
"Desi, if you can't be here on time. . ."
"Give her a break, Rhodie. We're not even ready for her yet."
"How you doin, Pumpkin?"
"Not bad, Uncle Frankie, and Pumpkin?"
"Always wanted to call someone that, and now I have you."
I shook my head ruefully at him.
My phone rang, and for once in the past couple of days I saw a phone number on the display. "Richard. What's up?"
"Just wanted to let you know that your phone is now being monitored by the police, Desdemona. Both numbers."
"Is that why my caller ID is now working outside of Utah?"
"Probably. Just wanted to let you know. Apparently they were already looking for the individual before you called me. Holly Volynczek has been abducted."
"Who is. . ."
"She's the one that this stalker previously stalked. I've told the police the threat that the stalker made on Ms. Volynczek's life."
"I feel like all of this is my fault."
"Don't. They've brought the FBI into this. Apparently this person has been doing this for the past five years or so."
"That's horrible"
"Yes, it is, but there's nothing we can do about it."
"But. . ."
"No buts. You can either live your life in fear of what might happen, or you can live your life. You've always struck me as the sort of person who lived, Desi."
I gave a weak smile that I knew he couldn't see, and then answered, "I choose to live. So, what did you call about besides the authorities monitoring my phone calls?"
"I contacted Juilliard this morning and they have an opening for a guitar audition today, but I'm not sure whether or not you are ready for it. It would be classical guitar."
"What pieces are allowable?"
"The Juilliard website has the information. You would only have about three hours to prepare."
"Not much time. I've got to go."
"Before you go, there is a composition audition available on Monday. You'd have to have some compositions either computer generated or hand written with you when you went, so I'm not sure how plausible that is."
"Thanks, Richard. Later." I hung up.
Frankie had wandered off while I'd been talking to Richard, so I went in search of him. When I found him he was talking to what I assumed were members of the crew, so I looked up the information for my audition.
Most of the options I had pieces for, but I'd never personally heard of Villa-Lobos, so I was at a loss there. I'd need a quick practice of my other audition pieces, and then I'd have likely an hour to an hour and a half to learn a new piece of music.
Suddenly writing two compositions before Monday seemed a lot more likely. Well, nothing ventured nothing gained.
Frankie finished with the crew member and turned toward me.
"What's up, Pumpkin?"
"I need a six-string acoustic and a quiet room."
"Ok, but they might need you at any moment."
"That's fine. Apparently I have an audition at Juilliard in three hours if I can get ready."
"Really?"
"Yes, but the longer we talk, the less time I have to prepare."
"Right away, Pumpkin."
The word Pumpkin was really starting to get on my nerves.
About ten minutes later I was locked in the greenroom, working out the fingerings for one of the Villa-Lobos studies. I was surprised. In the past couple of years, my finger work had become a lot more precise.
I only mention it because I'd originally gone into Jazz guitar because of the difficulty I'd had with the classical fingerings. I'd grown some, and I'd of course been practicing doing complex fingering on the 12-string.
Attempting something that was less complex on a six-string suddenly left me feeling giddy. I was better than I'd thought. A lot better. It took me an hour, but I had the study down and was moving on to a run through on the other pieces. I was a little rusty on them, since it had been a couple of years since I'd practiced any of them, but I got everything up to a level with which I was comfortable.
I was frankly amazed. I never thought that I was this good. All of my energy had gone into making my music career work. First trying to get it off the ground, and then trying to keep it going. It was only just beginning to dawn on me how good I was on the guitar.
Of course, the fact that Juilliard was bending the rules for me should have been my first clue.
There was a knock on the door.
I opened it to find Owen there.
"Heya, Desi. They're looking for you on set. They decided to have you in a single sketch with me, and they want to run over it now."
I looked at my phone and got the time. I still have a little over an hour before I needed to be there for the audition, so I figured that we could probably squeeze this in.
"Ok, but I need to speak to Mister Coolidge first."
"He's on the set, so let's get over there."
We got there and Rhodie was pacing.
"Finally we can begin."
"Look, Mr. Coolidge. I never signed up for this little stunt of yours. So, you need to relax a bit. I'll work with you on it, but there are things in my life that come first. I have an audition for admittance to Juilliard in a little over an hour. We have until I need to leave to get this, and then I can come back after and we can practice some more. If that's not good enough, then you can drop the bit."
"We can always just get Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools to play."
"Yes you can, and if that's what you want to do. . ." I turned to leave. I didn't need his approbation right now, and I wasn't going to blow a real chance at my future for a single night of acclaim.
"Look, Desdemona, we're under the gun here. We need this ready by the end of the day today. We do dress tomorrow morning and then our live show tomorrow night."
"I understand this, Mr. Coolidge, but there are things that are more important to me. Can we stop wasting time and get started? We have five minutes less than when I got here."
He walked off the set and we got started.
It involved Davey, Guthrie and I playing, as if it had just been one of the musical numbers scheduled for the night. Owen would come out with members of the SNL cast acting as his band and try to get us off stage. We ended up with a re-match between Owen and myself, first on guitars, and then moving through chess and a couple of other things.
Every time he came up with a new contest, I beat him. In the end, he challenged me to marry him. I end with the words, "that's one contest I'm going to let you win," and walk off the stage.
It had its moments, but like many of the SNL sketches I'd seen over the years it seemed forced overall. That or I wasn't part of the target audience. That's always a possibility.
It only took forty-five minutes before everyone was satisfied and I was out the door and being driven the two miles to Juilliard. I verified the location where the audition would be and called Hannah.
"Hannah? This is Desdemona. I have an audition in a little over ten minutes for guitar for the pre-college course. Could you guide me to the right room. . .that is if you're not busy?"
"I am in the middle of something, but I can have Sam meet you out front. He knows the right way to go, since he's in the classical guitar program himself."
"Thanks, Hannah. You're wonderful."
"No problem, Desi. Knock 'em dead."
I had only a moment to wonder how Gretchen was doing, and whether Ms. Volynczek was safe before the limo came to a halt and I was out and running with the borrowed six-string in my hand. Sam grabbed my hand as I got to him and we were racing down the halls inside the building.
Needless to say I was a bit out of breath when we got to the room, and I had about a minute and a half before I needed to be in there. I checked my makeup quickly using a compact mirror, pronounced myself good enough, and went in.
"Cutting it a bit close weren't you, Ms. Desdemona. Or should I call you Keith?"
"When I look like this, Desdemona is fine."
"Well, young lady, you can begin when you like. Any order is fine just announce the pieces before you begin."
"Thank you."
I played my soul into the guitar and felt it reverberate across the room. It wouldn't be my last chance to get into this program, but it was suddenly the only thing, besides Gretchen, that I wanted in the world. I could do this.
I did it.
The silence in the room worried me, but I'd given it all I had on every one of those pieces.
"We were under the impression that you might not be ready for this audition."
"I apologize for the roughness of the study. I only learned it this morning."
The three people sitting behind the table judging me were almost impassive, but there was a slight feeling of shock emanating from them.
"If you could play that piece again please?"
I did so, trying to recapture the feeling I'd had earlier. Taking a deep breath after a couple of missed fingerings and then just played.
Again there was silence from the three other people in the room.
"We'll be in touch, Ms. Desdemona."
"Thank you for this opportunity."
I gave a slight bow, packed the guitar back into its battered case, and left.
"So, how did it go?"
"Silence, mostly."
"You did that badly?"
"I have no idea. I played my best, but they barely said a word to me. They did ask me to play the Villa-Lobos study again when they found out I'd only learned it this morning."
"Play it for me."
He led me to a practice room, and I got out the guitar again. I played the study for him. I was becoming much more familiar with it the more I played it.
"I hope you told them that you were kidding."
"What do you mean?"
"There's no way you just learned that this morning."
"Thank you so much for calling me a liar."
"You're serious?"
"Completely."
"I'm impressed then. Very impressed. Heck, I'm intimidated. Sure, it was flawed in a couple of places, but I think that I would have done worse with months to practice it."
"Well, I'm sure that I'll be able to get in next year, then."
"If your other pieces were as good as that one, then I still think you might get in this year."
"That's sweet of you to say, Sam, but I'm engaged."
"But, you're too young to get married."
I laughed. "My life is complicated. Really complicated. I decided that life is too short to live by others expectations. I've known Gretchen for three years. Three years in which we learned who we were as people both with each other and without. Do I think marriage will be easy? Of course not, but I'm willing to give it a try."
"You are a braver man than I am, in more ways than one." He was looking at my skirt, when I got a really strange idea.
"Nah, you just haven't been given the proper motivation, Sam. You doing anything right now?"
"Nope, what did you have in mind?"
"Giving you the proper motivation."
At his look, I giggled.
"Look, Sam, I just want to give you the opportunity to know what I go through right now for my music. Why I feel so passionate about my life. I understand that it seems a little weird, but you might learn something."
"I just realized that I have something to do. . ."
"What are you afraid of? You don't have anything to lose here."
"Except my manhood."
"Don't be such a baby. Besides, my hotel room has a magnificent view."
"Fine, but I'm only going up for the view."
I wondered what I was doing, and why. There was no reason for me to be dressing Sam up in women's clothing, or so I thought. Then I began to study his motions. Could he. . .
That would be WAY too coincidental. There's no way that I just happened upon someone. . .
But I watched the way he walked. There was a natural sway to his hips, and he was a little shorter than I was. Could he. . .
I was borrowing trouble. I'd just go ahead with my plan, we'd have a little dress up, and that would be the end of it.
We entered my hotel room, and the first thing that Sam did was go to the open wall that comprised my view of the city. I was a little nervous about it, with someone else in the room with me, because I felt for the first time that the entire city was watching me.
"Well, let's get you into some girl's clothing. Strip."
"I don't think this is such a good idea, Desi."
"Come on, Sam. It's not like you have anything that I haven't seen before."
He blushed and undressed. I was shocked at what I saw. Sam had a pair of breasts. They were small and under developed, to be sure, but they were breasts all the same.
"What?" I was shocked. He didn't seem to notice my question.
He turned slightly away from me and undid his belt. Then he was naked before me, and I kissed him.
I couldn't help myself. I felt him taking off my clothing and didn't want him to stop. He put his arms around me for a moment, and I felt the strength of him. I didn't want him to let me go. He released me for a moment and slid his hand up under my bra and began playing with my breasts. I could feel him caress the nipples, and I moaned softly. He guided me to the bed and gently lowered me onto it. I felt his hand sliding up my leg. . .
. . .and my alarm went off on my phone.
What was going on with me? I still felt aroused thinking about the dream. It both sickened me and excited me at the same time.
"What you need right now, Keith, is to keep yourself busy."
I went into the bathroom and got myself ready for the day. I'd taken a shower the night before, so I just needed to attach the breast forms and get my makeup in place before running downstairs.
The limo was waiting for me when I arrived, and I got to the studio with time to spare.
At least this would be better than the dream had been.
We started when I arrived. They have four sketches that would include me, one of which was the news. I would be giving a mock interview with the mock news anchor. They gave me humorous answers that all had a kernel of truth. I vetoed the one that suggested that I was really a man in disguise.
"But it will be great considering some of the rumors about Lady Gaga in years past, and you're a lot more feminine than she is."
"She wasn't going to be playing a cross-dressing transgendered teen on the big screen."
"Good point."
We went over each sketch until everyone was comfortable with it. We'd run through each of them again tomorrow, but they were done with me for the rest of the day, at least what was left of it.
I looked at my phone to get the time. Two o'clock. The dream crept back into my subconscious. I called Tom.
"Hello?"
"Hey, Dad."
"What's wrong, Keith?" I winced, but realized that with what I planned next, the police would be getting an earful. . .no, that was the dream. I needed this more than I thought.
"I was wondering if you could set up some time between Dr. Allen and myself. I know he isn't really my doctor, but he knows most of my situation, and I just need to speak to him. I can afford to pay for the session. . ."
"What happened?"
"I feel like I'm falling apart. Nothing seems to fit anymore."
"I'll give him a call, Keith."
"Thanks, Dad."
I paced back and forth for about ten minutes, and then my phone rang.
"Hello, Keith, I heard you wanted to speak to me."
"Dr. Allen. Thank goodness. I'm going crazy."
"Well, let me be the judge of that. Tell me what's on your mind."
"I had a really weird dream last night. . ."
I related the dream to him in as much detail as I could, clarifying when he asked me to. It took longer than I'd expected to get all the way to the end.
"It felt so real, doctor."
"Just call me Allen."
"I thought Allen was your last name."
"Nope," he said with a chuckle. "Dreams seem real to us because out subconscious mind is ignoring all of the holes. The gaps in the reality. We assume that something is there, so we ignore it."
"Does this mean I want to have sex with Sam?"
"No more than it means that Sam has breasts. People in dreams, even you yourself, are simply representative of something that our mind is working through. From what Gretchen has told me in the past few weeks, I assume that you have been taking a very strong line where sex is concerned?"
"Yes."
"Contrary to popular psychological myth, dreams do not have only one meaning. They are unique to the individual dreaming them. Now, given the fact that you and I are both from Utah, there are certain things that our dreams will have in common, because of a commonality of environment and social mores."
"Ok. I think I understand."
"In this case, I think that Sam actually represents you. The male you that you feel is being subsumed by the needs of the female you."
"You think I was going to dress myself. . ." I paused for a moment, thinking about the choices I was making in my life.
"You do that every day, Keith."
"Point taken."
"Also, Sam represents your desire to be swept away romantically. You've built this wall between yourself and Gretchen. You don't let her cross it, which is frustrating you both. Your Sam figure, on the other hand, was able to move you into a submissive position so that you could accept sexual advances."
He paused for a moment, as if collecting his thoughts, and then continued.
"Most of that dream was probably wish fulfillment mixed with worry about the unknown. You need to remember something, Keith. It is what our waking mind does with the imagery of our dreams that we need to worry about. The dreams themselves are generally out of our control. Let them happen, and then let them go. You are working through a lot right now."
Strangely, I actually felt better. "So, is this what you do with all of your patients, Allen?"
"Nope. I deal with people on a case by case basis. Every person is different. They each need a different level of input from me to get to where they need to be. Some of my patients just need someone to listen to them as they work out all of their own problems. Of course, those are the ones I feel most guilty about billing."
We both chuckled at this.
"Keith, if it's ok with you, I'd like to see you on a regular basis over the next couple of months. Some of what you were saying regarding the dream seems to stem from misunderstanding your own gender role right now."
"I'm a man, Allen."
"Who is presenting as a woman. That is confusing in the least stressful times, and with what is going on in your life right now. . .You don't have to. I just feel that it might help to clarify things for you, even if all I do is listen."
"I'll think about it, Allen."
"That's all I ask."
I hung up with him, and looked at the time again. It was already 3:45, so I caught a cab to the airport. I didn't have the flight number, but there were only so many flights that would be coming in from Utah at approximately the right time. I was already at the baggage claim with Gretchen glomped me from behind.
"Guess who?"
"I don't know, but let me tell you, Miss, that I'm waiting for my fiancéee and I don't think she'd approve of you hanging all over me."
She gave a little squeal and continued, "I don't think she'd mind this once."
I turned in her arms and we kissed. She had a really sweet smile on her face when we pulled apart.
"Hey beautiful. Being engaged seems to agree with you."
She sat back down in the wheel chair she'd been riding in.
"Yes, it does." She turned to the porter behind her, "My girlfriend will handle it from here."
"Okay, Ms. Anderson. Just have her leave the chair at the security office before you leave."
"Ok."
"So, how was your flight?"
"Cramped. If I didn't get to see you now, I'd say it wasn't entirely worth it."
"You're not in pain, are you?"
"Not really. Just a little sore."
"I'm glad you're okay."
"So, to the hotel first, or to your Dad's?"
I made a face at the suggestion.
"Come on, Desi, you need to talk to your Dad, even if it's just to tell him you don't want anything to do with him."
"Fine. I'll give him a call."
The bags began to fill the carousel just as Frankie picked up, so I moved forward as I spoke to him. Juggling a phone and a wheelchair is no fun, but I didn't want to let Gretchen out of my sight.
"Hey, Frankie? I'm picking Gretchen up from the airport right now. We still good for tonight?"
"I'd almost thought you had forgotten. Yes, please. Get here when you can. Orion is running a little late today, so everything's good."
"See you when we get there, Frankie."
"See you soon."
It was only a couple more minutes before Gretchen's bags decided to make an appearance and we were out the door hailing a cab.
I had to leave her in the cab while I ran the chair to the security office, and I was worried the entire time I was gone that the cab would drive off without me.
She was still there waiting for me when I got back.
"We need to drop the bags off at my hotel, and then we need to head over to," I gave him the address of Frankie's apartment. "Can you wait for us while we get the bags settled?"
"The meter will keep running, you know?"
"Fine, but it beats trying to get another cab at this time."
"Your money, lady."
We got to the hotel, and again I left Gretchen with the cab. I flagged Ran down as soon as I entered the hotel.
"Desi, how can I help you?"
"I need my girlfriend's bags taken up to my room. I believe that I am currently paying for two people in that room, if not, could you get it changed?"
"Certainly."
"Thank you so much. And add another tip of the previous amount to my bill."
"Of course, Miss." Ran gave me a beaming smile. I returned a slightly less incandescent one to him and rushed back out to the waiting cab.
Gretchen and I cuddled in the back seat, talking about the normal small items that occupy the time of lovers everywhere. Well, they were the normal things for us.
I loved having her next to me, and the feel of her in my arms was bliss.
We arrived at Frankie's building and I paid the fare. We called his apartment and he buzzed us through the outer door. Just as we got on the elevator, a man in a business suit rushed into the lobby.
"Hold the door!"
"Thank you so much. New in the building?"
"No, just visiting someone," Gretchen said.
"Good to know. Well, here's my stop."
"Ours too, actually," I replied
"Then after you, Ladies."
"Thank you kindly, My Good Sir." I hammed it up a bit, but, as I said, I like acting.
I got a little worried when he turned and followed us down the hall. When we got to the door to Frankie's apartment, and he stopped with us, I got even more worried.
It all came clear to me when he stepped past us and unlocked the door with his key.
"Look who I found in the hallway."
"Keith? And this must be your girlfriend. . ."
"I'm his fiancée Gretchen."
"Fiancée?" The other man, who I assumed must be Orion, asked the question.
"I proposed last night. It's been that sort of a week."
"I can imagine."
I chuckled. "Probably not, I have a weird life."
"Try me," Orion said with a grin.
"First, I think we need to sit down."
"Orion, where are our manners. Yes, please. I have dinner in the oven. Come to the kitchen and you can tell me all about it while I finish up the veggies."
We all sat down around the table in their kitchen and I recounted the happenings of the past week, with input from Gretchen for the parts that I didn't know. We got up to last night where I proposed to Gretchen, and she just started smiling at me.
"I had to say yes to him. What other man would wear a dress for me?"
I giggled at this, and there were general chuckles from Frankie and Orion.
"I have to admit, that you guys are not what I expected."
"Expected us to simper around the place?" There was a glower on Orion's as he said this.
"No offense meant, Orion, but I've only had dealings with the T portion of LGTB."
"So you're saying that you're a little prejudiced where the other portions of that are concerned."
"What I'm saying is I just don't know you. Look, let's start over." I looked over to Gretchen and she nodded at me.
"I was born Ethan Anderson. I am physically and mentally female. Now."
"Congratulations, dear. Unfortunately medical science isn't enough to give me the same gift. I was born Julia Masterson."
I couldn't help myself. I blinked.
"Then. . ."
"No, I'm still gay, Keith. It's just that Orion doesn't. . ."
"I think he gets it, Honey."
"Okay. You handle this, Dearest."
"I waited until after I married your father to get myself declared male. The act of changing your gender doesn't change contract law. Loopholes are great sometimes."
"And he would know. He's a lawyer."
"Not another one. You'd think the entire nation was peopled with lawyers."
Orion chucked at this.
"I never would have guessed if you didn't tell me."
"That's part of the point. I am male."
Gretchen asked the question that I'd been wanting to ask since yesterday, "Why Orion."
"Because he was a great hunter. When I was little, my Dad took me out hunting because he never had any sons, well biological ones anyway. I got to fill that role, and it was perfectly fine with me. I played sports and generally made a tomboy of myself. I loved that time with my Dad. . ." the smile left his face as he was talking, and there seemed to be a deep sadness there.
"Dad disowned me when I started living as a man."
"I'm so sorry to hear that."
Frankie walked over behind Orion and just put his arms around the bigger man.
I held Gretchen's hand under the table. It was starting to look like I'd gotten the wrong impression about what happened from Mom, but I needed to hear it for myself.
"What happened, Dad? Why did you leave us?"
"It's not his fault, if that's what you mean. Your Mom was always prone to see things in the worst possible light.
"When you turned five, I began to realize that. . .no that's not right. I had known for years that there was something off in how I saw the world. Maybe not off, but just different."
"I prefer different, Frankie," Orion said with a kind smile.
"Fine, different. You knew I was raised on the reservation, right?"
"Yeah, and you left when you were sixteen."
"I was dared to kiss one of my friends during one of those silly games that young people play. I'd kissed girls before, but that was the first time I'd ever kissed a boy. It was like nothing I'd ever experienced before. I liked it, and I didn't understand it. My father was a very strict man who had a narrow view of how the world worked.
"My friend and I agreed to meet later and see if this was just a fluke. We were caught by my father who near beat me to death. I left his house than night and never looked back. My friend said what we'd done was a mistake and refused to come with me.
"It was hard for me, a sixteen year old with no education, to get by, but somehow I did. I earned my GED and was taking night classes trying to get my associates degree when I met your mother. She was the only woman who ever made me question what I thought I knew about myself. I thought that if I could change this one thing about myself, that maybe I could get my father to accept me.
"We were married and latter that year she became pregnant. It was the happiest time of my life for a couple of months.
"Your grandfather died in an accident about a month before you were born. My entire world collapsed on me. I didn't know what I would do. I began seeing a therapist to try to work through my feelings about what had happened."
"That's when he met me. He had the appointment after mine, so for a few weeks, I would be coming out, as he went in."
"There was nothing between us during that time. In fact, until after the divorce was finalized, I never even knew his name."
"And he didn't pick me up in the doctor office."
"So, how did that work out?"
"Week after week, and month after month, I watched as a change slowly came over Orion. He started out as a somewhat masculine woman, but definitely a woman. First, his mannerisms changed, and then there were slight changes to his appearance. I began to relish seeing what would happen next, but never really thought about him except while waiting for my appointment.
"Something began to bother me more and more about the situation, and it hit me like a ton of bricks the day after your fifth birthday."
"You mean I did." Orion smiled at Frankie, who smiled back for a moment before continuing.
"I was waiting for the mystery lady to come out when the most gorgeous man I'd ever seen exited. I think my jaw dropped."
"Yes. It made me really self conscious. That was my first day presenting as a man."
"When he blushed and turned away, I realized my mistake. And then something hit me, the aforementioned something. While he'd looked like a woman, I'd felt nothing except for idle curiosity. The same person looked like a man, and I wanted to follow him to the ends of the earth.
"That was the first day I talked with my therapist about why I'd run away from home.
"Your Mom knew something was up, but I couldn't talk to her about it. Sex, which had been a bit of a chore before, became impossible for me."
"Dad!!"
"Sorry, couldn't help it. Your mom thought I was cheating on her, which was why I couldn't perform. I couldn't explain to her that I just wasn't attracted to her. She kicked me out of the house and asked for a divorce.
"I gave it to her."
"Why does Mom think you left her for a man?"
"Well, that's because I ran into Orion at the courthouse when the judge finalized our divorce."
"By ran into, he means he planted the most passionate kiss I've ever received on me in the corridor outside the courtroom. I was shocked to say the least."
Both of them smiled at the remembered incident.
"We started dating at that point, and the rest was history."
"Ok, now what really happened?" Gretchen was looking at the two of them. Actually, it would be more accurate to say she was glaring at them.
They looked a bit sheepish, and then Orion started speaking. "Most of the story was true, but we started dating after the second or third time your parents came to the court-house. We went out for drinks a couple of times, and then dinner. I was really attracted to your father, but he was acting as straight as an arrow."
"I was afraid that he would push me away, since it wasn't normal to be gay."
"One night when he was dropping me off at home, about a week before your parent's divorce was finalized, I'd gotten tired of the looks of longing he was shooting my way, and so I practically yelled at him to kiss me and get it over with."
"So you kissed him then, Dad?" I was a bit disgusted that my father would have lied about a detail like that.
"Nope, he ran for the car like the hounds of hell were after him and I didn't hear another thing from him until the day in court when the divorce was finalized. I was waiting in the court-room for a case to come before a judge, and heard that he was a single man again. I checked with the court reporter, who told me it would be another thirty or so minutes before my case was called."
"I was talking to your mother, apologizing that I couldn't be what she wanted, when Orion comes over, spins me around, and gives me the best kiss of my life."
"Yeah, I'd decided that I could be the dominant one in a relationship, I was a man after all."
"And you've been my man ever since." They both smiled at each other as they held hands.
"I believe that story more. I mean come on, it's obvious who the dominant one in this relationship is."
We all laughed at this, and made small talk after that until dinner was ready. He'd made a roast for us, with all the trimmings, and I had my first home cooked meal with my father. There was laugher and reminiscing on their part as Gretchen and I just soaked in the joy of two people who had been in love for the past twelve years.
Gretchen nudged me, and I looked at her with a question in my eye.
She gestured to her ring finger on her left hand, and then looked at my Dad. It took me a couple of repeats of the gesture to get her meaning. It did remind me of something, though. That was for later.
"Dad?"
"Yes, hon?"
"I've asked Gretchen to marry me, and she said yes."
"I figured with the talk of her being your fiancée."
"There's a complication with that."
"Oh?"
"I need a parent's permission to get married at my age."
"Aren't you emancipated?"
"That just means that for most situations, I am my own guardian. However, I still can't drink alcohol, vote, have sex, or get married."
"I'd like to see them stop you from having sex if you want to."
"Dad!"
"Sorry, Keith. Won't your Mom have to sign off on anything like this?"
"I have a lawyer for things like that. I'd prefer not to have to wait a year to get married, and I doubt that Mom will consent. So, if my lawyer says you can consent for me. . ."
"Of course he will, baby. All your Dad has wanted was to be a part of your life."
"I will on one condition."
"What is it?" I felt the room begin to spin. It was as if I knew what he was going to say, but I was praying that he didn't.
"I always wished that I'd had a daughter. I wanted to do all of the father/daughter things like take you on your first date, wait up for you after prom, and walk you down the aisle."
"I'm your son, though."
"I know that. Which means I get a beautiful daughter-in-law. Hear me out, though. My condition is not that you let me walk you down the aisle. It is that you will at least think about letting me do so."
"Wait. . .what?"
"You make a beautiful woman, Keith. You would make a beautiful bride. I can tell by the gleam in Gretchen's eye that she's already suggested it." Orion was talking to me, but looking at Gretchen when he said this last part.
"I have," she said with a grin.
Dad continued, "Gretchen, this needs to be Keith's choice. I don't want anyone making up his mind for him. So, will you think about it, Keith?"
I nodded, Gretchen squealed, and Dad and Orion smiled at me.
"That's all we ask."
Since that was over, I excused myself and went to the bathroom. Not that I needed to use the facilities, but I needed some privacy for the next call I was going to make.
"Madame Zeela's"
The number was right, but I didn't recognize the voice.
"Could I speak to Zeela please?"
"She's busy, can I help you?"
"Tell her Desdemona is calling."
"Yeah, right. As if Desdemona would be calling in person, and not having one of her people call Madame Zeela on her private line."
"I am such an idiot. Thanks for reminding me she had a private line."
I hung up and called Zeela's OTHER number.
"Hello?"
"Hello. You still have Gretchen's ring size, right?"
"Keith? So nice to hear from you. I was beginning to think I had lost my best customer with Desdemona on the scene."
"Well, business seems to have picked up. You never had a shop girl before."
"Never had enough business to need one. Which finger you need a ring for?"
"Left hand ring finger."
"You didn't!"
"I did." There was a huge smile on my face.
"Congratulations. She said yes, I assume?"
"Yep, but I am going to make a more formal proposal when I get the ring. Do it however you want, but realize I want to repay you for the earrings."
There was an intake of breath on the other end of the phone. "You want a $5500 ring for Gretchen?"
"$5400, but yes."
"When you finally realize something, you don't mess around."
"How soon can I get something like that from you?"
"For you, I'll work all weekend if I have to. I'll have to size stones, hmm, something special. Not a diamond, too normal, something. . .oh my word, I just got the perfect stone. I was afraid I would have to cut it because it is just too big for anything else. This will be a masterpiece, no...I have a much better idea than that." She cackled in glee. "This is too perfect. They will be beautiful."
"They?"
"No time, have to get to work. Ciao, Bella."
"Zeela!" But she was already gone. I'd only seen her get like this once before, when she'd talked about making the skull earrings, before Angelina had decided they were too gaudy.
I took a few calming breaths and went out to join Gretchen and my Dads
"Thank goodness you're back."
Gretchen rushed off to the bathroom and I made a call to Jordan. A slightly out of breath Tom answered the phone. "Hello?"
"Ewe. I wanted to speak to Jordan."
"Crap, wrong. . ." and then Jordan was on the line, equally as breathless.
"Hello, Keith."
"Hiya, Jordan. If I were to want to get married in Utah, I still need parental consent even if I'm emancipated, right?"
"Yes."
"Does it have to be the custodial parent, or could my Dad grant consent?"
"Your Dad could, but he'd have to actually present written consent in person to the county clerk. That would require you finding him, of course."
"That shouldn't be too hard, as he's sitting across the table from me. He is a stage manager for SNL."
"Well, that settles that. . ." She let out a soft moan.
"Yes, good night, Jordan, and give my best to Tom." I hung up before she could respond. I didn't think I needed that response. The only way that could have been worse was if either had been my actual parent.
I giggled as I set aside the phone.
"What's up?"
"You can consent for me, and Jordan and Tom were in the middle of interpersonal relations."
"That's so nasty!" Gretchen had just come back in and looked a bit shocked.
"You never think it's nasty when you try to get me to do it with you."
"That's completely different."
"Yeah, in what way?"
"In this way Keith." Orion said and laid a full open-mouthed, tongue-involved kiss on my Dad.
My stomach lurched, "Ok, point taken." They didn't stop.
"Etch, I think it's time we left. Night guys."
They pulled apart. "Sorry about that, I got a little carried away."
"No, it's fine. Gretchen is still recovering from surgery,"
"Ok, I'll see you tomorrow afternoon, Keith. It was a pleasure to meet you, Gretchen."
"You too, Dads," Gretchen directed it to both of them, and got a smile for her troubles. We hugged at the door, and Gretchen and I went down to catch our cab.
We had to wait a couple of minutes at the curb for our cab to arrive, but then it was a quick trip to the hotel.
"Evening, Ran."
"Evening, Ladies. Turning in for the night?"
"Yes, we are."
"Remember, if I can get you anything, feel free to ask."
I giggled and Gretchen responded. "Id love some whipped cream and edible panties."
"Gretchen!" I said in a shocked tone. "Ignore her. She isn't up for more than sleep right now."
"Well, I'll definitely sleep with you. . ."
"Yeah, sleep is about all you'll get."
We both held each other and giggled.
"So, is that a yes or no on the items?"
"Whipped cream, yes, but strawberries for the second part."
"Oh yes, strawberries."
"Much more tasteful. Goodnight, Ladies, and I'll have your snack sent up to you."
"Goodnight, Ran." Gretchen sang out as the elevator doors closed.
"You are so naughty."
"Are you going to spank me?"
"Don't tempt me."
"Ok, since I've never been into spankings as foreplay."
"Good to know."
We got up to the room without any further complications, and Gretchen lay on the bed and stripped to her bra. "Keith, I'm having a little trouble checking my sutures, could you do it for me please?"
"You have a cut on your leg!?"
"Oh, yeah. Apparently after they got me all cleaned up, they found that the blood wasn't from torn sutures, but a shallow cut. It was designed to make sure that the police hurried in to get me."
As I checked that everything was healing, and re-bandaged her cuts, I thought about the behavior of my supposed stalker. He, or she, was acting more like this was some elaborate game. He'd won the first few rounds, and had given me a consolation prize in the form of Gretchen's safety.
"Keith? You're turning me on just staring at me like that."
"What? Oh sorry." I turned around, blushing profusely. "I was lost in thought and wasn't really staring."
"I'm hurt. . ."
"Don't be. I love the way your body looks, I just have a lot on my mind regarding that cut on your leg."
"Oh." She pulled on a pair of lacy panties, and sat with her back to me.
"Etch. . ."
"Keith, I'm sorry that I disgust you so much that a stalker is more interesting than looking at my naked body."
"I worry about you, Etch."
"Then be with me."
I kissed her, and she kissed me back.
There are some moments in our lives that we wish we could take back. They bother us and cause embarrassment for the rest of our lives.
They are our greatest regrets and can steal the joy out of future moments with a poor thought at the wrong time.
This was not anything like those moments.
It was a sublime moment that made all of the regrets worth the pain, if only because they led you to that place and moment in time.
There was passion in our kisses, but not enough to steal from us the knowledge that we were together. It was soft, and sweet, and powerful and gentle all at the same time. We lay there, kissing and talking and kissing and holding. I can't remember a specific thing that I did or said.
I can't forget the feel of her against me, or the smell of her.
We did not have sex. No intercourse. Nothing like that.
We made love in its most pure form.
I didn't even need to remove a single article of clothing.
"Thank you."
"For what?" I was lying there basking in the moment, and speech almost seemed to be superfluous
"Not having sex with me."
She made to say more, but there was a knock on the door.
We both giggled and I went to answer the door.
"Yes?"
"I have your strawberries, Ma'am."
I opened the door and let the waiter, busboy, whatever into the front room. He uncovered the strawberries and whipped cream and then seemed to be waiting for something.
"I have no cash, but if you would like, you can charge a twenty dollar tip to me room. . .?"
"I don't know. . ."
"Wait here for a moment. . .William."
I called the front desk. "Exeter House."
"Could you charge twenty dollars to my room so that William can get a tip for delivering my food?"
"Of course, Ms. Desdemona."
"And take ten dollars for yourself."
"Right away, Miss." There seemed to be a smile radiating from the phone when I disconnected.
"William, I had the front desk charge twenty to my room. If you have any problems, either talk to myself or Ran and I'm sure we can get it sorted."
"Of course, Ma'am."
I shut the door behind him and Gretchen came out of the room where she'd been hiding. We spent the rest of the evening eating strawberries and watching sappy movies.
Well, Gretchen ate strawberries. I just held her and watched movies.
We crawled into bed after the strawberries and our saccharine tolerance were exhausted. I held her and we went to sleep.
It had been a long day, and tomorrow would be longer. I'd survived my first week under contract with Spotlight Productions, and spent the most beautiful evening with the woman I love. All in all I felt that everything in the world was going perfectly, and simply prayed that it would last.
Unfortunately, nothing ever lasts.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips. Thank you for all of your help with this episode.
I woke up with her in my arms. A smile spread over my face as I thought about the events of last night. I wouldn't even allow the foreboding I felt to ruin my mood.
I watched the sun slowly rise over Central Park. It was a perfect moment that I knew couldn't last.
My phone rang, and Gretchen stirred in her sleep. She opened her eyes and looked up at me. In a sleepy voice she said, "you going to get that?"
I laughed and reached across her to get my phone. It was the Desdemona ring tone. I lay half on top of her as I answered the phone, and she put her arms around me.
"This is Desdemona."
"Desi, glad I caught you before you left for the studio."
"What can I do for you, Richard?"
"Nothing, at least not right now. Just wanted to check in with you."
"So, were you able to get in touch with anyone?"
"About?"
"You know what it's about. Why are you playing these games?"
"I'm not playing any games, Desi."
"Ok, it's good to hear from you, Richard."
I hung up the phone and started dialing Richard's number.
"What's going on, Keith?"
I held my finger up, as if asking for a moment, and listened to the phone ring. It went to voicemail so I called again.
Richard picked up after the third ring this time. "Hello?" a woman's voice answered the phone.
"Could I speak to Richard please?"
There was a noisy yawn on the other end of the phone. "Hello?"
"Richard, I take it you didn't just call me."
"No, I didn't. What's going on?"
"Crap. That explains why I couldn't recognize it wasn't Gretchen before. Richard, I think the stalker just called my phone trying to determine where I was."
"Why would she do that unless. . .Stay where you are, Keith. I'm going to hire a bodyguard and send him over to your hotel."
"How will I know he's from you? We don't know what this psycho looks like, after all."
"Good point. Ok, do you remember the name of Gretchen's first teddy bear?"
As far as I knew, Gretchen had never owned a teddy bear. What was he. . .and then it dawned on me.
"Yes, I remember."
"You're sure? Really sure?"
"This would be the one that saved her life by taking a knife to the stuffing?"
"Graphic way of saying it, but yes. That teddy bear."
"Ok."
"The guard will say that he was sent by the bear."
"Got it." I thought for a couple of moments before I continued. "Richard. It wasn't me you were talking with unless I end a phone conversation with the word Kisses. If I ever end with Hugs, then know I'm in real trouble."
"Got it, but why the. . .girly. . .closings?"
"Cause no one would suspect that as a safe word."
"Good thought. Oh, before I let you go, I contacted Juilliard yesterday. You will need to fly back in two weeks for an audition. They have to set some stuff up first, and they want you to be fully prepared. They'd like you to bring some compositions as well, since they'd like to see what you can do there."
"Thanks for that, Richard. Kisses."
"Bye."
I hung up the phone.
"Keith?"
"Yes, Etch?'
"My one true love."
"Yes, dearest?"
"No, that's my safe word. I will use it at the beginning."
I smiled at her. "I can get used to that, I think."
She wrapped her arms around me, and lay her head on my chest. I called my Dad.
"Frankie's phone."
"Dad, It's Keith. I'm going to be a bit late coming in today. Something came up, and I just need a little time."
"Rhodie isn't going to appreciate it."
"He'll live. I'll tell you all about it when I arrive."
After hanging up this time, Gretchen looked at me with a gleam in her eye. "So, what are we going to do now?"
"No idea. . ."
She kissed me full on the lips. I felt her reaching for my waist and pushed her up. "Wait, honey.. Not this way."
"But last night you made me feel so loved, that I needed. . ."
"You don't need to do this, Etch. I know you love me."
"I need to show you. I need to. If I can't show you then you'll never know how much that I love you. I know you'll like it. I've never gotten a complaint before. . ."
I just held her to me and didn't say a word. It was probably the hardest thing I'd ever had to do. She cried into my shoulder, and I held her.
"Am I that repulsive to you?"
"Never."
"Then why won't you let me do this? If we both want it, what's the harm? I can't lose you. Not now. Not after last night. I need to show you how much I appreciate you."
"You already do, Gretchen."
"But I was a bitch to you for so many years."
"You were never a bitch to me, Etch. Never. You may have ignored me while we were at school, but that was about the worst of it. You never pushed me away after school."
"But. . ."
"No buts, Etch." I began to kiss her deeply, to show how I felt about her, when there was a knock on the door.
I went to answer it. "Hello?"
"Larry sent me up here." A feminine voice answered me, but the name was right so I figured it must be the bodyguard.
I opened the door and in breezed a very pretty woman. I quickly shut the door behind her. When she caught sight of me she stopped and turned to leave. "I don't do harem attendant. Sorry for the mix-up."
"Wait, what?"
"I was told I would be the bodyguard for a female rock star. If you're the boyfriend, then I won't be taking this job."
"Wait, hold a minute. I'm the female rock star."
She looked at me with a little smile. "Sorry, but even with the hair there's no way anyone would be fooled by that body."
"Gretchen, could you explain to this person what's going on while I get ready to go?"
I had never had anyone push my buttons the way this chick just had. Who did she think she was? She was hired to protect me, and all I wanted to do was kill her.
I knew that the SNL crew would be doing my makeup between each of the sketches, so I felt that it would be a good opportunity to go all out right now. I attached the girls, put on my favorite black lace with pink satin bra, and went to town.
She wanted a rock star did she? I'd damn well give her one.
Stage makeup is a wonderful thing. But it over emphasizes in order to be seen without magnification. What I did could have been seen from space.
It wasn't the depth, it was the size: First, a white powdery looking base, than I put a circle on my face that crossed my eyes, at the top, and my lips, at the bottom. Down across my chin I put a vertical line that continued to my collar bone. Then, in the center of my neck I put the cross bar. I would have applied it all the way to the back of my neck, but my artistic skills aren't all that great when I can't see what I am doing.
I blended in the girls to my chest, and went out to the main room. I had no idea what I was going to wear with this, but it made me feel better.
"That's one of the more ridiculous things I think I've ever seen." Bodyguard chick was still trying to get on my nerves. "What happened to the guy who was going to get ready? He didn't get a quickie in there while we were waiting did he?"
"Are you blind or stupid?" I couldn't take this anymore, "There is a very real threat against me right now, and so my manager thought to hire you. Before you got here, I thought it was a good idea. Now, I can see that I was mistaken. We'll just have to do without today, and I hope nothing bad happens.."
"Oh my. . .Desdemona is a guy?" The woman just started laughing.
"What?"
"Keith, look how you're standing?" Gretchen was smiling at me.
I was standing with one hip thrust out a bit, and my hand resting on it. It was something I'd never do as Keith, but it felt right to me as Desdemona.
"I'm sorry, I couldn't help it. Let's start over. I'm Rachel and I've been assigned to be your Friend-i-guard."
"What in the heck is a Friend-i-guard?"
"It's a simple idea, really. We add a 'one more' to your group. Just one more girl, or just one more guy. We're trained, however, to protect you. Don't expect me to wear anything like that, though. And the makeup. . ."
"All I've done is my makeup. I was heading to get my clothing when you stopped me." I stuck out my tongue and headed into the bedroom. I shut the door while I tucked everything well away, and then grabbed a short sheath dress from Gretchen's side of the closet. I had to remove my bra, since it was strapless, but the dress itself seemed to hold me in place well enough. I went with a pair of stiletto heels, pink of course, and called myself ready.
"Well, you'll definitely stand out in that."
Instead of speaking, Gretchen just came over and gave me a hug. I gave her a quick kiss and let her finish getting ready. The three of us headed out the door after that and headed down to the limo waiting for us by the curb.
I had barely gotten settled into the seat when we were stopping and all three of us were getting out. The roar of the crowd was immense. There wasn't enough room for more than a couple of hundred people, but in the confined space in front of Rockefeller Plaza, they felt like they were more. I signed arms and legs, a breast or two, and a pink pump. I wondered how many people would start wearing pink shoes because of me. #82 was the shoe, and I got all the way to #86 before I was done.
I felt a bit like a princess.
"Etch, I need a piece of paper, now."
The words were pouring into my head, and I simply lost track of what else I was doing. Gretchen guided me into the elevator and then to a quiet room while I continued to write. As I wrote, the bits became pieces, which became phrases and stanzas. I had a new song. I began to write the accompaniment. I hadn't tried to write every piece before, but figured that this time would be different. Usually, I figured that a piece of music was more organic. It was jazz no matter what form it took. I had some idea of how the song would go, but I let the other two musicians find their own place in the song.
This song was different. I knew exactly how the song needed to sound, so I wrote the bass line, and the percussion, to fit that sound. I could hear the entire piece in my mind and it flowed out onto the page.
I read through it when I finished, and almost crumpled the whole mess into a ball before Davey saved it.
"What's this?"
"Nothing. Give that here."
"Love the makeup, Boss-lady."
"Yeah, seconded. Oh, is that a new song?"
I began to blush. "Give that here, Davey."
"Not until we give it one try on stage."
I hung my head and said, "Ok, let's get this over with."
We went up on stage and grabbed our instruments. I let Davey and Guthrie work through what I'd written a couple of times, and my embarrassment left me. I played my part with them, at the speed Davey set for us on his drums. We played through the song a couple of times, and then we began again.
I sang the words, and suddenly we had people converging from every corner of the studio. I let myself get into it and started to smile. I threw intentionally exaggerated dance moves, hamming it up and underscoring the satire tone of the piece. Sure, it was a pop beat, and mostly pop words, but it was still Desdemona.
With the last repeat of "Daddy's Little Princess" we drew the song to a close and I bowed to the audience to cheers and whistles.
Mr. Coolidge rushed up to me a bit frantic. "That song isn't on the approved list that was sent over to us by your manager."
"That's 'cause I just wrote it."
He goggled at me. "You just wrote that? And practiced it for the first time just now?"
"Yep," I said with a smile.
A light went on behind his eyes. "Well, get your manager to register that song so you can play it on the show."
"Wait, I didn't. . ." but it was too late for me to do anything. Rhodie had already run off to wherever he hid while the rest of his crew was doing the real work.
I gave Richard a call. He answered right away this time.
"Hey, Desi. So, how did the bodyguard work out?"
"She was not what I expected."
"She'll be able to protect you, don't worry about that. She's a qualified instructor in unarmed combat for the police academy in New York, as well as proficient in over forty small arms."
"Good to know, but that's not why I called. I have a new song, and Rhodie Coolidge wants me to have it registered with ASCAP before we perform it tonight."
"Usually it takes time. . ."
"Look, then you call him and tell him no. He wouldn't accept that as an answer from me."
"Desi, I know Rhodie personally. Another frat buddy. If he says he wants you to perform something, it is because he likes it. Him liking it means something, as he is a bit of a music snob."
"Okay. . ."
"Fax me the music, and I'll do what I can. Tell him you'll do it last, which will give me about fourteen hours to get it registered."
"Okay, Richard. I hope you know what you're doing. Kisses."
I went off in search of Rhodie, and found him in, of all places, his office.
"Mr. Coolidge?"'
"Yes, Desdemona?"
"Richard says that he wants until the last musical number of the night to make sure he has enough time to get it registered."
"You got it. Now, you're needed in wardrobe so that they can get you ready for the show."
Have you ever spent so much time worrying about something, and planning for something, and working toward something, that when that something finally arrives, it is sort of anti-climactic?
It felt as though I had been building up to this one moment on SNL for months, and yet, when I got there, everything just happened.
The dress went over without a hitch, and contrary to superstition, so did the show. They had me up there a number of times, with most of the sketches built around the punch-line "But I'm only sixteen."
I could tell that the audience was getting a little tired of it, so for my last appearance, a night-club-gig gag, I changed it up on the actor opposite me.
"Shouldn't be a problem to let you in, I just need to see your ID."
And of course, the sketch was supposed to just end there with the punch-line, you get the idea.
"Well, can't you just let me in? I'm playing with the band."
The actor glared at me, but the audience perked up. I think they noticed something was off.
"It's not like you're sixteen or something." The actor really tried, bless his heart, but I wasn't stopping.
"Well, my birthday is next week, so technically. . ."
"Your twenty-first birthday?" Finally, he got it.
"That would be next week. . .and another four years."
"Wait so, in four years and a week you'll be twenty-one?"
"Exactly, so can I get in the club?"
"Just as soon as I see your ID."
"Great!" I gave him my ID and walked past while he was looking at it.
Then, he looked at the camera and deadpanned, "Who knew? She's only sixteen."
The audience started laughing for the first time in about half an hour. See, that's the thing about humor. Even when you're expecting something, the delivery is everything.
I mean, every once in a while a chicken crossing the road actually is funny.
The rest of the show was fine, I got to play "Black Flag" and "My Life With You is Hell". Swearing on national television is a big rush, but I'm sure they bleeped me out.
Then we were down to the last song of the evening.
Owen got back up on the stage after his final sketch. "Here, one last time, with a song written this morning and performed here for the first time anywhere. . .I give you Desdemona singing 'Daddy's Little Princess'."
The opening chords were all pop. Heavy on the 12-String melody, with some bass guitar and percussion to fill in the holes.
It also had a pop sort of tempo to it. I could imagine Miley Cyrus or Taylor Swift happy with a song like that.
Then, for a moment, we paused. I smiled and used the first words of the song. They were sung without any accompaniment at all. Just me to a silent hall.
I'm Daddy's Little Princess, acting up the part,
I've got him round my finger, I'm the center of his heart.
Daddy loves his baby, wants to keep me from all harm!
I paused for a moment, and then smirked at the audience.
What Daddy don't know. . . I said.
Then we cranked up the speed, and let loose our metal souls. You could still hear the Pop theme running through it. The hard rock beat seemed to give it. . .soul.
I sang about sneaking out to dances, and spending time with boys. I sang about going to parties and staying out late at night.
Then, as all frenetic lifestyles do, that portion of the song came to an abrupt halt with a primal scream from me and the lights shutting off.
A single spot shone on me, and I started with only a soft beat from the bass drum. I sang about heart break, and loss of innocence. The bass guitar joined in and I sang about a hope that I could go back and regain what I thought I'd lost: The love of my Daddy.
I put my hands to the strings as if to add the lead guitar to the song. I looked directly into the spot and the music stopped again.
I love you Daddy.
We started back in, and ran a slower, and sadder version from the very first. It was pop, but it was a ballad.
I sang about redemption and forgiveness. I sang about going home again.
I sang about knowing that someday I would make my Daddy happy with my decisions.
Then, we brought the stage lights up, and we added some speed and strength to it.
I sang about finding the one, and true love. I sang about getting married to a wonderful man.
At the very end I sang about standing with my own Daddy, as I watched my husband holding our daughter, knowing she would be Daddy's Little Princess.
It was another song written for Gretchen, and like "My Life With You is Hell", I felt that it was one of my best works.
The audience loved it. "Thank you, New York. You're great!"
There were some chuckles at this and a call or two of, "Desdemona, I love you!" and we walked off the stage.
Then I got together with Rachel and Gretchen and we headed downstairs to brave the crowd.
After a few more autographs, I was able to get into the limo, and the other two quickly joined me.
We got out at the hotel, and there were even more people here. We slipped in past the throng and got into the elevator without any further delays.
"What is going on? I've never had this big a crowd following me."
"Looks like fame has finally caught up with you." Rachel was smiling at me, but I saw a hint of worry in her eyes. I figured it was just professional paranoia and thought nothing more of it for the moment.
The elevator door opened onto a deserted hallway and we went to our room. There was someone sitting in the main room when we got there.
"Finally. I was beginning to think that you weren't going to come." The girl sitting on the couch smiled at us and crossed her legs.
"Who are you?" Rachel asked her.
"Why, the agency sent me. They thought that one just wasn't enough for Desdemona."
"Which agency was that?" Rachel asked.
"Why are you asking me? You know which agency."
"I want to make sure, since they told me that I'd get these two solo." She gave a pout and put her hand on my arm, "and it's been so long since I got two all to myself."
"The escort agency thought that you needed some backup for your first threesome in so long."
Ok, and things were going so well too.
It was then that I noticed that Gretchen was paralyzed in fear. I walked over to her, turning my back to the person on the couch for a moment. Gretchen was staring wide eyed at the girl.
"Etch?"
"It's him. It's the stalker."
I heard a quiet pop and Rachel collapsed to the ground.
Spinning around I looked toward the stalker who was pointing a gun in my direction.
"It's always such a waste putting a bullet in a hooker, but I can't have her sullying your reputation, Desdemona."
I looked over at Rachel. She was curled around her middle with her back toward the couch. I expected to see more blood from a gunshot wound. Why wasn't there any blood?
"So, I can't very well keep calling you Stalker, so what do you want to be called?"
"So calm and collected, Desdemona. You're everything I could have ever dreamed for in a soul mate. It's so sad that our relationship will be so short lived."
"Why is that?"
"Well, because you will not be able to live through it. No one ever has. . ."
My phone began to ring. I answered it before the freak could say anything about it.
"Desi, my phone has been ringing off the hook since the end of SNL. Everyone wants a copy of that new song of yours. Something in it seems to have sparked recognition in a lot of people."
The stalker motioned at me to get off the phone.
"That's great, Mr. Fields. It's a little late here, though."
"I know what you mean, Desdemona. We'll talk later. Hugs?"
"Hugs." And I hung up the phone.
I knew he'd picked up on the situation, and now I just had to keep us alive and in this room until the authorities could come to the rescue.
"That was perfect acting, Desdemona. Just perfect." The stalker beamed a smile at me. "You can call me Lady Anne." Lady Anne stood up and pointed the gun in our direction. "I suggest that we move this to the bedroom. It's a more conducive atmosphere to what I have in mind."
I took Gretchen in my arms, and the two of us walked toward the bedroom.
"Hey, Lady."
We turned in enough time to see Rachel disarming Lady Anne and taking her to the ground.
"Call the police."
"They should already be on the way." I replied to Rachel's request. "Duress words are a great thing."
"So much more than a pretty face, aren't you, Desdemona."
Gretchen walked over to the person on the ground and spit in her face. "Desdemona is mine. She always has been. Keith is mine because he gave himself to me, and I am his. There is no you between us."
Lady Anne smirked up at Gretchen. "There will be, little girl. I will be there forever more, now. When you are lying in your bed with her. When she holds you in her arms. You'll be able to hear my voice, and feel my eyes watching you."
"Bitch, you're not going to be looking at anything except for concrete walls." Rachel pushed her back to the ground while I guided Gretchen over to the couch.
I sat in the spot where she had been sitting, and held Gretchen next to me.
"The more you follow me, Miss Anne, the more of you I own. I am the one who is filling your thoughts and forcing your actions. You are a puppet to your own obsession, and I hold all the strings. You hoped to cut them here tonight, but only got wound up in them more tightly."
I got up so that I knew she saw me when I said the next statement. "I OWN YOU, and from this moment on, you know it."
I felt Gretchen sit up next to me, and looked at her. She had a determined look on her face.
"Miss Anne, you are no longer the owner of your destiny. You called yourself a Lady, and hoped to rule over us. You have been brought low, and made our servant. Go from us now and never let us catch sight of you again." Etch had supported me with her own version of my words. They were her words as well, though.
I could see the anger kindle in Anne's eyes.
"Does the slave have something she wishes to say?"
Rachel looked at me, as if to suggest that I'd gone too far, so I directed my next statement to her. "This thing has killed at least one person that I know of. She was planning on killing Gretchen and me today. Pissing her off is not going to change that, nor will it make the situation worse."
I turned back to Anne. "It will, however, let it know that we will not tolerate it's presence. It will respect our wishes and realize that the simple pleasures of hunting us have come to an end. It may think it will get free and follow us for the rest of its life, but it would be wrong in that assumption."
For a moment, I felt myself being pushed in a direction I would not go, and the moment passed. Gretchen, Rachel, and I sat and watched Anne for the next five minutes until the police arrived.
They took our statements, retrieved the gun and took Rachel's bullet proof vest. They also took Anne away in handcuffs, planning on charging her with at least attempted murder and unlawful detainment.
Rachel made no move to leave with them.
"Isn't your job done?"
"Not hardly. Just because I saved you from one threat, doesn't mean that all threats are gone."
"Oh, sorry. I didn't mean. . ."
"Look, Keith, let me explain something. Yes, I am a hard ass. I do things to keep my principal safe. Sometimes that requires I not be friendly with said person.
"That said, I like you. You've got backbone, and you are hella talented. I'd like to stick with this assignment, if you don't mind. It could be fun."
"But won't people know. . ."
"If by people you mean the bad guys, and by bad guys you mean Anne, yes, Anne now knows that I am your bodyguard, so she is less likely to shoot me in the chest next time. That being said, if Anne ever gets out of police custody then I'm making sure you have a full presidential detail next time. If I'd known. . ."
"If we'd known, I'm sure that we'd have had one this time."
"Point taken. Sorry. Let me run your security, Keith. Let me pretend to be your friend for the cameras."
"Sorry, can't do it, Rachel."
"Oh, ok. Well I'll have someone else. . ."
"No, you misunderstand. I don't have pretend friends. If you're going to be my friend, then be my friend. None of this just for the cameras."
"If I'm your friend, then you won't listen to me when it's important."
"Rachel, yes I will. Look, I take my safety, and Gretchen's, very seriously. I know nothing about keeping my life secure. You know everything. If you were to start telling me how to write an Emmy winning song, I'd ignore you, as would be right. If I started telling you how best to keep me safe, then you'd ignore me, as would also be right."
"Are you sure?"
"One of my best friends is my boss at a Hot Topic store. She's wrote me up once for yelling at a customer. I never yelled at a customer after that."
Rachel blinked at me.
"Are you perfect, or just pretending to be?"
I blushed and tried to defend my ineptitude, but Gretchen beat me to the punch.
"He's pretty close to it, but would never let anyone else know it if he could help it. He keeps track of all of his failures so that he can prove his own imperfection."
"Doesn't that get annoying?"
"Nah, it's one of his more endearing features, because he actually believes he's imperfect."
"Guys, I'm right here."
"We know." Gretchen said, and ended my protest with a kiss.
"Guys, I know he's a guy, but it really makes me uncomfortable watching what looks like two girls making out."
"Ok, I'll go get changed. I've had enough Desdemona for the day anyway."
I left the two of them talking and went to get cleaned up. I peeled and scrubbed and primped and rubbed.
When I got done I was a bit raw, and happy to be so. I still had a very feminine looking face with my plucked eyebrows and a-line haircut, but it was me looking back from the mirror.
When I got out of the bathroom Gretchen handed me the phone.
"Uncle Richard wants to make sure that you're safe."
"Hey, Richard."
"Hey, Keith. So, I heard that they caught the guy."
"Girl."
"No, he's male. He let them know before processing."
"They get him to tell them his real name?"
"Not yet, and I think they'll likely have to drag it out of him."
"Well, that's fun. I told you I wanted to be in the movie, right?"
"Yes, you did. I've been meaning to talk to you about something, though. You're probably not going to be going back to school this fall."
"I can't just drop out!"
"I'm not asking you to. I think it would be a good idea if we hired private tutors to cover at least the next year."
"What about Juilliard?"
"Might have to give that up."
"Look, Richard. I understand the concern, but we need to be realistic here. I'm still a minor, and I need to finish my schooling. I need to go to college, since there's no guarantee that my life will continue in this direction, or for how long it will even work out."
"Keith, the way you spend money, you're currently set for life. And we're still selling videos and albums on iTunes."
"I want a normal life, Richard."
"You're life has never been normal. And if you really wanted a normal life, why did you propose to Gretchen. . .I mean propose so early to Gretchen. Damn it, you know what I mean."
"Yes, I know what you mean, Richard. I do. See it from my perspective, though, for a moment. If I can't make time for High School, how am I going to make time for college in two years."
"But we will be on the road so often, and then there's the movie to consider, and a possible tour this fall. . ."
"I'm going on tour?"
"I said possible."
"Well, better than not possible. Ok, if it's in the planning stages, then let's plan for the concerts to be on Fridays or Saturdays."
"Not always possible for all venues."
"When it's not possible, I'll have to fly out before the concert and back after. I will have the most normal life I can."
"And when you are out for a couple of months for the movie?"
"Fine. How about I take this fall from tutors, and we plan on me being in school next spring."
"I know how you feel about this, Keith, and for what it's worth I'm sorry."
"Me too. Kisses."
"Later, Keith."
The three of us talked for an hour or so to wind down from the show and the other event, and then Gretchen and I went to bed.
"You're sure it's ok?"
"Like I said. You're a friend. Take the other room."
"You two keep it down, then. I'm a light sleeper."
Gretchen and I chuckled at this.
"We will," I said.
Both of us were asleep shortly after lying down.
One month.
Had it really only been one month since I started pretending to be Desdemona? Well, since I started being Desdemona at any rate.
Somehow, my life in the past two months, while seeming to revolve around Desdemona, was really more about me than it ever had been in the past. I was singing my music. Gretchen and I were together as I'd always wanted us to be. I'd met people that I was sure that I would have as friends for the rest of my life, or at least I hoped that they would be.
I was, for the moment, content. I had a woman in my arms whom I loved more than breath. There would be problems in the future, of course, but in this individual moment in time there were no problems.
It was a perfect moment in time, and I simply wanted for it to last forever.
Like all such moments, it ended sooner than it should have, but it gave me strength for everything that came after.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
I entered the slightly messy room, not sure how I'd gotten there, and the person sitting at the computer typing away had no idea either.Let me try this again: I entered the slightly messy room. Or was it that I appeared there? The person sitting at the computer was just as shocked. . .
"You shouldn't be here."
"What?"
"Keith, you shouldn't be here."
"Isn't this just another dream?"
"Not in the sense that you think it is. You're in danger of completely breaking the fourth wall here."
"Um, okay. . ."
"Did you notice how much harder than normal your little internal monologue was?"
"Well, it didn't seem to flow the way they normally do."
"That's because you're in now, now."
"Huh?"
"You are actually in the moment. I don't have the luxury of editing your comments to make them flow. To make you sound more intelligent that you would. . .well, you get the picture."
"What are you talking about?"
"I'm the author you dope."
"You mean you write my story?"
"Yes, we could say that I am sitting in front of my computer, typing out a conversation I am having with you in my head."
"Wouldn't that make you insane?"
"A little, but it is a good insanity, it's the reason you exist after all."
"Before you go around congratulating yourself for that, I have a little something to say to you regarding the past incident with the stalker."
"I know you do, which is the reason you're here."
"Huh?"
"Repetitive use of monosyllables is beneath you, Keith."
"Ok, at the beginning didn't you insinuate that you had no idea how I got here?"
"Of course, but then again, I would be a little less of a deific being if I wasn't at least a little omniscient."
"I saw you hesitating. How can an omniscient being actually be omniscient if you have trouble spelling omniscient."
"Now you're just being cruel."
I smirked at this, but I had something serious to say to this individual.
"Why have you done this to me? Why did you throw the stalker at me, and have Bobby attack Buffy. Why do you inflict these evils upon your characters?"
"Would it make you happy if I told you that I did it because I could?"
"No."
"Of course not. But that is what you expect me to say isn't it. You think me capricious and mean spirited and a bully, even without any evidence to support it."
"Ok, so you're asking for the benefit of the doubt are you? Why should I give it to you?"
"Because of Gretchen."
"What does she have to do with this?"
"So, you're willing to lay the evil at my feet, but unwilling to give me credit for the good?"
I was a bit abashed at this. How could I forget that my life had some major blessings in it. But. . .
"They don't make up for the evil that you inflict on me."
"Keith, I take no pleasure in your sorrow. I have given you outlets for that sorrow. I give you people in your life that can support you through the tough times, and will love you in spite of yourself, and because of who you are."
"What about my mother? Huh? Why did you give me a mother like that?"
"She chose her own path, as all my creations do. I try to give them life and let them follow their own course. She isn't completely without redemption you know?"
"Oh really? Then why hasn't she called me? Why hasn't she apologized to me for her actions?"
"Why haven't you called her? Why haven't you apologized for your actions?"
I was pained by his words, but they really brought home a portion of my actions that I hadn't thought about before. Was there something in my treatment of my mother that was wrong? Did she really deserve to lose her son over something as insignificant as this?
Having talked to my Dad I had a better understanding of what had happened when they got divorced. I knew that he wasn't entirely to blame, but she wasn't entirely blameless either.
"I see you have realized one of the great truths, Keith. Every argument has two sides."
"Don't DO that!"
"I write your words. I can't very well stop reading them unless I stop writing them."
I stopped to consider that for a moment before my thoughts were interrupted.
"All that will do is prevent all of my loyal fans from reading your stories, and I think they would lynch me if I did that."I chuckled at this.
Something about the person I had been talking to bothered me from the moment I entered the room, and now I realized what it was. His, or was it her, features kept shifting.
"What are you?"
"Good question. Half the time I don't know."
It didn't really answer my question.
"But it will have to do. The time I've allotted for this dream sequence is almost up."
"Last night, while we had the stalker on the floor, I felt like you were trying to orchestrate it so that we let her, him, whatever escape."
"Yes, and your point is?"
"Why?"
"I hate it when things in my stories come too easily for the protagonist."
"Why?"
"Because in my experience life rarely works that way. Coincidence is not as common as people seem to believe, but usually results for a myriad of unknown incidents that result in a seeming happenstance.
"When I write coincidence into a story, I like to know the events that lead up to a given moment in time. I like to know WHY something worked out. Having you just capture this person, and them going to jail seems to defeat the whole purpose of all of that."
"Them not escaping wasn't coincidence."
"Having a bodyguard wearing Kevlar body armor who happened to convince the stalker to shoot her in the chest wasn't coincidence?"
"Ok, I'll grant you that. So, why not go back and change it?"
"Because most inexperienced shooters go for center of mass. You don't know how hard it is to go for a head shot at anything greater than point blank until you actually try it."
"You don't mean. . ."
"No, I shoot rifles mostly. I don't like the balance of pistols. They are really hard to aim as well, and their accuracy is shit at anything greater than about ten feet. Ok, I'm exaggerating. They are good for about twenty yards, but as far as gun ranges are concerned, that's all point blank."
"Ok, more than I wanted to know."
"Don't get me started on shooting weapons out of people's hands. . ."
"I won't. So. Coincidence."
"Just go back to your story, Keith."
And now, I address everyone reading this through my own words. The above 'dream' sequence was originally a free writing that I did to try and shamelessly pad a story that I had come to the end of, and I simply didn't care to recognize it at the time.
My first antagonist had been defeated, the heroes were taking a moment to relax before the next was introduced and I was trying to gather my thoughts as to where the next story would be heading.
The problem was that when I finished this little interchange, one very like others that I have had with my characters in the past, I simply did not want to delete it. I wanted you, my readers, to see a little into the chaos that I call writing.
No, I don't think of myself as god.
I do, however, think of god as an author.
It is not that he puts words into our mouths, but more that he created a scenario that he puts us into the live out.
There is a lot of me in Keith, and so the above is also a sort of conversation that I could have with my own god.
How's that for a convoluted take on something that should be so simple.
I started this story because of a dream I had about the characters. It wasn't the same story I ended up writing, as often has when I begin to organize the disjointed mess that most of my dreams are, but it is true to the core of it. The earrings, for example.
In the dream, they were what actually clued people in to who the Keith/Desdemona character was. I liked the image of those skull earrings, but I didn't want it to be such an issued of outing my character before he was ready.
I don't know that he is ready now, but he at least thinks he is. We will see. That, of course, is for the second story.
For now, this story is complete. I will eventually be returning to Keith, Gretchen, and all of their friends, but for now, at least, the story is at an end.
I hope that everyone enjoyed my story as much as I did in writing it. I may add to this note later, but for now, there is simply no more to say.
Sunlight played on the trees in central park outside my window and I could hear Gretchen's soft breathing next to me.
I sat there in bed just looking at this beautiful woman lying next to me. I loved this woman, and truly wanted to spend the rest of my life with her.
As I lay there watching her the recent past washed over me. In the past month, I'd begun performing as a woman in an independent Goth rock band named Up in Flames. I'd visited Juilliard, and planned to audition there. I had tried out for a movie, and been offered a role, again as a woman, and even performed on Saturday Night Live as the music act.
And I didn't even mind, much, that the world didn't know that I was really a guy.
Gretchen didn't get up until almost noon, at which point Rachel and I were more than ready to get going. Well, more me than Rachel, since she had lived here for a few years already.
She had at least gotten a replacement for the slim-line Kevlar she'd been wearing the night before. It wouldn't stop most heavy caliber bullets apparently, but it would blunt most pistol fire without any problems.
Thinking about it gave me a thought. Gretchen was getting ready, so I figured that now was as good a time as any. "Rachel. . .how difficult would it be to get a corset made out of that stuff."
"What stuff?"
"The light weight Kevlar you're wearing?"
"They can make it to almost any specifications, the only real issue is the cost. Most people wouldn't be willing to shell out the cost of a new car for a little bit of protection."
"If it's that expensive, how can your company afford to keep you in it?"
"The ones they provide for me only cost a few thousand each because they can be mass produced. That and the fact that I don't get shot every day make it affordable."
"Well, according to my agent, the other is affordable to me as well, and I figure that having something on me, and Gretchen, will make your job a little easier."
"But would you really want to wear a corset under everything?"
"Girl, didn't you know? Corsets go with everything." Gretchen's joke set us laughing.
Arm in arm the three of us went out to take the town by storm. We slipped out the back, hoping to avoid the greater throng, but we were still hit by paparazzi.
"Desdemona, over here!"
I'm not sure if they were trying to call people over, or get my attention, but I figured it was part of the price of fame, so I walked over to them. I felt Rachel tense at my side, but tried to ignore it.
"Hello, guys. Looks like you caught me."
There were general chuckles at this.
I pulled out my secret weapon as I got closer to them. I hadn't yet gotten a chance to use it. It had been sitting in my purse since LA, well, not that long really.
I figured, at some point while wandering the mall with Molly that I needed a pink marker just in case someone asked me to sign something black, or at least too dark to see a black marker on. I smiled like a shark at the paparazzi. I would leave my mark here today.
"Anyone who wants to take my picture has to let me sign their camera."
That got their attention. I signed fifteen cameras. The other photographers thought it wasn't worth it. I even gave one of the nicer guys a kiss. . .on the camera.
"Ok, be nice you guys. Remember this is my first time."
There was some more laughter at that, but they kept their distance. Apparently they'd gotten all of the close shots they needed while I was signing cameras.
It probably wouldn't last, but at least for the moment the paparazzi were a little less of a pain than popular media would have you believe.
We saw most of what we wanted to see, and I even convinced a couple of the camera guys to take normal touristy pictures of us at a number of places. They promised to send me copies, and we agreed the best place to send them was the studio.
I got a couple of business cards and requests that if I ever wanted to get into modeling I'd give them a call.
Like that was going to ever happen.
We ate dinner in the suite and went to bed assuming that the most difficult thing tomorrow would be getting our few possessions packed so we could get to the airport by one pm.
We were just heading out the door when my phone rang.
"Desi speaking."
"Glad I caught you. We have a problem."
"What is it, Richard?"
"Do you remember Greg Kondie?"
"Um, wait, wasn't he the guy at Riverside Records who wanted. . ."
"That's the one. Apparently they are trying to get the case thrown out of court and get me charged with interfering in a criminal investigation."'
"Um, but didn't you interfere in a criminal investigation? You called the chief of police to get those police called off us."
"What I did was ask the chief, a friend, to get them to do their jobs. You may notice I'm not calling him to get the charges dropped."
"If it helps you sleep at night."
"Desi, are you going to hear what's going on, or what?"
"Yes, Richard, go on."
"They even tried to cut Chief Terrell out of the loop, so he almost didn't hear about this. They're holding a hearing tomorrow morning at eight. They've gotten Ryan, the sound tech, to recant his statement. He's being charged with unlawful detainment again."
"Then how did they convince him to change. . ."
"With an agreement to reduce sentence. I'm flying out from here this evening. You can either drive down, which will get you there in twelve to fourteen hours, or you can fly."
I turned to my fellow passengers and put the question to them. "We're apparently going to Nashville. Do we fly or drive down there?"
"I'm fine with driving. How 'bout you, Rachel?"
"Sounds good to me."
I went back to Richard on the phone. "We're driving. We'll rent a car and be on our way within the hour."
"Sounds good. Anything else you need?"
"Nope. Nothing for now. Kisses."
"I'll see you there. I'll give you a call when I get our rooms booked so you know where to stop."
"Great, and make sure you bring a new change of clothing for me and Gretchen. You need something to wear to court Rachel?"
"Sure, can we stop by my apartment on our way out of town?"
"Definitely."
"Bye, Richard."
"Bye, Desi, and be safe."
"We will."
We rented the car, stopped at Rachel's apartment, and were out of the city by 1:30.
We switched drivers every couple of hours, talking about a lot of different things. It was a perfect time for us to get to know Rachel and for her to get comfortable with us.
Isn't that the way road trips work? They either bring you together or tear you apart. They don't let you really stay neutral with one another.
It was nine o'clock before I realized that there was something I needed to do today.
I picked up my phone and dialed the number from memory, hoping that she would be there to answer.
"Hello?"
"Mom?"
"Keith?"
"Yes, Mom. It's me. I realized this weekend that I never gave you a fair chance through all of this, and I'm sorry."
"So you're giving up this cross-dressing nonsense?"
I took a deep breath. I would be the adult in this relationship.
"Mom, I love you. I wanted to let you know. I'm getting married in a couple of months and I want you there."
"They don't allow homosexual marriages in Utah, so are you flying me wherever you're 'tying the knot'? Wait, never mind. I won't be there."
"Mom, we're getting married in Utah."
"What? How? It's just a fake ceremony, right?"
"She is legally female, Mom. She's PHYSICALLY female."
"That doesn't change. . ."
"I'm not Dad, Mom."
"Don't you dare. . ."
"Just stop it, Mom. I spoke to him this weekend. He works on Saturday Night Live."
"He's not an actor."
"No, he's with the crew. That's not the point, Mom. I talked to him about what happened."
"He blamed me, I'm sure, for chasing him into the arms of that man."
"No, he didn't. He blamed himself and was sorry for ever hurting you."
"Look, Keith. I don't have time for this. Can we talk later?"
"You don't have time for your own son?"
"I literally don't have time for this, but I could have been a little more. . .motherly about it."
I wracked my mind for a moment, but I came up blank. "Um, what do you have tonight. I know it's not a Church function and. . .are you preparing for another concert with the choir? Thursday is their normal night and I thought that the fifth of July was your next concert. . ."
"Will you be quiet for a moment, Keith."
There was a tone in her voice I'd never heard before. I shut up and listened.
"You were gone from the house and I realized for the first time that I was about to be all alone, Keith. Completely alone for the first time in my life. You knew I married young, right?"
"Yes, you were just eighteen."
"I went from my parent's home to my home with your father, Keith. When he left me, it hurt. I'm sorry I took it out on you. I really am."
"What does this have to do with you being alone?"
"I met someone recently, Keith. I'm going on a date tonight."
Gretchen looked at me in alarm. We were both sitting in the back seat while Rachel drove us for the moment. "Keith, What's wrong?"
"My Mom's going on a date." I couldn't help it. I smiled. I glowed.
"Go for it, Mrs. Robison!"
My Mom giggled at Gretchen's statement. "You take care of my son, Gretchen."
"Mom? I'm giving Gretchen the phone. You two can talk for a moment."
Gretchen shook her head at me, but I just dropped the phone in her hands and turned to Rachel.
"So, is it about my turn to drive?"
"Yep, anytime you're ready."
We pulled over to the side of the road and did the Chinese fire drill thing. I got us back on the road, and periodically glanced at Gretchen in the rear view mirror. She was smiling and laughing so I figured that it must be going well. They were talking about what she should wear on her date, a second from what I could tell from the conversation.
I turned my attention to the road and making sure that I was following the directions from the GPS properly. Not that it was that hard to follow a GPS' directions.
I sighed and drove. It was another half an hour before Gretchen put the phone on speaker.
"Keith, I just wanted to let you know I'm sorry. I'm sorry for the way I thought about you, and your choices. Gretchen is a wonderful girl, and I want you to hold onto her, no matter what anyone else says."
"Yes, ma'am. I will."
"Good boy. Now I need to finish getting ready."
"Ok, mom. You'll have to give us a call and let us know how it went."
She hung up and I just smiled. Why did I let it go as long as I did before giving her a call.
My mom and I had been close for a very long time. She was one of my best friends, which was why her betrayal had hurt me so much when she kicked me out.
I know, it's not cool for a boy to have his mom as one of his friends, but she was. She was the one who drove me to little league and Junior Jazz basketball. She'd been there for heartIbreak and triumph.
She was my Mom.
By eleven, when we switched again, I was almost dead to the world. Gretchen took over from me and I lay down in the back while Rachel took shotgun.
The GPS said what we were another three hours out from our destination. Richard had the rooms ready for us, and we just had to drive up, and get the key from the front desk.
The car stopping woke me up. I was disoriented for a moment, and realized I was the only one in the car.
I was getting ready to get out, when Rachel and Gretchen got back in. "We've got the keys, Keith, and we just need to head back to our rooms and get some sleep."
We parked the car and went up to our rooms. I collapsed on the bed in my clothing and only vaguely noticed Gretchen climbing into bed next to me.
I'd barely closed my eyes when I heard someone pounding on the door.
I stumbled over to it and opened the door a crack.
"Oh good, you're awake." Richard pushed his way in with a couple of garment bags in tow.
I heard Gretchen shriek and saw a naked streak flash into the bathroom.
"If you weren't fully clothed. . ."
"I promise I have not had sex with Gretchen, Richard."
"Good. Let's keep it that way. . .for another couple of weeks at least."
I snorted at this, and closed the door behind him.
"So, I've got a couple of outfits for you and Gretchen so that we can be presentable in court today. I want you to look your absolute best, okay?"
"I will."
"I want it to be obvious to every man in that courtroom exactly what Greg Kondie was thinking when he had you flown out here from Utah."
"He paid for our tickets?"
"Yes, he did."
"Ok, good to know."
Gretchen called from the bathroom. "Hey, Keith. . .um. . .all my clothing is out there."
"I've got this one, Keith." Richard grabbed her bag and handed both the garment bag, and her clothes bag, to her around the door.
"Thanks."
Richard and I talked for a moment while Gretchen got ready, and then I took my turn in the bathroom.
I went to town on my makeup. Not to say that I put it on thick. No. That would have been out of place. I applied it with my two months practice and years of training. I enhanced and emphasized. I matched colors. I made myself perfect.
"Are you sure you're only sixteen?" Richard asked as I left the bathroom.
"Of course I am," I said with a smile.
"I'm jealous." Rachel was sitting in the room with them when I came out. Frankly, I'd never have pegged her as a bodyguard. If I didn't know any better, I'd think she was a supermodel. And she said she was jealous of me.
I did the only thing I could. I blushed.
"So, Ladies, shall we?"
I glared at Richard, but answered, "Yes, we shall."
I guess in a way I deserved it. There's no way I looked like a guy in this getup.
We headed out to the cars and were met by Richard's wife.
"Aunt Daisy!"
"Niece Gretchen!"
They laughed at this. Daisy Mae Fields always thought that 'Aunt' made her sound too old, so she wanted Gretchen, and her other nieces and nephews to just call her Daisy.
"What are you doing out here, Daisy?" I asked.
"Well, I was tired of having Richard gone all the time, so, since we just shipped our youngest off to college I'm going to be travelling with my husband from now on."
Gretchen cheered at this, and I smiled.
"So, who is THIS young lady?"
"Daisy, meet Rachel, my bodyguard. Rachel, this is Daisy. . ."
"Gretchen's aunt. I got it."
I know, I'm silly with formal introductions occasionally. Sue me.
We climbed into the cars, leaving Richard and Daisy in theirs and the rest of us in ours. We followed Richard over to the courthouse, and were in our seats thirty minutes before the eight am deadline.
Mr. Kondie was joking with his lawyer until he spotted me. At first, he didn't realize who I was, and he simply leered. Then he caught sight of Richard and all of the color drained from his face. He looked back at me, and then started whispering frantically to his lawyer.
"All please rise."
The judge walked in, and Mr. Kondie continued to whisper.
"All of you may be seated, except for the corpulent fellow at the defendant's table."
Mr. Kondie snapped his mouth shut and turned to face the judge.
"Your honor," began his lawyer.
"Mr. Prince, I'll remind you that you spent the money to earn your law degree for a reason, and to keep outbursts to a minimum. I'm talking to your client for a moment."
The judge turned his attention to Mr. Kondie. "What's your name?"
"Greg Kondie, your honor."
"Now, Mr. Kondie, did you hear the bailiff announce my arrival?"
"Yes, your honor."
"So, you didn't just stand up to continue talking to your lawyer?"
"No, your honor, I mean yes I did, but. . ."
"Well, which is it, Mr. Kondie."
"I heard you being announced, but I just became aware of something pertinent to my case and I needed. . ."
"Mr. Kondie, let me remind you that the charges against you are serious. Be that as it may, contempt of court is equally serious. I'm of half a mind to let you sit in jail a couple of days while you think about your actions."
"Your honor, if I may?" Richard stood up in the back of the small room.
"You are?"
"Richard Fields, your honor."
"Ah, Mr. Fields. Mr. Prince here told the court that you were unavailable for questioning, and should have charges brought against both you and Ms. Desdemona."
"I was never informed that my presence was required, your honor, and have no desire to avoid my duties here in court."
"As I can see. And why did you interject?"
"I am here from Utah at my own expense, as is Desdemona. We found out that this hearing would be held to throw out the case today, and flew out yesterday in order to be here."
"Your point?"
"If you hold him in contempt of court before these proceedings, then we will be required to stay over until this hearing can be held again. As always it is your choice how to run your courtroom."
"It is, but I recognize your concern. Let me take a moment to consider the facts as I have them and I'll make my decision."
We sat there in that Nashville courtroom wondering what the judge would decide. What would the decision be, and could I live with it when it came down?
The judge took a moment or two to deliberate and then turned his attention back on us. "Mr. Kondie, I actually find the actions of yourself and your lawyer constitutes contempt. I recognize however that the other individuals involved in the case can't be expected to fly out here repeatedly at the whims of yourself and your legal team."
"I am going to put you both in jail for the next seven days so that you can think about your behavior in this courtroom. I am rescheduling this hearing for. . ."
He turned to his clerk who looked at the calendar on her computer screen and told him, "the fifteenth of August is your next available date."
"The fifteenth of August. Due to the way in which you tried to twist the legal system to your own end, I am also assessing a penalty equaling the amount of all reasonable travel expenses to and from this courtroom for the duration of your trial."
"Your honor, if I may have a moment?"
"Go ahead, Mr. Prince."
"The charges against Mr. Fields and Miss Desdemona are severe, to say the least, and since they are the only witnesses to this crime, I feel that the validity of their testimony is questionable to say the least."
"Mr. Prince, that is truly none of your concern. While they may be charged for their actions in relation to the crime at hand, this does little more than point to the mistakes on both sides of this interaction. It doesn't in any way excuse your behavior."
"But your honor. . ."
"Bailiff, please escort these individuals to jail."
I'd finally realized what was bothering me with this whole proceeding so I spoke up, "Your honor? What happened to the recording of the conversation between Mr. Kondie and myself?"
"What recording?"
"We were in a studio at the time, and the sound tech recorded the conversation. The officers who came threatened us with legal action, saying nothing about Mr. Kondie's actions. They took the tape with them when they left."
"This is the first that I've heard about a recording."
"Your honor. . .I think that might be my fault. It's actually in the mail to the DA currently." Richard was blushing profusely.
"Mr. Fields?"
"We had recorded a song before the events that are mentioned. The tape was still in when Mr. Kondie went into the studio with Desdemona. When I took the tape, I was unaware of this, and it wasn't until we were transcribing the master that we found out our mistake. The police were given a blank tape. I sent the tape by certified mail when I discovered my mistake."
"Thank you for your honesty, Mr. Fields. There is still the matter of the charges against yourself and Ms. Desdemona. Unfortunately, or fortunately in your case, no charges have been formally filed. That bothers me to say the least. If you will all sit tight, I'd like to bring the DA in on this discussion."
We sat around the courtroom, talking amongst ourselves. The judge left after a minute or two, and we were left to our own devices. The feelings I was getting in that moment started to formulate themselves into words, and I got a piece of paper from Richard and began to write them down.
They said something to me as I wrote, but I wasn't really paying attention to them at that moment. The words encompassed me. I felt good when I finished, but I really wanted to get the music down as well. I jotted out cheat notes to myself, and occasional tablature, and in general wrote down the impression of the song I would have to more formally record later.
"Done."
"So, what's this one called?" Richard asked me.
I turned to look in his direction, and it was only at this moment that I realized that Gretchen was leaning on my shoulder. I started a bit and then we laughed and kissed.
"I'm calling this one 'Blind Justice.'"
"Fair enough, I guess."
I proceeded to explain the song to them as we waited for the Judge to return. One of the most striking women I'd ever seen walked into the courtroom. The click of her heels on the hardwood floor pounded out a staccato beat as she walked over to us.
"Andy Simms." She said as she arrived and thrust out a hand in our direction. Richard took it first, introducing us.
"So, you are more than just a legend, Desdemona. I had a bet going with the rest of the office that you were a publicity stunt of some sort. You rarely hear of one pop star coming from nowhere and to have two at almost the same time. . ."
"I'm not a pop star."
"Could have fooled me with 'Daddy's Little Princess' on Saturday Night Live. . ."
"You saw that?" I did what any red blooded American would at being caught in my misstatement. I blushed.
"You're cute, you know that? Sometimes it's really easy to see that you're 'only sixteen.'"
Everyone else had a laugh at my expense while I blushed more furiously.
"Regardless, these are some serious charges against you two."
"Why isn't the sound tech being included in the charges? He's the one who locked Mr. Kondie in. Apparently if you turn the key in the lock halfway, it prevents the person on the inside from undoing the dead bolt."
"Oh, that's very interesting. I've never heard of a lock that worked that way, personally."
"Neither had I until we locked Mr. Kondie in," I replied with sincerity.
"Well, I've run into them before."
All of us turned to look at Richard.
"Honey, now isn't the time to be bringing that up," Daisy said. She looked genuinely scared.
"Daisy, honey. It's okay. I'm sure that none of these people are in league with. . ."
"Don't say his name. Every time you say his name he appears like a bad spirit or something."
"The kids are all moved away, honey. We're going to be alright. It's been almost fifteen years."
"What are you talking about, Mr. Fields?"
"Call me Richard, please."
"Sorry, I like to keep my professional dealings professional."
"Ok, then, Ms. Simms."
"I prefer Mrs." There was something to her smile, some sort of sweet wistfulness. It was as if being married was more important to her than anything else in the world.
Something dawned on me in that moment, and I opened my mouth to speak, but Richard continued, interrupting me.
"I wasn't always an agent, or I should say, I wasn't always a talent agent.
"I graduated college with a degree in criminology. I was bright and wanted to right the wrongs of this world. Like many idealistic youngsters, I thought I could make a difference so I joined the FBI."
"What?" Richard had been in the FBI? From the look on her face, this was news to Gretchen as well.
"I actually worked in the cyber-crimes division. We spend our days tracking down ones and zeroes that led to some pretty bad people. Some of the things I've seen still give me nightmares."
Daisy took his hand and held onto it.
"That's actually where I got a lot of my contacts that allowed me to become the agent you know today."
"In more ways than one," Daisy said softly.
"While working on a case involving bootleg DVDs of movies that weren't even released to theaters we found a warehouse filled with something else entirely: people.
"They'd altered the locks so that they didn't need to worry about their product getting a key somehow and escaping. When I saw the lock on that studio, I knew things were about to get ugly."
"What do you know about this? You need to tell me Mr. Fields."
"My advice to you, Mrs. Simms, is that you just go after Mr. Kondie. Pretend that he's the only catch in this pond. You don't have the equipment you need to go after a shark."
"I can handle myself, Mr. Fields."
"You can't handle this, Andy." Daisy spoke up. There was a strange light in her eyes. "He'll start calling your husband while you're at work, and ask him if he knows where you are. There will be strange men who stop by your house at all hours and just walk in. They'll be gone before the police get there, and when you install cameras, they start wearing masks. That's when they start breaking things.
"The police will tell you there's nothing they can do, and your FBI buddies will tell you that it can't be bad enough to warrant a real investigation. Then, one day, they'll pick up your oldest from school and give him a ride around the city. Just a ride. . ."
There were tears in her eyes when she turned to look at Mrs. Simms again. "You are not ready to take on this monster. No-one is ready to take on this monster. Accept your victory and move on, Andy. And pray that you're not on his radar yet."
"What is he? Russian mafia or something? Yakuza?"
Richard looked at Mrs. Simms sadly. "Mrs. Simms, the person behind all of this lives in the shadows cast by the media with names like Yakuza and Mafia. He is a man of business, and he is involved in anything that will gain him a profit."
"Why not give him a name?"
"Because I never found out his name. The Russians who ran the warehouse called him Apparatchik, so that's what we called him."
"So you have a name. . ."
"No, we just have a title. It's sort of a derogatory title for a boss, with references back to the communist party. It would be like one of us calling him The Senator or The Politician."
"You don't mean. . ."
"No, I don't, and if you're smart, you won't either."
Mrs. Simms gave a little shudder. "It's too beautiful a morning for ghost stories. And I think I'll take you up on that suggestion. I'll let the FBI play with Apparatchik. That's more their jurisdiction anyway. So, what am I to do with the two of you?"
"Let us go for a song?"
Mrs. Simms laughed outright at that one. "Oh, I like you, Desdemona. You've got a fire to you. With Richard's prior knowledge, I could easily bring charges against you two, except the likelihood that his specific lock would have the same modification as those he saw fifteen years ago. . .I came in this room all fired up to make an example of you two.
"If either of you had tried in any way to get out of this by trying to influence me with money or favors, I would have brought you up on charges and included graft to them. However, I hate people who lie to my face even more than I hate people who bend the law to their will."
"That sound tech told me that it was Mr. Fields who locked Mr. Kondie into the room, and never mentioned anything about the key needing a half turn to do it. . .
"Look, you two, I still reserve the right to bring you up on charges for this at a later date, but for right now, you're free to go."
"Thank you so much, Andy." I said and went to hug her.
"We're not friends, Desdemona."
I stopped, stunned.
She smirked and then gave me a real smile, "but maybe after all of this is over we might become friends."
She gave me a quick hug and then walked out, the sound of her heels retreating into the distance in the courthouse.
Everyone else was smiling, but I could see the worry on Richard's face. He hadn't hired Rachel because of Lady Anne. He'd hired her because he thought I'd come onto Apparatchik's radar.
For the first time since early Sunday morning, I was worried. As soon as we left the courthouse, I called out, "Richard, why not have Daisy ride with the girls. I want to talk to you for a moment."
After getting a good look at my face, he spoke to Daisy, "It's probably a good idea, honey. Desdemona probably wants to talk a bit of business with me. We'll meet up back at the motel."
As soon as we got into the car, Richard spoke, "before you get indignant, let me explain something. I didn't know that this was related to Apparatchik, but I had a good idea it might be. Hopefully, we can keep this low key enough that he won't try anything, but I hired Rachel just in case something happens."
"Aren't you worried about your kids?"
"Of course I'm worried, but I've spent the last fifteen years worried. Mostly that he'd find out that the agency was a front."
"Wait. . .what?"
Richard laughed at my reaction. "I'm holding on to your secret, so I'll let you hold onto mine for a while. About fifteen years ago, my entire life turned into an undercover operation. We had information that Apparatchik wanted to get into the music industry at that time, and so I became a talent agent. Because he already knew who I was, and knew I didn't know him, we thought the risk was worth it."
"He could have been playing you all this time. He might realize that you know that he knows who you are."
"We don't think that this is a problem. I'm not really the main arm of the investigation. I'm the bait. There are certain things we know about him. The first is that he loves irony. He is also a 'long view' kind of guy. We ran into one plan that he made thirty years ago, that only came to fruition at the time that we were investigating him."
"But, that would make him an old man."
"We figure him to be in his mid to late 50's at this point."
"Like I said, old."
We both got a good laugh out of this, but I sobered up quickly.
"Does Daisy know?"
"Of course she knows. There isn't anything that I won't tell her."
I sat in silence for the rest of the trip, contemplating what I was going to do. In that moment, I decided that I wouldn't let this affect me. Maybe I was finally letting the brashness of youth affect me, but I felt untouchable. I wasn't some unknown FBI agent whom the Apparatchik could disappear. I was a famous pop star.
I began to laugh.
"What's so funny?"
"I just called myself a 'pop star' in my head."
Richard chuckled at this. "Speaking of which, you have studio time booked for Wednesday to get 'Daddy's Little Princess' recorded."
"Tomorrow or in a week?"
"Tomorrow of course. Mr. Praetor wants to get your song on the radio as quickly as possible. Apparently he believes that we might just have a #1 single on our hands."
I smiled at this. During our conversation we'd arrived at the motel, and I got out as soon as the car came to a stop. I went up to my room, gave Gretchen a quick kiss, and then packed up my belongings.
Just before we all left for the airport, I pulled Richard aside one last time. "So, does this mean you're really my agent?"
"Yes, it does. In fact, the only thing that keeps this investigation going is the fact that I'm not currently being paid by the FBI."
I shook my head at this and walked out to the car where Rachel and Gretchen were already waiting for me.
We got to the airport about two hours early and decided to get ourselves through security and wait in the lounge.
Everyone was through except for me. I took off my boots and put all of my jewelry into the container and walked through the metal detector. It went off.
"Miss? If you could step over here please?"
Confused and a bit alarmed, I stepped over to the side. They ran the wand over me, but it didn't beep at any point. I was really starting to get worried now. What had they detected. I put my had to my ears to make sure that I'd out my earrings into the tray. I had. I didn't have any underwire bras, so I felt safe there.
"We're going to have to ask you to step this way please," said a strict looking female security officer.
"I'd like for my bodyguard to accompany us, if that's alright?"
She looked a little upset at the suggestion, but nodded. Rachel walked over to me and we followed the security personnel into a back room. The two of them walked in first and shut the door behind us as we entered.
"I'm going to have to touch you, miss. I'm looking for any weapons and so I will be giving you a pat-down."
Oh, shit. Could I pass. . .did I want to even attempt to pass as a female during a pat-down? Sure I was securely tucked, but. . .
"Where exactly do you plan on touching me?"
It was her turn to blush, "I need to check everywhere, miss, so pretty much. . .everywhere." There was something off about her smile.
This could be a real problem for my secret, so I took a deep breath, and imagined that I was in the same room as Lady Anne. I figured that would be enough to keep any. . .involuntary. . .reaction of this to a minimum.
I shuddered when she began, and soon enough she had touched everything from my shoulders to my waist. She caressed my behind a bit longer than I really felt comfortable with, and I pulled away.
"What's the idea, here?" I was beginning to get angry. "There's nothing in my ass that would set that detector off."
"Maybe we need to do a strip search," the other woman suggested
"Excuse me?" I walked over to the door and walked out as Rachel opened it for me. She prevented the two women from grabbing me, and we walked back out to where everyone else was waiting.
"Richard, could you get Jordan on the line. . .or Tom. . .this womanbegan to caress my butt while patting me down for weapons, and then suggested they were going to strip search me."
"What, is he your servant?"
I turned and glared at the security agent who'd just arrived next to us. "No, he's my agent, and he's currently calling my lawyers. Considering that you just did that to a minor, without any consideration of legal status, I figure that there's going to be some sort of. . ."
"Wait, did you say you're a minor?" Her face went as white as a sheet. I showed my driver's license to her.
She rushed over to a garbage can and proceeded to vomit. The other guard just kept mumbling to herself. Another security guard, a man this time, came over to us.
"What seems to be the problem here?"
Before anyone else could answer, Richard hung up the phone and turned to the new arrival, "your employees just violated my client and her rights. She's a minor, and they performed a 'pet'-down on her, which apparently isn't something that the FAA regulations allow."
"Children can be put through pat-downs."
"A modified one, yes. Apparently this individual caressed her behind."
"None of my. . ."
"I witnessed this act."
"Are you one of her girl friends?"
"No, I'm her bodyguard. Sir, why don't you make it easier on yourself; discipline your employees and let us get about our business?"
Seeing all of us standing there, me still blushing fire-engine red, he decided to go for the better part of valor.
"I'll take care of this. Thank you for bringing it to my attention."
We gathered our things and got our shoes back on. As soon as we were ready we continued to the lounge where we would be waiting for our airplane. Gretchen held me while I tried to relax and put this event behind me. Nothing had happened, but I'd felt so dirty in that moment and I'd just wanted to lash out or run or something.
I shuddered and burrowed deeper into Gretchen's arms.
She rubbed my back and I simply relaxed into her. I really loved this girl.
Flight 1993 to Salt Lake City will be boarding shortly at gate A.
The sound of the PA startled me and we got up to get onto the plane.
I smiled at the flight attendants, and we made our way into business class. It was a fairly uneventful flight back to Utah. I was finally home, with no plans to go anywhere else for a while. Tom and Jordan met us at the airport and Gretchen and I piled into the back seat of the car.
"So, I hear you proposed to my daughter without talking to me first."
"Actually, Sir, I made my intentions to marry your daughter clear shortly after I came to live with you."
"You mentioned it to me, Daddy, so he does have a point."
"Tom, I think you lost this one."
"Hush, Jordan, I'm trying to give him a hard time."
Gretchen and I chuckled in the back seat.
All four of us talked and laughed for a while in the car, as we travelled toward home. My phone rang, interrupting us.
"Keith here."
"Hey, baby. I was wondering if you'd mind coming over. I'd like to talk to you in person for a little while."
"Is something wrong, Mom?"
"No, nothing is wrong, per se. I just wanted. . .damn it Keith, why is it so hard to talk to you? I just wanted to spend some time with you."
"Mom, I'm not sure that it would be a good idea to see you right now. I really look like a girl."
I waited for her response for a moment or two, "Mom, are you there?"
"Yes, Keith. Trying not to say something I'll regret."
"I was flying back and forth across the country this week, hardly spending any time at home, so I decided to get my hair cut and styled. I'm not becoming a woman, Mom, but I needed to make something in my life a little easier and that was it."
"You don't have breasts do you?"
"No mom. I don't have actual breasts. I'm using padding on stage."
"Oh. . .I'm sorry, Keith, this is just so strange for me. I'm finding it hard to accept."
"I will be your son for my wedding, Mom. That, at least, you can remember."
"But with pink hair?"
"I'll either shave it all off, or wear a wig."
"Um. . ."
"I'll give it time to grow back, mom. You don't have to worry."
Something occurred to me, and I needed to give Richard a call.
"Mom, I'll talk to you when I get home. We're on the road from the airport."
"Airport?"
"Like I said, I've been flying around, literally."
"Where are you coming from?"
"New York by way of Nashville."
"New York?"
"I told you this. I was on Saturday Night Live."
"I just have so much trouble grasping that. My son. . .a famous female pop star." She laughed a bit at that. Maybe there was some hope for her after all. "I love you, Mom."
"I love you too, Keith."
I hung up and dialed Richard.
"Desi, what's up?"
"What sort of endorsement deal could we get for wigs should we let my fans know it wasn't my real hair. . .and offer wigs for sale as part of my swag."
I could almost hear the gears turning on the other end of the phone.
"I have to admit, that's something I never considered. It would also resolve one of the major issues with your image we've been running into. We keep the color, but you can have costume changes during the concert to change styles."
"Issues with my image?"
"Oh, I didn't tell you. Mr. Praetor wants you to get an image consultant, so I have been talking to a couple of them."
"Richard, you need to remember to run things like this by me. I want to know I can get along with anyone I'm going to have to be spending that much time with."
"I didn't think of it that way. You're right. This is a bit new to me as well. I've had some good talent in my stable before, but you are the biggest thing that's ever happened to me. Ok, we'll devote some time on Thursday to meeting with the consultants."
"Thursday is my birthday, Richard. I'd prefer not to. . ."
"Adults are called upon to work through birthdays and the like. I know, it's not something you thought about in the past, but there it is. . .look, we'll compromise on this one. We'll work with image consultants 'til noon, and then the rest of the day is yours. Does that work?"
"Yes, Richard, that works. Kisses."
I sat and thought for a moment, considering the direction that my life was heading in. I smiled and joined back into the conversation. It didn't take us too much longer before we were home.
It felt good to actually be done for a little while. Sure, I'd stopped here on Wednesday night of last week, but there wasn't this feeling of being home then. Finally, for at least a little while, I was home.
I looked next door to my Mom's house, and that feeling went away for a moment. Well, no time like the present, but first. . .
I went up to my room and changed out of Desdemona and back into Keith, or as much of Keith as I could right now. I switched my diamond studs for something a little less girly. Ok, so it was a small pair of skulls in silver, but they were skulls.
There was nothing I could do about the eyebrows or hair, but I at least looked mostly like myself right now.
For the first time in days I left the house in shoes that weren't pink, and I actually felt naked. I was used to the pink shoes, and sort of missed them there on my feet.
Black shoes just didn't do it for me anymore. I'd have to think of something that fit Keith, but wasn't black.
I felt weird doing it, but I knocked on the door instead of just walking in. I was now a guest in my mother's house.
She answered the door, and she smiled at me, "Keith! Come in."
I followed her into the house. Immediately I felt as if this was a bad idea. I was uncomfortable in this house.
"Mom, I know I said I'd come over and talk, but I'm not sure if this is a good idea."
"Nonsense, Keith. I'm sorry for the trouble I've put you through. I want to change. I really do. None of my family will talk to me right now."
"Mom, is this about me telling the family to talk to you so you feel better, or about the two of us getting along?"
She looked embarrassed for a moment, and before she could answer I spoke again, "Yeah, Mom, I'm not here to fix your relationship with your family. I can tell why you want to do this. You need to talk to someone about this. A professional."
"I'm not crazy, Keith. These behaviors and relationships aren't natural."
"I never said you were crazy, Mom. Look, let me be the first to agree with you, at least in part. For you and I, these types of relationships aren't in the cards. We aren't wired that way. However, you have to admit that we're here to make our own decisions, right?"
"Well. . ."
"Mom, how can you believe we have the right to choose, and not afford that right to everyone else."
She opened and closed her mouth a couple of times, as if trying to find the right words to say, and finally gave up. She sighed and closed her mouth. She took a deep breath and tried again, "Just because we have the right to choose. . ."
"Unless we have the right to fail, success means nothing. Just because your personal morality does not allow for you to have a sexual relationship with a woman, does not mean that someone else's morality is wrong for allowing it."
"But God has said it is a sin."
"Are you God, Mom?"
"No, but. . ."
"There are no buts, Mom. Either you are the arbiter of morality for the entire world, or you aren't. If you aren't then you have to allow them to choose their own path. No matter what you feel is correct, other people have to be allowed to set what is correct for themselves."
"Why don't we just go and murder people then, Keith. If you can't set morality for another person. . ."
"There is a difference between a behavior that affects only yourself, like drug use or sexual orientation, and murder. Freedom only exists in our personal living space. As soon as we begin to impinge upon the rights of others we lose our right to act."
"What about freedom of speech? That automatically impinges upon the rights of others."
"We have the right to express, but not the right to be heard. We can't force anyone to listen to our opinions."
I shook my head. "Look, Mom, I love you, I do, but I'm not here to argue with you."
"Keith, I need my son in my life."
"Then stop pushing me away, and accept me for who I am. I don't drink. I don't do drugs. I don't even engage in sexual activity. Can't you allow me to express myself in other ways? I am good, Mom. I'm really good. I might even be getting in to Juilliard this fall for their pre-college program."
"What? Juilliard? That's amazing, Keith."
I smiled at her. Someone chose that moment to ring the doorbell. Mom went down the short hallway and let someone in. I heard them talking in the entryway as they walked toward the living room where I was still standing.
A handsome middle-aged man walked in with my mother.
"Keith, this is Lyle Jensen. We've dated a couple of times, and I wanted him to meet you."
"Pleased to meet you, Keith." His voice said it, but there was a look of distaste in his eyes as he looked at my hair.
"Sorry about the hair, Mr. Jensen. Occupational hazard, I guess."
"Occupational hazard?" He looked a bit confused.
"I'm a pop rock star."
"Oh." He didn't look any less confused.
I figured that now was as good a time as any to beat a hasty retreat, "Mom, call me with the details for your concert on Monday. Mr. Jensen, nice to meet you. Love ya, Mom."
I left them there and went back home. I went up to my room and relaxed on the bed. I stared up at the white ceiling, just breathing in the aromas of the house. I must have dozed off, as the next thing I knew, Gretchen was gently shaking me awake.
I pretended not to react. I think she knew I was faking it.
"Oh whatever shall I do," she said in a fake southern accent. "My man is here and dead to the world. Maybe a kiss will wake him up?"
I puckered a bit, and the next thing I knew I had a face full of breast.
I pushed away and opened my eyes, "Gretchen!?"
A moment later, I closed my eyes again. "Honey, would you please put some clothing on? We can do all of this that you want to after we get married. For right now. . ."
"Keith, I want you now."
"That's all well and good, but aren't we supposed to wait at least eight weeks from your surgery before we. . ."
"Um, well." I felt my bed moving and opened my eyes to see what was happened. Gretchen was just slipping under my covers.
"You know, it gets harder to resist you every time you throw yourself at me."
"Then stop resisting."
"Roll over, dearest."
She looked a bit confused, but did as I requested. I pulled down the blanket and sheets and began rubbing her back. She purred a bit and stretched, luxuriating in the feel of my touch. I just continued to rub her back until she began to snore softly.
Chuckling, I covered her up again and left her there in my bed. I set the door so that it would lock when I pulled it shut behind me, and left the room.
I went out to the garage and practiced my 12-String. It had been so long since I'd actually just played. I closed my eyes and let the music flow over me. Pure jazz.
I heard a bass join me, and I just continued to play. Our songs interwove and teased around each other. and then the percussion joined in. I looked at the other two members of my band. They were smiling and laughing occasionally as we accomplished a particularly complex passage.
I began the opening chords for 'Daddy's Little Princess' and their attitudes changed. They didn't stopped smiling, but their posture straightened up, and they got a little more exact in their playing.
I sang the words, just feeling them, and practicing at the same time, and we went all the way through without a break. I didn't stop playing at the end, and morphed into the opening of 'My Life with You is Hell.'
We played through that, and I morphed it into 'U + Ur Hand,' and then 'Just a Girl,' 'Stupid Girl'. . .yeah, we went through our entire repertoire in one set.
My fingers were cramping, and I was sweating a little by the time we were done. Davey was drenched in sweat. Guthrie on the other hand didn't act like he was put out at all.
"Hey, we can keep going," he said.
Davey threw a drumstick at him.
I just laughed. "So, what did the two of you show up for?"
"Impromptu jazz session which turned into practice."
"I have no idea how to interact with you guys. I'm still a kid for all intents and purposes."
"Treat us like your friends," replied Guthrie.
"But we have nothing in common. . ."
"Boss-lady, we have the music in common."
"You guys don't have a problem with pop?"
"I love to play, and as long as we have a good bass line, I'm glad."
"I feel the same, but only with a good percussion line."
These guys were so different from the two friends that I'd started this with. I was so different from how I'd been when I started this. I'd thought it was about making a statement when I started, but I finished my statement with Gothplosion.
I'd proven that an indie band, writing their own songs, could beat corporate music.
I realized that after that moment, I was playing for myself and myself alone. 'Don't Blame the Girls,' was only the first of my songs that was more pop than anything else.
Was I really a pop princess at heart? I shuddered at the thought.
"You cold, boss-lady?"
"No, just the image of me as a pop princess."
The other two shuddered as well, although Guthrie got a goofy grin on his face.
"Guthrie!?"
"Sorry, Keith. Just the idea of you and Miley or Sarah up on the same stage doing a duet or something."
I snorted at this. "I don't think that's ever going to happen. We just don't appeal. . ."
"To the same audience? I think you'll be surprised. Sure, you're a little heavier than Sarah Carerra, but you're still pretty pop. You write many more songs like 'Daddy's Pop Princess', and you are going to be competing directly with her."
We spent the rest of the evening just hanging out in the front room and watching TV. Tom and Jordan came home around nine, and went directly up to Tom's room. Guthrie and Davey took that as their cue to leave. I waited until eleven before I went to my room, which happened to be next door.
I'd seen Sarah walking up the red carpet when I got out of the limo. I almost rushed over to greet her, but since I hadn't seen her since our very public falling out, I just didn't know what to say. I tried calling her a couple of times, but I'd never completed dialing.
She was such a sweet girl. Not one of my smarter moves. Gretchen brought me back to myself and we walked up the carpet. Our infinity engagement rings glinted on our fingers. We always wore the matching engagement rings when I was out with her as Desdemona. Zeela had really known what she was doing when she chose emeralds for the main stone.
I signed autographs, and was surprised for a moment when I signed #300. I kept track, but sometimes it felt like I'd signed so many more. I answered the normal raft of questions from the talking heads from numerous networks and channels.
"We heard rumors that you and Gretchen were married. Is there any truth to this?" Like all the variations on this, I answered it the same way.
"Desdemona is not now, nor has she ever been married. You know that these rumors all started with the music video for 'My Own Person'. There was no real minister on site at the video."
"But what about the rings?"
Gretchen picked this one up for us, "Zeela made me this ring at the request of my husband. He is a bit reclusive, so likes me to go out with Desdemona." She gave a blinding smile at this.
I continue, "I liked the ring so much, that I asked Madam Zeela to make one for me. She wouldn't do it without the permission of Gretchen's spouse, but eventually he allowed me to get one made. We've been friends for a long time."
We answered this a number of different ways, and eventually made our way to the doors to the theater where they were holding the Tween Music Awards this year.
It seems the organizers had heard about the problems that I'd been having with Sarah, because they seated us on opposite sides of the room.
I had to smile at this.
I sat through the awards program, unable to mock them like I had just a year ago with my friends.
So much had changed between the three of us in that year. So much had happened to me in that year. A few tears fell at the memories I'd made, the plans broken, and the hearts torn in two.
It hadn't all been bad, however. Most of it had been wonderful. I smiled at my wife sitting next to me and squeezed her hand.
I just zoned out thinking about the past year when something caught my attention.
"For Best Female Artist for the year of two thousand eleven," the girl announcing fumbled with the envelope for a moment or two and read the name. She smiled and took a deep breath to speak. . .
. . .and Gretchen pushed me off the bed onto the floor.
"Gretchen!?"
"You were crushing me, Keith." She sat up, forgetting for a moment that she was naked. She gave a little eep and covered herself with her hands. She rushed out of my room heading toward hers.
What was I going to do with that girl beyond marrying her?
I heard the water start in the shower and I started looking for what I was going to wear out on the town today. It was probably time that I started looking into some other hair styles for Desdemona, as well as getting a wig for times when my real hair was pink and I wanted to be Keith.
I collected my clothing and went in to get my own shower for the day.
I went with the leggings and tulle skirt that I wore the first time I went out as Desdemona. On the top I wore the corset and a maroon half jacket. I put in the skulls and crossbones. Their weight was a lot for me after wearing studs almost exclusively for a week.
I put on my necklace and a couple of bracelets.
As had become more normal for me, I went with light makeup, and not all of it in traditional Goth colors. I used a light pink lip balm.
I would forgo the breast forms today.
"Ready to go?" I said walking into Gretchen's room.
She leaped up and gave me a kiss. "Yep."
We hopped in her car, me for once in a long time a passenger instead of a driver in this car. We talked about nothing much as we drove to Madam Zeela's shop in Orem.
We walked in hand-in-hand. The girl was pretty in a faded sort of way. She definitely needed to work a bit on her style.
"Welcome to Madam Zeela's. Can I help you?"
I recognized the voice from the phone on Friday. "Yes, please get Zeela for us."
"She is busy finishing up some jewelry for a client. How can I help you?"
I couldn't help it, I laughed. "Look, while I realize that you might not have recognized me over the phone, surely you recognize me in person?"
"I'm sure that you think you're important but. . ."
I sang the opening bars of 'Daddy's Little Princess,' and her eyes grew wide. At that moment Zeela came out of the back room. She'd pushed the door open with her back, so she didn't notice us yet.
"Tonya, could you give Desdemona a call. . . perfect timing. I've finished them."
"Desi, what's this?" Gretchen asked me.
There were two wooden boxes on a tray. They were hinged in the middle and octagonal when looking down at them from the top.
"Two?"
"Yes, this is the one for you, and the other is hers."
At that moment I realized that I wanted to do this a little more special, but I'd forgotten and brought Gretchen in with me. I picked up the box that Zeela had indicated would be Gretchen's and turned toward her. I dropped to one knee and opened the box for her.
"Will you marry me, Gretchen?"
"Of course. I already said yes," she said with a giggle. I stood up and looked at the ring for the first time. Looking down at the emerald stone from the top, the ring formed a perfect figure eight. The top and bottom loops would go below the finger, making the symbol invisible most of the time. It was encrusted with diamonds. The emerald in the middle, one band passing over, and the other passing under, was the size of the tip of my thumb.
I slipped the ring onto Gretchen's finger, and it fit perfectly. It was gorgeous on her hand.
She grabbed the other box, dropped to one knee, and opened the box for me. "Desdemona, will you marry me?"
"Always and forever."
She slipped the ring, a twin to her own, onto my finger.
It fit perfectly as well.
It was only after I felt it on my finger that I realized it was the same one as from my dream. Everything blurred around me for a moment, and I got dizzy.
"Desi, are you ok?"
"Yes, Etch. I'm fine. Just a really bad case of deja vu."
I turned to Zeela. "You haven't ever made a ring like this for someone else, have you? Inspired by another ring? Called me when I was half asleep and described it to me?"
Zeela looked a bit puzzled but said, "no."
"I dreamed last night about this ring."
Zeela chuckled. "That might just be your mind filling in details. . ."
"It wasn't the look of the ring I remembered from my dream, it was the feel of it on my finger."
"Weird."
"I'll say." We talked price, and I paid, and then we headed out toward Salt Lake. It was a little weird having the ring be the same one from my dream, but I figured that the rest of my dream would eventually prove false. There just wasn't any way that I could see Sarah Carerra and I running into each other.
The things that the subconscious will do to you with a little outside guidance.
We arrived at the Spotlight office a little after ten, and I headed up to the studio.
We laid down the track for my first single in just under four hours. It's not that we had any trouble with the song, but that they wanted us to play with the styles of the three segments a bit.
By the time that we were done we had a definite bouncy pop tune for the first part of it. We shifted into a melodic rock middle section, and then closed up with a slower version of the original pop opener. It still had a beat and just made you want to dance, but it was more of a hold your partner close dance style, than the frenetic bounce around the room that the first part was.
All in all I was really happy with it by the time we got done.
We stopped in at the South Towne mall on our way home to get some more wigs. We ended up with an androgynous wig that framed my face, and was in a color somewhere close to my natural one.
"That makes you look really cute," Gretchen said with a smile.
"Boy cute, or girl cute?"
"Does it really matter?"
"No, I guess not," I said with a chuckle.
We drove home and got some swimming in. The summer seemed to be getting over so quickly, even thought it was barely July. It seemed half the time that I simply never had any time left to be me.
After taking a shower and changing into some of my more masculine clothing I decided to try the new wig on and see how I looked in full blown "Keith" mode.
I pinned it in place and went into the bathroom to take a look in the mirror.
I looked into the mirror and immediately turned to look behind me. There wasn't anyone there. I was thinking at the time that I could have sworn that I saw. . .a girl.
I quickly turned back around and looked into the mirror. I was wearing no makeup. I'd taken out my earrings. My clothing was very masculine.
And yet I saw a girl looking back at me. For the first time I realized that there was a name for the haircut that the wig was styled after: Pixie.
I laughed until I cried, and just sat there on the floor of the bathroom. What was I doing? Who was I really?
Was I the role or was I. . .something else?
Gretchen found me on the bathroom floor and just wrapped me in her arms as I continued to alternate between laughing and sobbing. I knew I was completely out of control, but I couldn't help it. She just held me and rubbed my back and eventually the hysteria left me and I just cried. It cleansed the emotion from me and left me feeling drained.
She guided me to the bed and I lay there as she continued to rub my back.
The crying had stopped by that point and I just relaxed into the feeling of being close to the woman I loved.
"Am I a man or a woman, Etch? Who am I?"
I heard her breath catch, but she didn't answer immediately. She waited for a moment, and I almost turned over to look at her to see if she was alright.
"Keith, you are a good person. That is what you've always been. Playing a role this long would make anyone worry about losing themselves."
"That's not the answer I expected to hear from you, Etch."
"That's because it's not the answer I thought I would give."
"Huh?"
"You say that a lot recently."
I blushed at the unintended slight and waited for her to continue.
"Keith, I loved becoming a woman. It occupied my entire life and for a while it was my life. The act of becoming a woman. Recently, though, I've come to the realization that while I am a woman, it's not what my life revolves around. I am a fiancée. I am a student. I am a rock music enthusiast. I am a driver. None of that requires me to be a woman. It just makes all of it more enjoyable to me. You helped me realize this."
I smiled into the bed, keeping my blushing face from view, mostly anyway.
"I didn't mean to embarrass you."
"You didn't embarrass me, Etch."
"Then why are you blushing?"
"Because I'm pleased."
"Keith, you really don't act like a woman. Sure, you're sweet and caring, but those are not things that women have a monopoly on. You go after things aggressively."
"You mean I'm driven?"
"Yes, but not just that. You really. . .tear into your work. You get this single minded purpose that takes you to the completion of a task. You tune everything out around you. There is only yourself and your goal."
"I never meant. . ."
"I know. You don't mean to shut me out. You do, though. It's like there are two of you. There's the you that recognizes that there are people around you. Then there's the solitary Keith. You won't take no for an answer, and you don't take prisoners."
"There are women who exhibit those traits. . ."
"Yes, but they are more masculine traits. I heard a statistic once about the prevalence of females who felt out of the right body to males feeling out of the right body, well at least gender wise."
"And?"
"I forget the exact number, but genetic males who felt they were women were much more prevalent than genetic females who thought they were men."
"What does this have to do with. . ?"
"I'm getting to that. Our society is much more forgiving of a masculine woman than an effeminate man. I should say feminine man, but I used the other to prove my point. While the words we have for masculinity can be used derogatorily, they can also be used to compliment.
"If I call a woman butch, it depends on the context as to whether I am insulting or not. I call a guy effeminate and it is a cut.
"Tomboys are allowed in all walks of life. Ball-busters are looked up to, even as they are feared. What do we call men in the same positions? Sissy? Pansy? It is as if our society only allows crossing of the gender barrier one way."
"Gretchen, how can you say that. I mean look at you. You're perfect."
"And how hard was it for me to be accepted? I had to go through surgery, and keep my genetic identity to myself, or face derision and scorn."
I looked sadly at her as she continued.
"Keith, I am happy presenting who I am to the world. I couldn't stop short of where I went. It doesn't change the fact that I chose the hardest of roads.
"A man realizing that he was born with the incorrect gender has many more options available to him. He doesn't have to follow a single path or become outcast by society. He can act masculine even while presenting as female.
"That is the main reason for the discrepancy in genders. It isn't the incidence that is different. It is what society allows."
"Gretchen, even you can't believe that is true. I mean, lesbians face a lot of difficulty."
"We're not talking about sexual orientation, but it does have some bearing. Lesbians are doing the same thing with sexual orientation that other girls simply do by action. They are becoming more masculine in the eyes of society at large.
"There was a paper written about research into human sexuality. They tracked the brainwaves of people looking at erotic imagery. They wanted a true baseline of what people were aroused by. Want to know what they found?"
"Sure. What did they find?"
"They found that most women were aroused by both lesbian and heterosexual images. Whether or not they were aroused by images of gay men seemed to be determined by their sexual orientation, but even then it was a very small percentage.
"Heterosexual men were aroused by images of lesbian women and heterosexual couples. Gay men were aroused by pretty much everything."
"Ok, is there a point to this lecture?"
She blushed prettily, but continued. "Sorry, I've been thinking about your situation a lot, and wanted to get this all off my chest before I lost my nerve."
I rolled over and caressed her breasts. "And such a nice chest it is too."
Her eyes glazed over a bit and then she shook her head and removed my hands. "You always pick the worst times to get physical, Keith."
"No, I pick the times I know you won't reciprocate," I said with a huge grin.
She glowered at me as she continued, "Society accepts women acting like men, but not men acting like women. That is my point."
"So, because I like to have a lot of choices in my wardrobe, I'm breaking social mores?"
"What?"
Oh, shit. Did I say that aloud? Crap, crap, crap, crap. . .
Gretchen grabbed my chin and turned me to face her. The self flagellation would have to wait.
"Keith, what are you trying to tell me?"
"Look, I'm not aroused by clothing in any way. Wearing it just feels like, well clothing."
"I didn't say you were."
"I like having choices. I like pants and shirts. . .and dresses and skirts and blouses and everything. I love wearing different styles of clothing. It has been freeing being Desdemona this past month. I've gotten the opportunity to explore my sense of style. Sure I'm still learning, but I LOVE the clothing."
Gretchen giggled at me. I had to chuckle myself. "It's not that funny, Etch."
"It's hilarious, Keith. You're a cross-dresser."
"Um, but wasn't that obvious?"
"There's obvious, and then there's you. You just realized that a lot of your dressing as Desdemona was all your choice."
"Of course it was."
"I mean, have you noticed you have tried some really girly styles along the way?"
I blushed but nodded.
"It's so wonderful!"
"Why do you say that?"
"Because, you are my girlfriend and my fiancé all wrapped in one. Um, I have a question. . .promise you won't get mad?"
"I make no promises."
"Do you like shopping as much as you seem to?"
"I love shopping. . .with you. I went shopping with Molly in LA, but it just wasn't the same. Sure, I loved getting more clothing, since I needed some, but I missed seeing you while I tried things on. It's just not the same without you."
She smiled at me and I figured I must have said the right thing. For the first time in more than a week, I figured I'd actually won. Guys have to work a lot harder at it that women.
"So. . ." Gretchen got a gleam in her eye, "now that we're done talking. . ." She put a hand to the bottom of her shirt and began lifting it off. I was out of that room like a bullet and I didn't stop 'til I found Tom, Jordanless for once.
"So, whatcha up to?" I asked.
"Did my daughter try to seduce you again?"
I chuckled at him.
"Like the hair. Makes you look like a girl though."
I laughed at that. "I know. Apparently I'm the last one to recognize that I really like dressing like a girl."
He got a concerned look on his face. "Gretchen's not pushing you into. . ."
"Oh, no. Nothing like that. I just like the ability to pick from both sides of the wardrobe, so to speak."
He chuckled at my turn of phrase.
"Well, as long as you're sure."
We called it an early night, since I would be getting up at six to start talking to image consultants.
Six came much too early.
I got up, bleary eyed, put my wig back on, and pinned it in place. I picked a very subdued selection of clothing. No breast forms. Light makeup. A pair of dangly garnet earrings I'd stolen from Gretchen the night before. No pink whatsoever.
All in all, I don't think I looked like anything other than a teenager, probably a female because of the hair and makeup.
I was ignored by consultant after consultant. It was a very inauspicious beginning for many of them. They talked to Richard about color schemes and cloth types. I would interject a question like:
"How well would something like that breathe?"
or
"What would that look like on stage?"
or
"Wouldn't something like that get really hot under the spots?"
or
"How well will that go with pink?"
The answer to this one is notable: "Pink is a nice gimmick to get into the game, but we need to tone that back a bit as we move forward." The answer was spoken to Richard, even though I'd ask the question.
I ended all of the interviews the same way: "Thank you for your time, but I think that we're looking for a different vision for me."
I loved their reactions when it dawned upon them who I was. Shock, dismay, and a light of fear in their eyes. Then the bargaining began, which would end with one simple statement from me. The words changed, but the concept was the same.
"You ignored me until you found out I was famous."
I was getting tired and cranky and I just wanted to go spend some time with Gretchen. I wanted to see my Mom. I wanted someone to remind me it was a good thing I was now seventeen.
"Sweetie, can I do something for you before we get started?"
"Huh?"
"You look tired and a bit down. I know this is Richard's office, but can I get something for you?"
I smiled a weak smile and shook my head. "Sorry, it's been a long morning for me."
"Are you Richard's daughter?"
Richard was sitting up in his chair watching the interaction. I think he was hopeful about this one.
I shook my head, "No. I'm a friend of the family, you might say."
"If you're not his daughter. . .then. . .it's a pleasure to meet you Desdemona."
Shock was the only emotion I felt. Not a single person this morning had acknowledged me, let alone guessed who I was.
"I'm sorry, am I wrong? I didn't mean to offend you."
I pulled out the bobby pins holding the wig to my head and pulled it off.
"Does this answer your question?"
"I was sure that the hair was a wig. . .I mean the pink hair."
"I only got my hair styled this way last week. I can tell you why after you sign an NDA that Richard said my lawyer prepared."
"I can hold onto my curiosity. Let's decide if we fit each other first."
"I like this one, Richard."
"Finally."
"You don't want to hear my ideas first?"
"Of course we do. I'm just saying I like your personality, which is a point in your favor."
"Ok, well, let's hit it then. Assuming that the hair was a wig, I thought we might want to try different styles for each song. Each song has a specific emotion to it, and the hair could underscore that emotion. It would be the most flamboyant part of most of your costumes. I prepared a portfolio of style ideas if you'd like to see them. . ."
"I'd love to, as long as you explain it all to me."
"I call the overall concept Goth-next-door. There is a certain innocence to most of your songs. It is as if you are a really wholesome person underneath the persona that you present onstage. So, I took your initial costumes I've seen you in, including the one for 'Don't Blame the Girls,' and worked an overall concept for it. To begin with I have costumes for most of your current songs. Notice the sort of Goth-pirate-wench look that I provided for 'Black Flag.'"
I looked through the sketches. None of it looked off the rack.
"Are you an image consultant or a designer?"
"A bit of both, actually. I couldn't ever break into the world of fashion. My ideas weren't out there enough I guess. I did succeed in telling people what to wear, so here I am. I employ a small shop to provide the one-of-a-kind pieces, but most of this is actually just repurposed clothing from other sources."
"You do realize that during most concerts I may have seconds between songs."
"Which is why I will be modifying the clothing to be changed quickly just off stage. You'll be wearing a leotard underneath it to make it so that even if there is not an 'off-stage' then you can make the changes you need in public."
"Doesn't that end up just being little more than a gimmick?"
She sighed, but gave me a smile. "I figured you'd say that, but I had to try. Most of the rest of the clothing, after the ones titled for the songs, are my more 'normal' ideas for a full concert getup. I'll be making changes as we go along, of course, but those are some of my initial ideas."
I was flipping through and I stopped at an off-the-shoulder gown in white, black, and pink. I stopped and gaped at it.
"Not possible," I muttered to myself.
"What was that?"
"So, is this just a repurposed gown?"
"Nope. I designed that one a couple of days ago. The idea wouldn't leave me alone."
"I looked. . .I mean I would look gorgeous in that gown."
"Well, don't get your hopes up on that one. I figured that if I got the job I'd make it for an awards show. I wanted to get my label out there and see if maybe I could someday get into the industry I love."
"I want to wear this dress to the Tween Music Awards."
"Does that mean. . ."
"Only if you tell me your name."
"Linda Nesmith."
"No wonder you had trouble getting into the fashion world."
We all laughed for a moment at this. "Linda, thanks for being yourself. I have a birthday party to attend."
"Wish them a happy new year."
"You just did." I gave her a huge smile as I left.
Linda was certainly a character.
But what would I do about that dream? Did I even believe the dream? . .There are no such thing as visions or prophetic dreams. No psychic abilities. This is real life. My mind is simply making connections to a dream that had a limit of detail. That's what it is. Nothing more sinister than that.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
I'd recently appeared on SNL, and things were beginning to look up. I had recorded my first single, 'Daddy's Little Princess' and I had a new image consultant. I was engaged to Gretchen, had a one-of-a-kind engagement ring made by Madam Zeela, and I was finally seventeen. Life was good.
Richard stopped me as I was about to leave his office building. "Keith, I know we decided we would stop around noon, but I had something I really needed to tell you. I got a call from the America's Freedom Festival committee and they want Up in Flames to play the pre-show at Stadium of Fire this year."
"The Stadium of Fire doesn't have a pre-show."
"That's supposed to be changing this year. They will be opening up the gates at four in the afternoon on Saturday. They'll need you to play for a couple of hours until about six."
"A couple of hours?"
"Yeah, a couple of hours. So, we'll be going over the line up tomorrow."
"Couldn't you have told them no?"
"Sure, but I figured it was a great opportunity."
I sighed. So much for relaxing for a bit.
What am I saying? I'm a ROCK STAR!
And they picked me to perform.
I smiled at this, "Richard, I'd be happy to perform. What do the other guys think?"
"Haven't told them yet, but I'm sure they'll be ecstatic."
"Ok, thanks for the heads up, Richard."
"Happy Birthday, Desi."
"Let Linda know the whole deal, would you, Richard? I want to make sure I never end up on stage in the next best thing to lingerie."
Richard chuckled at me and I drove Gretchen's car home.
I had to park a block away. Alright, it was only a couple of houses down. Extended family, remember? I put the wig back on and walked past the tables that had been set along the road. It was a fairly quiet street, and we left room for cars to get past. I greeted Nathan and my other cousins, I got the normal ribbing for my look, and the girl cousins and my aunts commented at my makeup skills. I smiled and sought out Gretchen. She was showing off her ring. When I got there she handed me mine, and I put it on.
"Keith, that ring is so beautiful. Is it true that you had it custom made? How did you ever get the idea for it?"
"The design was all Zeela's idea. I let her design whatever she wanted. I find that is the best way to get really pretty jewelry from her."
My grandmother looked sad for a moment, and then brightened. "Looks like my grandmother's ring misses another wedding."
"What?"
"Didn't know that you were descended from royalty, did you?"
"Gran?"
She pulled a lacquered box out of her purse and opened it. Inside, sitting on black velvet, was the most pretty ring I'd ever seen. Its center stone was an opal, and it was surrounded by a variety of other stones. I could almost say a rainbow. The metal was primarily gold, but some of the accents were silver.
Several of my aunts and cousins gasped.
"How many of the boys have you offered this to?"
"All of them," she said with a sad smile.
Gretchen put her hand upon my grandmother's arm. "Gran, the ring I'm wearing is more a symbol of my bond than a true engagement ring. It is a ring I can wear at any time. If you wouldn't be opposed to it, I'm sure that Keith would be fine with me wearing this ring."
My grandmother looked at me expectantly, and I smiled.
I gently removed the eternity ring from her finger and laid it upon the velvet in the case. I slipped the antique ring onto her proffered finger. It fit perfectly.
Gran threw her arms around Gretchen in a hug and whispered something in her ear. Gran then kissed her on the cheek a couple of times.
"Keith, I love this girl of yours." There were general noises of assent. I noticed my mom talking with Nathan to one side. I decided to walk over to them.
"I'm so glad you're here, Mom."
I could see a smile in her eyes, and she mouthed a 'thank you' at me.
"I'm sorry I treated you like I did, Tracy. I had to be sure. This is Keith's day after all."
"My day? What are you talking about? My mom deserves all the credit. She's the one who was pregnant and then had to deliver me into this world."
"Keith!?" Mom blushed at the praise I'd given her.
"I hear that!" My grandmother shouted from the other side of the gathering.
There was general chuckling and giggling and we got down to the serious business of partying.
"Are you happy you agreed to wear the ring, Etch?"
"More than happy. They accept me as a woman, Keith. This ring is proof that they accept me."
I just smiled at her self-revelation, and watched as she preened with the ring. I was glad that she was happy. Her happiness completed me for the moment.
I lay down in my bed, and she finally came to join me. We quietly talked about nothing in particular. Talking became soft, but insistent kissing. I felt myself getting into it, and slowly pushed myself away.
"I can't do this to you, Gretchen."
She looked sad, but she nodded assent. "I know. It's just I want so bad to be this for you, Keith. I feel complete. And I want you to share in my completeness."
I put my hand to the side of her face, and she nuzzled into my hand.
"You complete me, Etch. Always and forever. I don't need to penetrate you to prove that. We are one."
She giggled at me for a moment and then threw her arms around me and kissed my chest a couple of times. She talked into my chest, "I love you so much, Keith. I really do."
I just held her. We spent another hour or so talking about inconsequential things, before I began to hear her quietly snoring into my chest.
I smiled into her hair and just held onto her.
I must have fallen asleep shortly after that, because the next thing I remembered was her kissing me awake. I smiled into her kisses. "Good morning, Etch." Well, that's what I said, but it came out more like "Gubmormm,emmf."
Talking through kisses does that.
"Just kiss me for a moment, Keith. That's all I ask."
We did that.
Looking back over everything I've written, I realize for the first time that I've never once mentioned my alarm. I mention it here, because it pertains directly to what I need to relate.
I have a radio alarm. When it clicks on, it starts silent and slowly increases in volume. It allows me to slowly become aware of my surroundings and wake up more normally, even if it is to my alarm.
Well, as Gretchen and I kissed, something on the radio caught my attention.
"Desdemona, folks. You heard me. We have an advance copy of her new single and are proud to be able to play it for you now. You requested it, and here it is, 'Daddy's Little Princess'."
For about two minutes I was in ecstasy. They were playing my song on the local pop station. My song. And then. . .
"What in the world?"
"Keith?"
What was he doing to me? This was my song. Sure it was over seven minutes long, but the whole thing told a specific story. For them to do this. . .this. . .
"It's so short," Gretchen said as soon as the song ended.
"It's too short.
I had not been this angry, well, ever. I was up and pacing the room. I was opening and closing my fists. I wanted to hit something. I wanted to hit someone. I needed. . .release.
"Gah!!!" I screamed into the air, and Gretchen got up and put her arms around me from behind. I struggled with myself not to pull out of her arms.
"Keith, honey, calm down. You can fix this." She was frantic, and I sat down on the bed with her. She was scared for me, and of me a little I think, so I calmed myself. I couldn't do this to her.
My phone began to ring. Desdemona. I answered in my sweetest voice, "you've reached the ninth ring of hell, Demona speaking. How can I rend your soul today?"
"Desi?"
"Oh, Richard, how nice of you to join me in the fiery pit today. Should I be tearing you a new one, or Mr. Praetor."
"Over what?"
"My song. Please tell me it wasn't your idea. Please tell me I don't have to shorten your life. I don't think Etch would ever forgive me."
"What are you talking about, Desdemona?"
"Who was the one who thought it would be a good idea to chop my song in half and play the beginning and the ending without any of the middle?"
"Desi. . ."
"Don't you dare 'Desi' me, Richard. Don't even start. That song is about reality. It is a song of a fall from grace followed by redemption. I introduce the main characters in the first 45 seconds of the song. They kept those intact, thankfully.
"The end of the song, 2:20 in length, is the redemption from the fall. Total between the two is 3:35. That is what I just heard on the radio. They destroyed the meaning, Richard."
"They felt that removing the harder rock portion of the song would help it to appeal to a wider audience."
"I don't want to appeal to a broader audience if the meaning of the song is missing. They want me to write a complete bubble gum song with edgy lyrics, fine, I will do that. They DON'T get the option to screw with this song that way."
"Keith, you have to understand. . ."
"No, Richard, I don't. I have to understand nothing. Before this, people were tuning in because of my music as it was. If they can't handle the songs the way I created them, then we're done. We break ties with Spotlight and we move on."
"Is that wise, Keith. Think before you. . ."
"I am thinking about this, Richard. I really am. I will sing pop songs until I'm blue. I will pander to my audience as far as they want. However, if I write a song, and we record it, it gets played as is, or not at all. That is what my contract said. So, who authorized this butchery?"
"Desi, I'm sorry, I really am. I didn't think. . . "
I took a deep breath, and then another, "I'm sorry, Uncle Richard."
I heard him sigh on the other end of the phone. "Let me give Ashley a call. I'll see if I can fix this."
"Thank you, Uncle Richard."
"Uncle?"
"Well, you did say I was your niece-in-law at one point."
"Not yet you aren't, you little minx." There was a smile in his voice, though, and we parted on better terms.
"Kisses."
"Bye, Desi."
I went out to the garage and phoned the guys. They were already on their way over to Gretchen's house. I warmed up a bit and then went through a couple of arpeggios on my 12-string.
Eventually the guys arrived, and we really began to jam. After about thirty minutes we took a break.
"So, you guys hear what's up tomorrow?"
"Yep, boss-lady. We get to play a two hour concert."
"With only 37 minutes worth of music? How we pulling this one off, Keith?"
"Well, we could easily double the length of 'My Own Person' with more battling at the beginning and general fun."
"That only gets us to 42 minutes."
"We need more songs, boss-lady."
I played idly on my guitar and thought of what we could do. Two hours was a daunting amount of time to take up with the limited music that we had here. Talking between songs would probably add between ten seconds and thirty seconds between each song.
That was between one minute thirty seconds and four minutes. Figure two minutes and that got me to 44 minutes total.
What if. . ?
"Ok, we'll run two sets. The first we start when we get in there. We run through our music in sort of a warm up, playing to what little audience there is. We jam for the next 30 minutes. We then play our second set. That will leave us two minutes for wrap up and getting off the stage."
"Now we just have to decide the order."
"If I may make a suggestion, boss-lady?"
"Go ahead, Davey."
"We make a 'Daddy's Little Princess' sandwich. Start and end with our new single. Speaking of the single, have you heard what they're playing on the. . ."
At my glare the smile left his face and he swallowed.
"I guess you have."
"I'm not pleased, to say the least. I talked to Richard this morning and he's trying to get it resolved."
I paused for a cleansing breath and tried a tentative smile, "We're here to practice guys. This is the fun part of our job. . .well that and performing." My smile became genuine at this point.
"Hell, yeah." Guthrie yelled, and then blushed bright red. "I mean, let's do this?"
Davey and I had a chuckle at his expense and we got down to it. We practiced, and practiced, and practiced. I went through what felt like a gallon of water.
We took a break at 2 pm for some lunch, more water, and a little break from our playing. I got some cuddle time. Then it was back into the fray.
God, I love my job.
We practiced until about six and then decided to call it quits for the day. It was one of the better days that I'd had in about two weeks.
We relaxed and watched some TV, joking around like a group of friends.
"You know, it'd be more fun if you guys had girls of your own. Then the three girlfriends could all hang together and swap stories while the three of you practiced."
Davey blushed, and Guthrie looked away.
"What?"
"Well, I didn't think that my girlfriend was invited."
I looked at Guthrie, and realized I'd made a stupid comment. I didn't know if they had girlfriends or not before I opened my big mouth.
"What about you, Davey?"
"Um. . ." It has his turn to blush. He closed his mouth and refused to open it.
"What? What is it?"
"I'm embarrassed, okay?"
"There's nothing to be embarrassed about. I'm sure that she'll be just as cute. . .I mean," Gretchen blushed at what she was about to say.
"She might be a he, Etch."
"No, I like girls, Gretchen. Women. Tall. . ." Davey's eyes glazed over a bit.
"So you like average sized women. There's nothing wrong with that, Davey."
Davey's blush deepened. "Gloria is 6'5" tall."
"Go, Davey!"
"Yeah, Davey!"
Davey visibly relaxed. "You're not shocked?"
"Davey, I'm engaged to a woman who was born a man, my Dad is married to a man who used to be a woman. I dress as a woman on stage. Where in this do you think there would be a problem with you dating someone almost twice your size?"
"Keith!" Gretchen punched me in the arm.
"I still see you as a woman, Etch."
"You didn't have to be that blunt about it."
"Fine, our next practice session we'll invite our girls. Okay with you Davey."
Davey flushed a bit, but nodded.
"Great, guys!" Gretchen was bouncy for the rest of the evening. I'd always preferred my Gretchens bouncy.
We got a good night's sleep and I was up early to get ready. I was looking through my clothing when there was a ring at the front door. I went down and opened the door. Linda breezed by me.
"Keith, so great to see you. We've got a lot to do, and so much time to do it in."
"Morning, Linda." I chuckled at her. She was so full of energy for seven in the morning.
"Ok, so here is what we're doing today. Today, we introduce Goth-next-door to the public. I'm going with a little bit eighties here, and a little bit nineties. I figure that it will give people the impression we are looking for."
"Eighties?"
"You already went there a bit with the tulle skirt for your first costume. Sure, they still use that a lot in Japan, but they've always been following us in certain aspects of fashion. And then again, we follow them in others. It's sort of a cycle. One country invents something, it gets passed around, changed, and then the originating country picks it up in an altered form.
"Anyway, I figured that we would simplify your wardrobe a bit for today, and possibly add some complexity later on.
"We're going with acid washed black jeans, minor slashing in the front. We'll give you a white peasant top over a black long sleeved shirt with a scooped neckline. Exaggerated eye liner in an 'Egyptian' style. Black blush today, to heighten the contrast with your pale skin. Peach lipstick. . .no, that won't work with the blush. Grey lips I think. Let's keep it a little monotone there. Make sure to wear the skulls today.
"And I think. . .pink ballet flats as your shoes."
She brought the outfit into my room, and left while I changed. I hadn't really gotten that much of an opportunity to wear the ballet flats since I'd purchased them, and they were as comfortable as I'd thought they'd be. They outfit was light, and mostly airy. The jeans were tight, but not overly so. I know I'd never worn anything like them as Keith before. The outfit did say Desdemona, especially with the skull earrings and pink hair.
I tried the makeup as suggested, but it ended up making my face look a little washed out. Not everyone can be perfect I guess. I removed the 'blush' and lipstick and began to play a little with my stage makeup. I mixed a bit of black in with my pink. I had to adjust it a bit a couple of times, but I ended up with a sort of grey with a pink tinge to it. I applied it to my cheeks and lips, but I still wasn't quite satisfied. I added a touch of pink as another layer on my cheeks, fading from the bottom up.
It was perfect. I went out into the hall to show off for Linda, and Gretchen wolf whistled. "While not what I wanted on the cheeks, I think you hit the overall style perfectly."
"The black on the cheeks and grey on the lips made me look washed out."
"I can see that. Sorry, I wasn't used to your complexion yet. You really are pale for a guy." I blushed at this.
"Well, we have a couple of hours, so I thought we'd go through your wardrobe for Desi and see what options you have in there that fit the image."
Linda breezed into my room and began making notes and examining my girl clothes. I think she really liked the black with pink hearts motif that I'd picked up in LA. Her eyes sparkled as she made some notes in her book about it anyway.
We hugged before she left, and the house seemed somehow less without her.
"She is a character," Gretchen said as I closed the door behind the retreating figure of Linda.
I sighed in agreement. One thing was for sure. It would never be dull when Linda was around. Sure, she only talked a little more than the other people I'd tried out for the image consultant spot, but when taken cold you could see that she always ran a mile a minute.
We drove the hour to Provo so that we'd be ready to go when they needed us. As it was we arrived at the LaVell Edward's Stadium shortly after one. I wished that I'd remembered how crazy Provo gets on the fourth of July, because we would have stayed there over night.
Let me explain something about The Freedom Festival for everyone who may not have had the opportunity to participate.
Provo begins celebrating the 4th about midway through June. There are balloon races and breakfasts and. . .well lots of stuff. I don't know exactly anymore since it has been years since I was into that "kid stuff."
Anyway, this is all just precursor to what they do on the fourth, or in this case third, of July: the Parade.
People will camp out the night before so that they can get a curbside seat, waiting as the sun slowly rises so that they can watch the three to four hour spectacle that begins at about nine am.
For a good period before and after this parade, they shut down a number of major connecting streets. It becomes impossible to get to or from certain parts of Provo while this is going on.
Then, the parade ends and people try to get home. All of them at the same time. Through congested city streets. At the same time, people begin to gather at the stadium for the biggest fireworks show/concert in the valley, if not the state.
As you could probably imagine, it is faster to walk. That's what we began doing at ten. Walking. And people wanted my autograph. And so I signed autographs. And walked. And talked with my fans a little.
They even made some suggestions for some songs I should do covers of.
Some were kind of cool, and some were stupid, but I smiled and nodded all the same.
All in all it was a great opportunity to see what people thought about me.
"So, you going to watch the Stadium of Fire as well?"
A little girl with what once used to be blonde hair asked me. She was definitely a little below my normal demographic, or so I assumed. Ok, so she wasn't really a little girl. She was maybe ten or eleven.
Oh, and her hair? It looked as though she'd tried to color it pink, and her Mom, or someone, had tried to wash it all out.
"Nope, I'm not going to watch the show. I get to play while everyone is getting seated, or at least for the last couple of hours of it."
"Will you play 'Daddy's Little Princess'? It's my favorite song in the world, especially the long version."
I smiled at this. "Of course I will, princess. I love that song too."
"Is it your favorite?"
"Want to know a secret?" I asked her in a conspiratorial whisper.
She nodded her head at me, and her eyes lit up, "All my songs are my favorites."
We giggled a bit at that. She turned to her parents. "Can Desdemona sign my tee shirt?"
"I don't know, sweetie. . ." She looked over at me, obviously embarrassed to ask.
"It's perfectly fine. I'll just sign the back of it, as long as it is really okay with your parents."
"Please?"
"Okay," her mother said with a resigned sigh. The girl hopped up and down a bit. As soon as she calmed down a bit I signed the back of her shirt. #92Everyone deserves to be a princess at least some of the time. Princess Desi
"What does it say, Mommy?"
Her mom read it to her, and when I looked up at her she mouthed a thank you at me. I even thought I saw a tear or two in her eyes.
I smiled at her, and we all continued to work our way to the stadium. By the time we got there I was very glad for the simplicity of the costume I was wearing. Sure, I was only a little more Goth than the other people walking in the crowd, but that little bit counted.
Guthrie and Davey were there waiting for me, and they'd brought their girlfriends with them this time.
Gloria was literally 6'5". I expected her to be tall, but I think I thought that he was exaggerating a bit. Nope. She was taller than all of the rest of us, and taller than some of us combined. She was pretty in a blonde Amazon sort of way. She had eyes for Davey alone, though, so I was happy for them.
Guthrie's girl was quiet. I mean really quiet. She almost seemed to be looking for a mouse hole to go hide in. I felt a little sorry for her to be thrust into public like this.
Gretchen noticed her discomfort I think, because she walked over to her and began talking quietly, as Guthrie, Davey and I all started our initial prep for the show.
"Desi, I'm going to take Gloria and Farah and we're going to go find the green room." We kissed and they walked off. I'm pretty sure that Farah's jaw dropped to the floor when I kissed Gretchen because there was an audible snap from that direction which I assume was her closing it.
We still had a couple of hours before the concert started, and we hung around under the south stands of the stadium. I caught some glimpse of Carrie Underwood, who was performing that evening, but Guthrie, Davey, and I pretty much stuck by ourselves.
About twenty minutes before they wanted us to do a sound check, which we did. Some random noise and a couple of notes from me. Yes we goofed off.
We were bored, what can I say. There isn't much you can see from where we were, even though most of it is fairly open. We could see into the practice field where they had the fireworks set up. All in all it was a kind of interesting experience.
Then we were on stage, and everything was suddenly. . .better.
When we started, the seats were only about a quarter full. It really felt like we were playing to an empty amphitheater. Well, that is except for the "cougar thunder" every time we finished a song.
If you've never been to LaVell Edwards stadium, then let me describe it a bit for you. They built the north and south stand out of structural steel, and everything above about halfway on the east and west sides is made out of structural steel as well. There is a historical reason for this, but I never really cared to learn.
The area under the stands acts as a reverberating chamber. You end up with four huge drums, and the mallets are the feet of the fans. Yes, it makes a rumble like thunder and can be heard for miles in every direction.
Now, I'm sure that there are other stadiums that have the same effect, but the sound of that stadium has a special nostalgia for people who grew up in the surrounding area.
To have that noise generated for me and my band?
I almost choked up there on stage.
Needless to say, it took about three times my projected time between songs to get my fans quieted down. Every third song, a yell went up for 'Daddy's Little Princess'.
And so we ended up playing it every third song or so. We played right through the central thirty minutes that I'd figured we would have, and even cut a little into our next set before we finished every song in our repertoire. And still they called out for 'Daddy's Little Princess'.
"Hey, guys," I said looking at my band mates as I spoke into the microphone, "it sounds like they want us to play 'Daddy's Little Princess' again. What say you, Davey?"
He played a riff on his drums, and so I turned to the crowd and said, "Translated that means, 'Sounds like a good idea, boss-lady.' What about you, Guthrie."
Guthrie played a long whine on his bass that could only be translated as, 'Do we hafta?'
"Yes, Guthrie, we have to. Our fans want it."
He played the opening to 'Black Flag'.
"He says he'd prefer to play 'Black Flag'. Can we do that?"
The 'no' from the crowd was resounding.
"You heard them, Guthrie. They don't want 'Black Flag'."
The crowd began to sing the chorus to 'Daddy's Little Princess'. Guthrie played a sour note and then mocked the crowd a bit by playing the song slightly off key.
"Come on, Guthrie. The fans love it. Do it for me?"
I batted my eyes at him.
He made an exaggerated sigh and then began playing along with the crowd. I joined in signing with them till we got done with the chorus, and then went back to the beginning of the song and we played our hearts out for them.
The crowd sang along with me on the chorus, and pockets kept with me through the whole song.
I was about to look to see how much time I had left when someone stepped up next to me on stage.
"Let's hear it for Desdemona and Up in Flames."
The crowd cheered as we left the stage.
I looked at the clock and realized that I'd gone about fifteen minutes over.
"Oh, Shit."
"Don't worry about it. You really played that crowd like they were your 12-String."
Carrie was standing there, ready to go on stage. She had a smile on her face.
"I don't know if I'd go that far," I said, but I was smiling none the less.
"No, you perform well, live. I hadn't had the opportunity to listen to your music before."
"Yeah, we just don't run in the same circles."
They called Carrie out to perform her first set of the night, but when she got on stage, the crowd started calling my name, and they were unable to get them quieted down.
I walked out on stage, and they cheered, but I put a hand up.
"Ms. Underwood, could I borrow your mic please?"
"Certainly," she said. She looked a bit worried at what I was going to say.
"I know you loved me being up on stage, but this is Ms. Underwood's time. I wasn't even scheduled to be here until late this week, and I have to imagine that none of you actually bought tickets expecting to see me, right?"
There was general assent from the crowd, but there was some confusion as well.
"Look, I love that people enjoy my music, but I would feel really betrayed if my fans were to ever be rude to another performer. Think you can all be polite for Ms. Underwood? Please?"
There was cheering from the crowd so loud that it drowned out the sound system. People started chanting Carrie, Carrie, Carrie.
I smiled and handed the mic to Carrie and made to leave the stage. "Sorry about that."
"No worries, Desdemona. It happens occasionally to everyone. I haven't had it happen to me before. . ."
We both had a light giggle at this.
"Desdemona, would you like to perform with me?"
"I don't know any of your songs."
"Well, I know one of yours. 'Daddy's Little Princess'?"
I laughed, but nodded my assent.
"Good evening, Utah. It seems that my first number for the evening will be one that you've heard a lot, and will likely hear quite a bit more in the coming months. Performing her new single with me, I give you Desdemona and 'Daddy's Little Princess'."
It was a slightly new experience hearing the tune with a decided country twang to it, but I adjusted before the first verse, and I sang an impromptu duet with Carrie Underwood.
Not something I ever dreamed about, but I definitely enjoyed it.
I went and found the rest of the band in the green room assigned to us, and as soon as I entered I was accosted by Farah.
"Desi, look, I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"Some things I've been thinking about you. I knew that Guthrie had a thing for you before he started working with you, and that made me jealous. You are so much more talented than I could ever be, and that's something that I could never share with him.
"On top of that you're gorgeous."
"Listen, Farah, I'm sure that Guthrie thinks you are better looking that I am."
"He probably undresses you with his eyes while he's on stage. I know how he is."
I laughed at this, and Guthrie made gagging noises.
"Farah, you've got the wrong idea about Keith."
I cocked an eyebrow at her, but she just shrugged.
"Don't you mean. . ." it suddenly dawned on her what Gretchen had said.
"You're. . .a. . .BOY?!" She began laughing and just couldn't stop. She was borderline hysterical, but not quite over that edge.
"No WONDER I never got that lesbian vibe from Gretchen or you. Sure you kissed with enough passion, but neither of you act like ANY of my lesbian or gay friends."
She giggled a little bit. "I was sure the two of you were heterosexual all the way. It seems I was right."
We all had a bit of a laugh at this, until Gloria spoke up. "Wait, Desdemona is a guy?" She was speaking with a heavy Swedish accent.
I looked at Davey, and just stared at him for a moment. "Ok, could you get any more stereotypical blonde goddess? Swedish?"
"Desi, I'm kidding." They all began laughing, and eventually I joined in.
We watched the show on the CCTV until it began to get dark, and then went up to an area assigned for us to be able to see the fireworks. All in all it was a pretty spectacular day, and I loved almost every minute of it.
We said goodbye to my band-mates and their mates and made our way to the car. We walked with tons of fans, both of myself and Carrie Underwood.
"Desdemona, wait up a moment."
An older woman touched my arm and I turned to look at her. I smiled because she acted a bit nervous.
"Desdemona. . ."
"Call me Desi, it's easier."
"Desi, um, I'd like to apologize."
"What for?"
"For bad mouthing you to my friends and not allowing my daughters to listen to your music."
"Okay. . ."
"What you did tonight showed class. And you looked very pretty on stage. I wouldn't mind my daughters wearing clothing like you have on. . .as long as they don't go for pink hair."
"That's good. I like being a bit unique."
I giggled at that, and we said our goodbyes. Someone approached me in the dark, and I figured it might be a different fan, but then there Rachel was.
"Probably a good idea to keep moving, Desi."
"Rachel?"
"Yep, that's me. Moving?"
"Where have you been?" It suddenly occurred to me that I hadn't seen much of her since I'd come back to Utah. Or was it that I was already ignoring her?
"I've been sticking to the shadows, you might say. Staying just out of sight. It was kind of hard to do with you walking to and from the stadium today, though."
"Where are you sleeping?"
"Tom's house. He has more than one guest bedroom you know."
"This is so weird. Do you have a super power or something?"
She snorted at that as we started moving again, "No, but I have a lot of training in blending in. I wanted to see what sort of threats you face on a daily basis, and I can tell that my work is cut out for me. You are entirely too people friendly. If that woman had meant to do you harm. . ."
"Rachel, if I have to stop interacting with my fans. . ."
"Nothing like that. I will just have to stick with you all the time. Well, from now on. Expect that I am nearby, even when you can't see me. I'll also be setting up a full surveillance team. I think it would work better than using a wall of flesh. People will assume you are unprotected, and so all of their plans will hinge on that."
"You're talking like you expect me to be attacked."
"Desi, that's my job. I plan for you being attacked at any minute of any day, so that you don't have to worry about it."
"Thinking like that would tend to make me paranoid."
"Yeah, that's sort of a hazard of the job. The best of us are one step away from being hospitalized in a mental institution."
We laughed, but I could hear the bitterness in her voice as she said this.
It took us until about three in the morning to get home, and even then the buzz of performing hadn't left me. I talked with Gretchen for about an hour before she decided she was too tired to continue. It was after six when I finally gave up looking at the clock and just stared at the ceiling.
The doorbell ringing woke me up around noon. I'd missed my ride to church, and was thinking of just rolling over and going back to bed. The doorbell rang again.
I stumbled out of bed and made my way downstairs.
"Hi, Keith."
"Jake?" He looked like crap. His beard was scraggly, and he didn't look like he was eating well. Could he really change this much in just three weeks?
"Hey, yeah it's me."
Something in his voice sounded broken. It was as if life no longer held value to him. I did the only thing I could. I invited him in.
"Sorry I bailed on you, man, but I had some thinking I needed to do."
"Don't worry about it. I'm sure your parents were happy to have you back."
"They don't know I'm here. I just wanted to see you once more, to explain, before. . .well, I wanted to see you."
"Jake, look, there's got to be. . ."
"Just let me talk, Keith, okay?"
I nodded mutely at him as he began to speak.
"Bobby raped me the first time when we were in junior high."
My jaw dropped open, I was speechless. I could not force sound past my vocal chords.
"I tried to convince myself that I enjoyed it, that I wanted it. Boys don't get raped. I had to keep hold of that."
He began to cry, and I wanted to comfort him, but guys didn't do that either. . .screw it. I got up and sat next to him in his chair. I put my hand on his back and he leaned into me.
"I thought he loved me Keith. I thought that it would all work out in the end as long as he loved me. I could live with his temper and. . .and. . .everything. I could handle it. It just made us gay, right?"
He tried to pull away a bit, so I let him. I didn't want to cause any more trauma, but I left my hand on his back.
"I thought he'd just found someone new when Brock came around in that getup. I thought it was another one of his games he'd play with me. I thought anything but what was really going on. He'd found a new victim."
Jake put his head in his hands, "It was my fault, Keith. All my fault. If only I'd told someone what was going on, if I'd DONE something. . .Buffy. . .it's all my fault."
He just cried like a baby after that and I put my arms around him. Sometimes boys needed to act more like girls in my opinion. Holding in your emotions, and refusing to comfort someone in pain never served any good I can think of.
"I tried to join up with the gay crowd, to bury my pain in someone else's arms, but it wasn't there. I wasn't attracted to any of them. That's why. . .I've been ruined, Keith. I'm ruined and I just want the pain to stop. I had to say goodbye. . ."
I waited for him to continue for a bit, but he just cried.
"Before you go, don't you think there are other people you need to say goodbye to?"
"Who?'
"Well, Buffy is home from the hospital."
"I couldn't, I just couldn't."
"Come on, if this is the last thing you do, you can do anything, right?"
"I guess."
"Let's take Gretchen's car and drive over there."
"Ok."
Since I didn't see Rachel anywhere, I decided to call out. "Rachel, I'm heading over to Buffy Hansen's house. You want to come with?"
"No, it should be fine."
I guided him to the car, hoping that I was able to think of something in the next few minutes to get him out of this funk. Even if I couldn't there was no way I was letting him out of my sight.
We rang the doorbell, and I heard Suzi's voice over the intercom. "Who is it?"
"Keith and Jake. We thought we'd stop by to see how Buffy is doing."
There was a buzz at the door, and Suzi's voice said, "Come in."
I led Jake to the room where Buffy was recuperating, and she smiled at us when we got there. Most of the bandages had been removed from her face, and I could see that she was a knockout. Seriously. There was still a little discoloration around her eyes, and a yellowed bruise or two on other parts of her face, but there were no traces of Brock left there.
"Looks like you came out of this looking like a model, " I said with a smile. She typed into her keyboard, and I read the response on the screen.
:I got the bandages off just a couple of days ago. I was surprised to say the least.:
"I'll say. You are very pretty, Buffy." Jake said. He was mesmerized. I'm pretty sure that he was expecting to see a scarred and depressed boy lying in this bed.
Buffy blushed. :Thank you, Jake.:
"Buffy, I wanted to apologize."
:What for?:
"I knew what kind of a monster that Bobby was, and I did nothing to protect you."
:How could you know? Nobody could have known that.:
"I knew. He raped me as well. I did nothing about it, and I could have. . .I could have."
Jake was crying and not looking at the screen, so he couldn't see what she was typing.
She began to talk through her wired jaw. I could tell that the effort was a little painful for her, but I could also see that she was finally relieved to say something. Anything. It was a little slurred, but completely understandable.
"Jake, this is not your fault. It never was. You were the victim too."
"I should have said something."
"You just did. Please, Jake. Trust me. We can get through this together, you and I."
"What are you saying?"
"I'm saying I want to be friends."
"I need more friends." There was pain in his voice at this, and sarcasm as well.
"You can always use another friend, Jake."
"I'm damaged, Buffy. I'm soiled. I'm filthy and no girl will ever want anything to do with me."
A 5'3" bundle of fury and energy lit into Jake, pounding him on the arm and trying to get his attention.
"Jake, you self centered, narcissistic, idiot of a boy. You KNOW I've had a crush on you for years."
"Hi, Susanne."
"Hi, Susanne? Hi, Susanne?! You take off for three weeks, tell no one where you are going, not even your parents, and all you can say to me when you get back is 'Hi'? I ought to. . ." She stopped, realizing that he was just pulling further away into his shell, and so she hugged him.
"I ought to let you know that I missed you, and I don't want you to ever leave me again. I know you don't love me, but can you at least be friends with me? I couldn't bear to lose you completely from my life."
"I'm sorry, Susanne. I didn't mean to hurt you."
"I've told you a million times, Jake. It's Suzi. I'm too small for a name like Susanne."
"I've always thought that Susanne was too small a name for you. You are one of the most intense people I've ever known."
Suzi blushed a deep crimson and tried to hide her face behind her hair. It doesn't work too well when your hair is only chin length, and you've got bangs at that.
Jake smiled. He actually smiled.
He reached up and brushed a few stray locks out of her face, and then tilted her chin up to look at him. "Susanne, I'm not sure if I'll ever feel worthy of even this, but I'll be your friend until you get sick of me. I'm sorry I left so suddenly."
Suzi threw her arms around his neck and gave him a hug.
"I'll wear you down eventually, you know? I haven't given up on you and me being a couple."
"I know, and I appreciate it. I need to make sure that I'm alright alone before I inflict my problems on anyone else."
I looked at the time on my cell, and realized that Gretchen would be home from church soon. "You ok if I leave you here, Jake? Gretchen will be home soon."
"Go on, Keith. I'll be okay."
"You sure?" I looked him in the eyes, trying to see if he was telling me the truth.
"I'm not saying goodbye for now, Keith. I'll see you later."
"Ok," I said with a smile, and then let myself out of the house.
The rest of the day I spent with Gretchen and her father. Jordan arrived a little after seven, and joined in the family time at that point. Looking at them, I realized that Tom and Jordan really were perfectly matched as few couples are. They complemented each other in all the right places.
Their personalities had large areas of commonality, and equally large differences.
No, I'm not saying that they were perfect, but they were trying, and I guess that's all anyone can ask.
The rest of us just have to work a little harder to get to where they naturally went.
The next day dawned clear, bright, and hot. I had nothing planned for most of the day, so I swam with Gretchen until I hear the doorbell ring. Not wanting to drip on the carpeting I went around the side of the house to see who it was.
Jake, happier than the last time I'd seen him on the porch, and Susanne. He was holding her hand.
I looked at that and raised an eyebrow.
Jake shrugged, "she insisted. It doesn't mean we're a couple, but you know. . .things like this sometimes happen."
"What, you hold your best friend's hand while she beams at the world and looks like the cat that ate the canary?"
"It's not like I kissed her."
"Yet."
"Whatever. Did you two bring swimsuits?"
In answer Susanne shifted her shirt aside to show the strap of her bikini. I let Jake through the gate, but I stopped Susanne to talk to her a moment.
"Sooz, I'm not sure if this is the best thing for him at the moment."
"What are you talking about, Keith?"
"Don't push this. He really needs some help. Look, while he's depressed like this it isn't a good idea for him to make any big life changing decisions. Neither you nor he will like where you end up because of it."
"But I love him, Keith. I really do."
"Then be there for him. Not for you."
"It hurts to see him like this, Keith. I want to fix it all. Make him better."
I brought her into a hug. I was more free with those since I started putting Desdemona on. "I know, Sooz. I know. Look, why don't I see if Dr. Allen has any spots to talk to Jake. If not, I'll get the name of a good therapist for him to talk to."
She nodded silently at me, and then wiped away the few tears she'd shed.
"Let's go swimming, huh?" I said as I started walking toward the back of the house.
"Susanne!"
"Gretchen!"
"Guess what?"
"Um...you're swimming?"
Gretchen, ever the tease, just held her left hand up next to her face and shook her head.
"You're. . ." her eyes grew large and a smile spread across her face when she saw the ring, "ENGAGED!!"
Gretchen nodded and the two of them began engaging in girl talk at the side of the pool.
Jake came over to me, subdued as I was beginning to realize was his new 'neutral'. "You?" he asked, gesturing with his head toward Gretchen.
"Yep."
"Congratulations," he said with a little half smile.
"Thanks," I said with a big one.
"So, the hair?"
"Yeah, pink."
"Sorry."
"Don't be. Like it."
"Um. . .this?"
"Guy time."
"Got it."
So, for those of you who don't speak adolescent male, let me translate:
Jake: So, you finally proposed to Gretchen, huh
Me: Yes. I figured it was the right time, and even if I'm a little young we can work things out.
Jake: Well, Congratulations, Man. You two make a perfect couple.
Me: Thanks. I really appreciate that
Jake: Changing the subject because I'm uncomfortable expressing my feelings, you actually went and altered your hair style?
Me: Yeah, as you noticed, it's pink just like Desdemona's.
Jake: Sorry you're inflicted with such girly hair.
Me: Don't worry about it. I kind of like it and it is so much easier than the wig I had before.
Jake: You don't mind that we're not delving into our emotions and only talking in short monosyllables and grunts?
Me: That's what guy time is for and the reason I will be a guy for many years to come.
Jake: I understand you completely and agree with you there. I love being a guy too.
We spend the rest of the afternoon in or around the pool. About twenty minutes after Jake and Susanne arrived, Rachel appeared out of nowhere, handed me a bottle of SPF 90 sunscreen, and then disappeared again.
I'm beginning to think she's part ninja or something. She is definitely good at her job, I think.
So, warmed and funned out, we got ready to go to my Mom's fourth of July concert on the fifth. Yeah, that's what they were calling it.
It was pretty standard fare as far as music goes. Some Sousa. Okay, a lot of Sousa. You know the ones, as they're always played and sung around the fourth of July.
And then the day was over.
Dr. Allen would be talking to Jake in the morning the next day, and I had no plans whatsoever for the next week. . .
That is until I realized I had a dual audition with Juilliard in one week.
I looked up the requirements for composition, and realized I had my work cut out for me. I had composed for multiple instruments before, but this? This would be really difficult.
Ok, so I started with voice, because if I was going to do it, I wanted to be able to sing it later.
Nothing would come to me. I would have moments when I couldn't get words out of my head, and now I couldn't even put two words together.
After ruining an entire legal pad with doggerel, I got out my sheet music, and began stringing notes together.
I could almost hear the music as I put it to paper. Piano, 12-String, Bass, Percussion. . .I worked my way through a small orchestra. 2 violins and a viola. Oboe. I could hear the sounds I wanted. I knew where they would come in and where they would leave. Alto and Tenor sax. Clarinet. Bamboo flute.
I had so much there, and I needed to hear it, not just imagine it.
I looked at the time and realized my Mom wouldn't be home for another hour or so, so I snuck in to my old house, and snagged one of the favorite computer programs I'd ever found. It was a little program called Noteworthy.
Primarily it is a program for writing, and printing, sheet music. It also included a midi converter, though.
Now, if you've never heard midi music, then you're not missing much. However, it would give me an idea of what it sounded like and I would be able to adjust the notes a lot more easily.
By the time I was done, I had fourteen instruments plus a voice line with no words. Total run time was just under fourteen minutes.
Now, this wasn't a single day's undertaking, let me tell you. I worked from the time I realized I needed to prepare on Tuesday morning, all the way until late Thursday night.
But it was perfect, or as perfect as I could make it.
It wasn't a complete symphony, but at least it was mine, and it was done.
I printed off the tabs for the songs I would need to practice for my guitar audition and went to bed.
I'm pretty sure that Gretchen was feeling neglected, because on Friday morning, when I started practicing, she came out and just hugged me from behind.
"Hey, babe."
"How much longer you going to be?"
"Well, I have my songs to work on for my audition on Tuesday with Juilliard. What did you have in mind?"
"You in mind."
She gently removed my guitar from my hands and placed it on the stand. Then she climbed into my lap. It started oh so slow, and we never removed any of our clothing, but it made her happy. No, there was no petting involved.
She just wanted to know I still considered her the center of my universe. When she was sure of that, she left me to my practicing.
She had a contented smile as she left me to my work. I think she'd noticed the state of my jeans since she had been sitting on them.
I did some breathing exercises and got back to my practicing.
Saturday was more of the same, without the interlude with Gretchen
I never listened to the American Top 40. It wasn't my scene, but that didn't stop me from tuning in this morning. It was the first full week since my single was recorded and distributed, and I wanted to hear how well it did.
I have to admit that I actually liked some of the songs that were there. Not all of them mind you, but enough that it wasn't torture.
I figured that I would be lucky to beat the thirty spot, so when that one came and went. I was seriously thinking about just turning it off at that point.
Stubbornness kept me listening though, and I finally heard my song not much later.
"With her first single, at number twenty-five, I give you Desdemona and 'Daddy's Little Princess'."
It was the full length version of the song, for which I was grateful. After the song finished I turned off the radio.
It had been a long road to this point. There was so much more in store for me, but the difficulties I'd overcome made it all worth it.
Now, if only I could pass one or both of my auditions with Juilliard.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
After my almost gate rape the last time I went through the airport, I decided that today I wasn't taking any chances. Besides that, I wanted to be Keith. So, I put on my brunette wig, wore my more or less androgynous clothing, and left my purse behind.
That doesn't mean that I didn't keep both IDs in my wallet.
You know, after the weeks I'd been going out exclusively as Desdemona, I felt naked leaving the house without a purse. I really needed to buy myself a car.
Gretchen had allowed me to take her baby to the airport. She didn't want to have to get up at four in the morning to drive me, so she just told me to go ahead and take it. So, in the lessening gloom I drove Rachel and myself to the airport for my flight out to New York.
Even if it had been two weeks since I was there, it really felt like I had just come from there.
For some reason, my thoughts felt so much more shattered than normal. It might have been the fact that I was Keith running around with Rachel, or the fact that I'd been almost running myself ragged the last half of the previous week.
I was so ready to get this over with.
Now that I was on my way to the audition, I finally had a moment to actually think about it, and I wondered if this was something I wanted. Gretchen and I were getting married this fall. She was already accepted at BYU, and I was planning on living in New York. How was that going to work?
I can't believe I never thought about this at the time. What was wrong with me? Well, beyond being a teenager.
I began laughing a bit at that. Rachel looked at me inquiringly, but I just shook my head.
She shrugged her shoulders and went back to what she'd been working on. I think it was a sudoku book.
Driving the roads in Utah is one of the most boring tasks I know of. Long straight highways interspersed with complex interchanges for a little bit of variety. So, it leaves you a lot of time to talk, or think, with nothing to really interrupt.
Or a lot of time to do a lot of nothing.
We got to the airport and got through security without much fuss this time. First class this time, since I'd purchased the tickets, so I got a couple of hours sleep in the lounge while our plane arrived, the passengers disembarked and it was being cleaned.
We got in our seats and I went back to sleep.
I knew it was a dream the entire time, but that almost made it worse.
I was driving home from the airport when I got a call. "Hello, Desdemona. I missed you so much when they took me to jail that I just needed to get out and come to you. How could you not be home when I came here."
"What are you talking about, Gretchen?"
"Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot," the voice slowly changed into that of Lady Anne.
"I was talking to Gretchen in her own voice, figuring it would prolong it all a little."
"You'd better not have hurt her, you freak."
"It wasn't painful, for one of us."
I was rushing through the door of our home, and there was blood everywhere. I rushed to our bedroom and I smelled the stench before I saw the broken body. I turned away, not able to look, but so wanting to do nothing but.
"Gretchen!"
I collapsed to my knees on the floor. I was broken. I couldn't do anything. I didn't even resist when Lady Anne pulled me to my feet and dragged me to the bathroom.
"So, Desdemona, where will we start. . . "
The plane accelerating for takeoff woke me from the dream and I let loose a shuddering sob. My face was covered in tears, which I futilely wiped away. They just kept coming.
I'm sure it wasn't part of her job description, but as soon as the fasten seatbelts light was extinguished Rachel was out of her seat and she took me in her arms.
"Shh. It was just a dream, Keith."
"I can't protect her. I'm supposed to be the man in this relationship and I can't protect her."
"Keith, do you want to talk about it?"
Hesitatingly at first, and then with growing confidence I related the short dream to her. As I began retelling it, it seemed so silly, but the fear and anguish of losing Gretchen had felt so real to me, even as I knew somewhere in my mind she was safe.
"You survived something that not many adults are prepared for, Keith. You may be legally emancipated, but you're still a teen emotionally. The advice you gave Jake would be a good thing for you when we get back to Utah, Keith. Talk to Dr. Allen."
"I'm strong enough. . ."
"No, you're not. You've already talked to him once about things, why don't you go back?"
"Because. . .I want to be. . .I need."
I took a deep breath and shared something with this relative stranger that I couldn't share with anyone else in my life.
"I'm losing myself, Rachel. I used to be this self-contained person. I was the one who people went to for solutions. What am I now? Some weak girly boy who has to hide behind a mask in order to be popular?"
"Keith?"
"No, it's about what I feel. I feel like I'm betraying myself when I get on stage, Ok? I want to quit, even though I love my fans. I want to run and hide my face from everyone because I'm too weak to do this.
"Dressing up. . .I enjoy it. That makes me weak too. I try to show everyone how okay I am with it. I want Gretchen to know I'm okay with it. But I'm not okay. I've never been okay. I'm a weak scared little boy who hates himself.
"I don't deserve what I've gotten. No one who is willing to lie as much as I have deserves it. I'm afraid that one morning everyone is going to wake up and all they're going to think is, who was Desdemona anyway, really?
"I can't keep doing this. I don't deserve this. I am filthy and unclean. I'm not fit for society, and society should leave me alone."
I kept rambling like this, but the sobs were more than the words. Rachel just held me as I cried and could not get a hold on myself. When I was cried out, I simply lay there whispering these foul things to myself over and over again.
Finally, Rachel set me down and slapped me.
"What was that for?"
"You've had your moment. Now, stop wallowing. You've got a lot of people rooting for you. I saw your family during your birthday. You have the love of a pretty young woman, and you have a lot of friends that rely upon your strength. Sure, it's tough on you, but guess what? Life is tough. There was a movie that I watched as a kid that had the perfect line for times like this:
"Life IS pain, princess. Anyone who says differently is selling something."
I couldn't help it. I chuckled a bit at this.
"Now, go to the lavatory and clean yourself up a bit."
I washed my face in the lukewarm water and really looked at myself in the mirror. It was till me starting back. No makeup today. Just puffy eyes. I smiled at the mirror and my reflection smiled back at me.
After a couple of minutes I went and sat back down, but it seemed that Rachel wasn't through with me yet.
"Keith, when you get back home, get some help. You are too talented to let something like this destroy you. And if you have to let the world know that you are the one behind the music and mystique that is Desdemona, then do it."
"I'll think about it, Rachel."
I still wasn't ok, but I might be able to get there from where I was.
The rest of the flight, thankfully, was uneventful. We drove from the airport to Juilliard and I went inside to have my fate determined.
In the audition room, there were a couple of what I could only assume were judges, a guitar, acoustic of course, and a stool for me to sit on.
"Keith Robison? You can begin whenever you're ready."
I took a moment to make sure the guitar, a 6-String, was tuned properly, and then I began to play. Flawless, it wasn't. I picked out every moment where I had a hesitation, a missed fret, or a sour note.
Well, that was just the first song. Toward the end of the song I loosened up, and the other pieces I'd prepared went a lot more smoothly. I even started to get into it and add the little flourishes that I enjoyed so much when I was on stage. Nothing out of character for the piece, but I made it mine, as opposed to playing from a script.
One of the two judges was smiling when I finished.
"Thank you, Mr. Robison. We'll be in touch."
"Thank you for this opportunity."
I retrieved my sheet music from the floor where I'd set it down, and the second judge spoke, "Were you reading from that while playing? I noticed you glancing down at it a couple of times. . ."
"Oh, sorry, I know I shouldn't have had it with me, but they want me down the hall next. My manager thought it would be a good idea to keep my options open. Here, take a look, if you'd like."
"Well, it's definitely not the music you were playing. Mind if I walk you to the other room?"
"Not at all."
As we left the room, the second judge was still looking at my sheet music. "So, I take it this is an unpublished piece, and it was composed by you?"
"Yes, I prepared it last week. Quite a bit different from what I usually write."
"How so?"
"Usually I'm writing for four parts, not the twenty-six I have here."
"String quartet?" the judge said with a knowing smirk.
"Rock band actually."
"Oh?" he seemed a little inscrutable at that point, "anything I'd know?"
"'Daddy's Little Princess' is on the radio a lot right now."
"Wait, you wrote that?"
"Yes. I wrote that in a single morning, refined it during recording."
"Ok, so now I'm more than impressed. How long did you spend working on this?"
"Three days, but I don't know if that's impressive or not. The voice line has no words, since I simply couldn't think of any that fit. Am considering replacing it with a flute, but I haven't decided yet."
"You don't feel this is a finished work?"
"No, but I feel it is complete. Everything else is interpretation."
"Why the sudden shift in percussion here?"
"Well, I needed the audience to hear the sudden shift in the wakefulness of the dreamer."
"Dreamer?"
"Oh, crap. One minute. Do you have a pen?"
"Sure."
I took the sheet music and the pen and I quickly scrawled the name of the piece across the top of the first page. "Solitary Dreamer".
"I know, pretentious, but it's what I was thinking about when I wrote this."
We entered the room, and there was only one judge this time. Well so it seemed until the person who'd been walking with me sat in the second seat.
"That was a bit sneaky, wasn't it?"
"Sometimes it is necessary."
"So, you two have a good talk, Dr. Jacobs?"
"Yes, and apparently one of our young hopeful's works is playing on the radio."
"Oh?"
"'Daddy's Little Princess.'"
"Really? Mind if I ask you to sing it, Mr. Orbison? The bass line if you please." The second judge was pretty in a disciplinarian sort of way.
"That could be a bit of a problem, Ma'am."
She smirked a bit at my discomfort.
"Because I am a countertenor, ma'am."
"Really?"
I sang the first section of Daddy's Little Girl.
Dr. Jacobs was a bit shocked, but the woman smiled. "Exactly as I thought. You are the person who sang that on the radio, aren't you."
"Yes, ma'am."
"Then why come here pretending to be a boy?"
I started laughing. I couldn't help it. As I laughed I tossed my driver's license to her.
"Notice the M and not the F. There is a reason, however, why I take on a female persona on stage. No one would actually believe I was a guy."
Dr. Jacobs shook his head slightly, and then picked up the sheet music to try to dissuade his colleague from further side tracks.
"So, Keith," he emphasized the name, "why don't you sing this passage here for us?"
He gestured to one of the more challenging sections for the oboe. It was toward the end of the piece following a short nightmare segment I'd envisioned in part of it. It was a calming period for most of the instruments, but I still had the oboe racing as well, as a pounding percussion. Heart and mind still coming to grips with the reality that they'd simply been asleep.
I sang the segment clear through to the end, even without looking at the music.
They had me sing a couple of other sections, and then asked me to explain my use of percussion in a couple of sections.
It took almost two hours for me to get through that audition, but I felt a lot better about it, overall, than I did about my guitar audition. It felt technically perfect at least.
"Thank you, Mr. Robison. We'll contact you with our decision."
I smiled, retrieved my ID, and headed out to a waiting Rachel.
"How do you keep fading into the background?"
"Practice. That and the fact that you get so engrossed when talking about music that the entire world around you disappears."
"I'm not that bad, am I?"
"Gretchen and I had some long discussions about it last week."
I snorted at this.
"Keith!"
"Sam?"
"Hey, I heard through the grapevine that you had an audition today."
"Yeah, just got done."
"Weren't going to slip out without saying hello, were you?"
"Well, I do have another six hours until my flight back home."
"Utah, right?"
"Yep."
"Well, come join me for lunch. The others will likely be happy to hear how your audition went."
I looked over at Rachel who nodded.
"I so totally didn't notice you there, and I try not to miss the pretty ones. I'm Sam."
Rachel smiled at him, "I caught that. Rachel. I'm a friend of Keith's."
"You're not his girlfriend, are you?"
"No, his fiancée has me keeping an eye on him."
"Dude, you're engaged? Congratulations! Um, aren't you a bit young?"
"Sure, but isn't that what it means to be a teenager? To be too young for pretty much everything you really want to do?"
Sam laughed at this and we headed off in search of his brother and friends.
We found them in the cafeteria.
"So, you found our wayward disciple, huh, Sam?"
"Last I checked, I wasn't anyone's wayward anything."
"So glad to officially meet you, Keith," Hanna said.
"That goes for me as well," Blake said, "who ran your audition?"
"Only person I am sure of is Dr. Jacobs. In the guitar audition there was a guy in horn rimmed glasses with a bad comb-over, and in my composition audition there was a librarian looking woman with a bun that seemed tight enough to hold her brains in."
"That was Dr. Inez in the guitar audition," said Blake.
"And that might have been Dr. Hunter?" Hannah said looking at Mark.
"Yeah, that sounds like Dr. Hunter to me."
Sam looked over at me after their confirmations, "How do you think it went?"
"Well, I made some technical mistakes on the guitar. I only started practicing on Friday morning."
"Why did you put it off so long?" Blake asked.
"Well, I had my birthday and getting a image consultant, court, practicing for the Stadium of Fire, performing in the Stadium of Fire. . .well that was the week before last. Then last week I composed a song and practiced my music. I finished composing late Thursday so that's why I didn't practice 'til Friday."
"Oh, the trials and tribulations of the rock star, right bro?" Mark said.
"Yeah, I mean it's not like you can fly to New York first class on a moment's notice."
I blushed a deep red.
"Oh my god, you did fly out here first class."
"Wow, how much money do you have?"
"I don't know? I don't use that much of it, and I'm still selling albums on iTunes as well as individual songs. I asked Richard to deal with it."
"Well, why not call him and find out?"
I chuckled at this, and gave Richard a call.
"Hey, Desi, I'm glad that you called. We've been asked to play the Utah State Fair in September, since we're a local band. I'm still working out dates for your tour. iTunes wants to renegotiate our rate with the distribution company. We have a small concert in Denver. Apparently the Hole in the Wall wants us to actually play there so that they earn something out of the use of their stamp. That will be later in the week. Just wanted to give you a heads up."
"Wow, talk about the fire hose. Glad to hear what's going on. So, I wanted to check on how my finances are going."
"Well, I've been keeping a constant $10,000 in your checking account for use with your Desdemona band card. I have an additional $10,000 in your Keith account. I know we didn't discuss that, but I figured you'd appreciate it."
"Yes, I do."
"At your current rate of spending in both accounts, you have enough in your high yield savings to live for about sixty years."
"You dork. I have only spent. . .oh wait. I spent $5400 this month on engagement rings." I blushed at this.
"So, for the two months I have tracking data for, yes, that is about $3400 per month, or. . ."
"Ok, wow. Really? I have that much currently? That means. . .three hundred years of spending not including the rings. . .or. . .how many albums have we sold?"
"On iTunes alone we've sold 478,125."
"Are they paying us on the per song rate?" I asked.
"You mean 57%?"
"Yeah. . ."
"We take a 50% hit in our normal profit for the album, which I was only able to negotiate because we already had a presence on iTunes, or I should say our second iTunes album. $9.99 list price per album.
"We are still selling copies of our original iTunes album, which is listed at $5 even. We get the full 57% for that one. We've sold more copies of that one. We're up to 801,002 copies of that album sold."
The blood drained from my face. I suddenly realized how much money I was making. The large numbers started really making sense, and it scared me witless. Assume 500,000, and for the moment round down to $5 per album in profit.
Simple math. Just from the first album, Up in Flames was grossing $1,250,000. Now, this was by far better than the $0.02 per physical CD that Spotlight produced, and I didn't much care about the numbers of those. Really, it was chump change.
The original album, at an assumed $2 in profit got another $1,600,000 gross for Up in Flames. This didn't include singles sales at $0.57 cents in profit each. This didn't include the video at $2.85 in profit per download.
"Desi, you there?"
"I'm here, Richard. Um, so, I'm really a millionaire after we figure your cut, and the bands cut?"
"Multi, yes. And we haven't received our payment for Stadium of Fire yet. Contractual issues there, but I expect somewhere between fifty and a hundred for that."
"You mean thousand?"
"Of course. And we're finalizing negotiations with MTV for the footage of your impromptu concert of 'Bodies'. Apparently they paid royalties for that to Drowning Pool. Drowning Pool has already paid us the royalties, we're just negotiating for proper credit now."
"Wait, that's so much more than what you were saying about my high yield account."
"Oh, there's about a million in your college fund now. I'm not putting any more in there."
"Kisses, Richard. I'm about to die of shock."
"Later, Desi."
Everyone was looking at me with wide eyes. I tried a weak smile.
"Dude, really?" Sam asked. He was the first to find his voice.
"Yes, really. I'm. . .shocked to say the least. I knew I had $10,000 in Desdemona's account, but I have that in my account as Keith as well. I'm. . ."
"Yeah, you're filthy, stinking. . ." Mark began.
"Loaded." Hannah continued.
"My new best friend," Blake concluded to general laughter.
"More seriously, I'm trying to be a little circumspect with this. I can maintain my current lifestyle for sixty years right now if I neither earn any more money, nor increase spending."
"Well, I doubt either of those will remain the same."
"You'd actually be surprised, Blake. I'm a pretty frugal guy."
"Remember what I said about being my new best friend? I only allow rich people who put out for that role."
We all laughed again.
"So, Keith. Want to go catch a Broadway show at the last minute?"
"As tempting as that sounds, I'd actually be more interested in looking for an apartment I could either buy or rent."
Hannah giggled a bit at this. "Normally I'd tell someone that it would be hard to do in New York proper, but with the amount of leverage you have, and by leverage I mean money, you don't have that problem."
This was truly strange for me. Not that I had so much money, but that I realized that none of the money meant anything to me. After the initial shock, I realized it was all a simple matter of scale. I had more than I needed before I sang for the first time. I had more than I needed.
And this was just, more.
Sure, it was cool having this MUCH more, but it was simply more.
I needed to figure out something worthwhile to do with my money, and that would require some thought. Especially since I was covered until I was 77 right now.
"Earth to Keith."
"Sorry, guys. I got lost in my thoughts."
I had a pleasant afternoon, and Rachel even joined in after a little while. I think she was beginning to get a bit of a crush on Mark, but figured it wasn't my place to interfere.
Course, if the looks he was throwing her way were any indication, then he was more than a little infatuated himself.
Another airport, and another flight in first class.
Before I knew it, I was pulling into the driveway. Everything was perfect for me.
"Keith! I'm so glad you're home. No one can find Jake. No note or anything." Gretchen was in tears and Susanne was right behind her.
"It's all my fault. We were talking about my sister, and I was sitting close to him and he went in for a kiss, and I denied him and he ran out and. . ."
"Sooz, you did the right thing. If you don't think he's ready, or you're not ready, don't allow him to force you into it. Has he been talking to Dr. Allen?"
"He keeps breaking his appointments."
"Oh crap."
I took a couple of deep breaths and simply relaxed. Where could he be? Where would he have gone?
"I assume you've checked his house?"
"He hasn't been home since he was with me."
"Gretchen, would you go wait at his house?" At her nod I turned to Susanne, "let's go look for him."
I began to walk toward the desert behind my house. The sun was already beyond the horizon and it was beginning to get dark. It would be hours yet before it was really completely dark, but the desert is like that. Nothing to obstruct your view of the sky.
We walked in silence for a while before Susanne began to talk.
"Keith, am I doing something wrong with Jake?"
"I see you think you are."
She took a deep breath and nodded, "yes, I think I'm hurting him by staying with him. He's such a special person, and I'm. . ."
"You're special as well. You work tech."
"I'm in the background, Keith. That's where I've always been happy. Out of the spotlight, but with you and Jake, I feel like it keeps finding me."
"And you don't like the attention."
"No, I hate the attention. I hate people seeing me. I worry about it as well."
"Because you're afraid of what they'll see," I stated.
"I'm not a very good person. I'm petty and I'm conniving. I convinced Buffy to come out so that people would focus more on her than on me. So that I would become more invisible. I wanted her so big in the public mind that no one ever thought of me at all."
"Really? You don't love your sister at all?"
"Oh, I don't know. I guess I like her more as my sister. I loved to spend time with her when we were kids. She was so alive. I felt more alive with her than I did any time I was alone."
"Don't you want that again?"
"Of course. I want to feel alive, but it is so much more comfortable in the shadows. I like being missed, but having all of my actions seen by everyone. Attributed to other people. I don't know if I can handle this. . .this fame. I don't want fifteen seconds let alone fifteen minutes."
"That's a misunderstanding of the initial quote anyway."
"Huh?"
"Never mind. So, how do you feel with Buffy in pain?"
"Pain? She's happier than she's ever been. Her light fills the room and blinds me."
"Sooz. . ."
"No, it's true. She is a better person than I am. I wanted nothing more than to have Jake be with me, and I ignored everything that could interrupt that. I ignored your warnings. I ignored my own conscience.
"I had sex with him last night, Keith. And today, I went back on my own decision and pushed him away from a kiss. I was gross feeling and sore and I felt so guilty for what I was doing to him. I was telling him that as long as we were behind closed doors, it was fine for us to be together, but in public. . ."
"Suzi. . ."
"I screwed up, Keith. I needed to have him so badly that I ignored everything that everyone else was saying to me. I thought it would make everything better between us, but it only made everything worse."
"Sooz, sex isn't a therapy tool."
"Don't you think I know that. . .now?"
"You should have known it before. All sex does, when used without love or respect or compassion, is make your relationship worse. Both of you know you're using the other person, and feel used in return. Sure, for a one night stand that might work, but with someone you deal with on a regular basis?"
"Sure, leave it for a guy to say something like that. Men have casual sex all the time."
"Technically, I'm a virgin, Susanne."
"But I thought. . .you and Gretchen. . ."
"We've never gone all the way, I guess you could say. No orgasms. No ejaculation or petting or manual manipulation."
"You two have this comfortable vibe about you. It's as if neither of you has any secrets with the other. It's only ever married couples that I see this with, well and the occasional long term couple living together. I thought it was holding nothing back, including your body, from the other person that brought that closeness."
"That sort of my point. This sort of relationship takes work, and a willingness to be hurt to achieve. It takes being absolutely vulnerable. Making love can speed that up, but sex can't."
"I thought sex and making love were the same thing."
"If they are, then how does an actress make love to the camera, or a singer make love with her audience?"
"Figures of speech?"
"It is about opening yourself. Showing the entirety of your person to someone else, and not holding anything back. It is knowing someone else can hurt you more than anyone else in the world, and accepting that. It is the other person knowing that you are open and accepting responsibility for your well being.
"It is communication. It is love at its most raw and refined, its core essence."
Susanne was breathing a little heavily. Apparently I was being a little passionate with my words. "Damn, but you have a way with words. I've never felt this release, even when. . .well Jake knows a lot of how to bring pleasure."
"Most of that is you, Susanne. You were thinking about your real relationship with Jake. I can see the two of you. I know how you both feel. He just needs time. And so do you. You're fifteen, girl. You're too young for all of this."
"I know, it's just. . .I want so much to comfort him."
"Well, like I said. Without a strong relationship, sex becomes nothing more than a physical need you're filling. It will destroy a relationship that is just taking root."
"Have I ruined everything?"
"Well, that's for you and Jake to determine."
"I feel so. . .ashamed."
"That's something for you to do some soul. . .you've got to be kidding me."
I knew the place where we were. It was the same bowl depression, and the same crumpled form in the center. This time, however, it would not be Buffy barely clinging to life.
I rushed over to the still form, and the deja vu intensified. Jake was covered in blood. He'd slashed through one of his wrists, but had been unable to complete the other one. From the way his left hand was flopping, I think he severed the tendon.
"JAKE!?!" Susanne was screaming and crying, "JAKE, speak to me. You've got to be okay. Keith, do something. No, no, no, no. JAKE! Honey. Don't leave me. Don't abandon me here in this place!
"I love you."
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
"I love you."
I almost didn't hear the words because they were so quiet, and because I was frantically searching for a pulse.
"Come on, Jake. Don't do this to me, man."
There it was, oh so faint.
"Sooz, I need you to focus. Put your hands here. I need you to apply pressure. I need to make a call to 911. Can you do this for Jake? Sooz?"
She nodded numbly and then put her hands over his wrist. He was so pale. I had to turn off the flashlight app as I ran over the rise to make the call.
Every second that passed seemed to bring Jake closer and closer to death.
"Pick up. Come on. I need an operator, and I understand that they're busy."
"911, what's the nature of your emergency."
"I am in the middle of the desert, my friend tried to commit suicide. Someone is with him, but I can't get close due to a cell dead zone. He has a pulse, and he still seems to be breathing, but he's lost a lot of blood."
"We'll have someone out there as quickly as we can. Would you stay on the line please until help arrives?"
"Yes, but the girl I left with my friend is in a bit of shock. It was her boyfriend we found."
"Is she okay to be alone with him? The helicopter is ten minutes out."
"Crap, this is not good. Look, I need to get back to them, and I will lose you. I don't trust her being there alone for that long."
"I understand sir, but right now I'm worried about you going into shock."
"This isn't my first time at the rodeo, ma'am. Or even second. What can I say to convince you I need to go without being rude."
"If you could leave your phone here, where we can still get a fix on it, it will speed up the process of getting to your friend."
"Ok, got it."
I set my phone down and ran over the rise to where Susanne and Jake were. As I'd feared, Susanne had collapsed next to the still form of Jake. I had barely enough light to see their forms from the moon and stars, but I sorely wished I still had my phone so I could shed some light.
I had nothing to raise her feet or cushion her head. I placed her feet on Jake's leg, and made sure there were no rocks or roots under her head. I checked Jake's pulse and breathing and they were weaker than before.
"Come on, Jake, stay with me. Suzi needs you, man. She's actually in love with you, you idiot. Why'd you have to do something as idiotic as this?"
I just kept chanting over and over to him. I couldn't get the bleeding to stop, so I applied a tourniquet. Better no hand than no Jake. I tightened it until the blood stopped.
And then it was sitting there in the growing darkness with two unconscious friends.
Something occurred to me and I ran back to the phone.
"Hello, you still there?"
"Yes, I am. Welcome back, sir."
"I applied a tourniquet below the elbow on my friend's left arm to stop the bleeding. The hand is flopping around quite a bit and I'm afraid that he might have cut the tendon."
"Was the cut across the wrist or along it?"
"Across."
"Well, thank goodness for small miracles. Hopefully that choice has helped to keep enough blood in his system."
"My other fried has passed out, possibly due to shock. I elevated her feet, but there's not much else I can do."
"Ok, the helicopter is maybe two minutes out. They've got a bit of a higher altitude tailwind so are a bit ahead of schedule."
I knew what she was not saying, however. That meant a headwind trying to get Jake to the hospital.
"Crap."
She didn't need to ask me what I meant.
The long shot was becoming longer still. Why couldn't I have gotten here sooner?
The dispatcher chatted with me, but I was looking for the approaching running lights to signify the rescue team was close. I heard it before I saw it, and that helped me zero in.
"They're here. I need to go where my friends are."
I walked quickly through the blinding sand. The spotlight from the helicopter followed me, and then they landed nearby when I reached the forms of Susanne and Jake.
One of the EMT's rushed over to Jake while the other got my attention and gestured toward Susanne.
"We heard that she might be in shock?"
"This is her boyfriend. He ran off earlier this evening and we were out to look for him. He confessed to me about a week ago he was going to commit suicide. I suggested he talk to someone. I thought he had talked to someone. He had an appointment with a therapist any way."
"I think we've got it, Keith."
It was the same pair who'd come for Buffy. I guess that was to be expected.
"Ok. We need to stop meeting all the way out here."
"That we do. Like the new hairstyle, by the way."
I smiled at the comment. "You taking them both, or do I need to wait for Suzi to wake up?"
"Well, she seems alright, but we might as well take her with us to make sure."
"Ok. Need me along, or can I head out to start letting people know what's up?"
"Looks like my partner is almost done, you take off, as there won't really be enough room as it is."
I waved as the two of them got Jake and a still unconscious Susanne onto the helicopter and took off.
As soon as I was back in cell coverage I began calling people. "Hello? Jake is on his way to the hospital. . .yes, he tried to kill himself. I hope we found him in time."
"Hello? Buffy? Yeah, you are sounding better. Suzi is on the way to the hospital. What? No, she should be ok. She fainted. Jake tried to kill himself. Yeah, I hope he's okay as well. Ok. Thanks."
I walked out of the desert, praying to my God for their safety, hoping for some change in my life. It seemed to be one crisis after another. I really didn't know how much more of being the adult I could handle.
I broke down completely when I saw Gretchen's house, and I stumbled the last steps, barely registering what was going on around me. I sat down on one of the chairs by the pool and just wept. I couldn't handle this anymore. I wanted to retreat from the world.
I cried to God in my anguish, asking him why he had created a people so weak and imperfect. I railed against a God who would allow the pain I had seen so much of recently.
After I calmed a bit, I realized my own error, and apologized for my pride.
People were allowed the right to choose. If God were to impinge upon that right, in any way, it would destroy Him as a perfect being.
I knew this logically, but at that moment it was emotionally that I wanted to know it, and emotion doesn't bow down to logical argument.
I felt arms encircle me, and by scent I knew it was Gretchen. I let her hold me. When I was ready I pulled her around beside me and just sat there next to her looking up at the stars. I hadn't done that enough recently.
It was the canvas of the night. . .
"Gretchen, I need some paper."
"Hmm? Oh, sorry, I was a bit asleep there."
I went inside with her, already pacing with the words that needed to get out.
I started with the music. It would borrow heavily from Mozart this time, but I wouldn't be the first rock musician to do borrow from the classics.
In fact, the title I was thinking of would be an homage to the originating song. I felt oh so very Trans-Siberian Orchestra. . .at least until I got to the words. Then the music diverged, keeping some of the same chord progression, but following the soul of the song.
The words flowed as easily as the music. I got done and realized I had a serious piece of fluff, and decided to change the name slightly from what I'd originally thought to cal it.
The words were wistful, melancholy. A dream for a better tomorrow. It talked about the future dreams of the 50s unrealized even today. It was more specifically the story of a girl out of time. Lost in the stream of life and not quite connected to anyone else.
There was a sort of lurking darkness in the music that was never realized in the words. As I played through it on my 12-String, I could feel the sense of impending doom. As if I knew something the girl didn't. It made me want to reach out to her. To stop her. But the girl was me, and I was singing. Trapped on my way to a doom of my own creation, blithely, happily, skipping. Looking more over my shoulder than in front of me.
"Something about that song gives me the chills."
"I know. Cool isn't it."
Gretchen nodded at me with a huge smile.
"Have a name for it?"
"Eine Kleine Popmusik."
"The bass harmony on that is really chilling. It is like something submerged under the water and you just want to yell at the singer to look below her."
"That is so close to what I was thinking myself."
"It is so. . .sweet that it makes my teeth hurt." she said with a huge smile.
"I know. That is why I went with pop instead of rock."
"Good choice. So, just wanted to let you know, it is early in the morning, and you probably want to get some sleep before the rest of your day."
I looked at the clock on my cell. It was almost two in the morning.
"Crap."
"Yep."
I walked inside with Gretchen, and we lay down on my bed. We talked about the new song, and about our planned life together. We even began talking about where our lives were going after we got married. I could tell that something was bothering her about it.
"Gretchen? Something bothering you?"
"No, it's nothing."
"What is it. Something worrying you about the wedding?"
"No. . ."
"There's something."
"Well, what if I don't compare?"
"To what?"
"Well, Emily said that. . ."
"Wait, what? You think that I would. . .with Emily. . .and not with you?"
Gretchen nodded, there were some tears in her eyes.
"And that's part of why you've been so insistent?"
She nodded silently and started to cry.
"Etch? Look at me please. I want you to see my eyes. I've never had sex with anyone."
"But. . ."
"I told Emily that there was no way in hell I would ever go out with her."
"Why did you do that?"
"Well, we went on a date. It was pretty okay. We went to my house and you'd just broken up with the last jerk, and you needed some comfort."
"Oh. . ."
"Yeah, you know, the night I sat with you until dawn because you wouldn't let me leave? Well, the next morning at school, Emily told me that if I wanted to have a relationship with her that I had to cease all ties with you."
Gretchen had grown silent as she listened.
"I told her that I was a packaged deal. I came with my friends, my problems, and my history. I wasn't going to change overnight, and I wasn't going to abandon people I'd known for longer than I'd been going to high school. Implied was longer than I knew Emily."
"Go on."
"She told me that if I wanted her, I would change because she was that good."
"She what?"
"Well, she did this. Exact words as close as I can remember."
I got out of bed, and I struck an Emily pose.
"Look, Keith," I said, "I am the hottest girl in this school." Gretchen began giggling at my impersonation.
"It's not every day that a guy like you gets chosen by a girl like me." I first gestured toward Gretchen and then myself. It was a really girly gesture.
"If you want to open this package," I slid both hands down my sides as I did a slight sideways hip shift, "Then there are a few ground rules. You do want to open this, don't you?" I leaned forward and used my hands to more emphasize than cover an imaginary décolletage.
Gretchen nodded while still giggling at me.
"Then I need you to realize that I am all the woman you need. Friends are great and all, but a girlfriend? Well, that's something special. You do want a girlfriend don't you?"
I gave a little pout and pulled some puppy dog eyes. I even looked a bit over my shoulder at her as if I were getting ready to walk away.
When I began batting my eyelashes Gretchen burst out laughing.
"What did you say to that?"
"I told her that if she had to advertise that aggressively then the product must be subpar or over used, and that I don't betray my friends for used goods."
Gretchen's jaw dropped.
"You didn't."
"I'm sorry to say I did. And she looked just about like you did. . .for long enough to get really pissed off."
"And then?"
"Oh, well, she said that just because she'd given a test drive or two to past boyfriends didn't make her a slut. I said that I wasn't calling her a slut, just sloppy seconds."
"Keith!"
"Sorry, I'd expected a more. . .demure? . .girl when I started dating her. She basically told me that I could jump her bones as long as I said goodbye to my relationship with you. In my book, at that moment, it made her into a prostitute haggling over price."
"Keith!"
"Well, it did."
"You didn't have to tell her that's what she was acting like."
"I tried to apologize at that point, but she was already too pissed. She told me that she'd virtually take what she'd been willing to take physically: My virginity."
"Yeah, a lot of people were shocked that the boy virgin gave it up to Emily."
"I actually liked that name."
"Well, it's good to know. I'm sorry Keith. I really am. I thought I'd lost any possibility with you when that happened. That's the main reason I dated Mr. Football at the beginning of the year."
"Shh. It's okay. Don't worry about it. If you can forgive me for having virtual sex with Emily, I can forgive you for dating the jock-strap."
She nodded and I wrapped my arms around her.
When I woke up the next morning, my arm was asleep, and I really had to use the restroom, but as far as I could tell, Gretchen was still asleep.
I began to try to extract myself without waking her when she started giggling at me.
"Good morning, Lover."
"Morning, Etch, but technically I don't think that applies."
"Sure it does. If Emily can claim she had sex with you, and you never saw her naked or vice versa, then I, who have seen you naked, and a mighty good naked it was, have all the right in the world."
"Okay. . ."
"Besides, we just had sex. . .in my dreams."
"You. . .I'm going to the bathroom."
She laughed at me as I left, but I could tell that a tension which had been in our relationship had released. I hadn't realized it was even there before it was gone.
I called Buffy. "Any word on Suzi or Jake?"
"Suzi is home, but frantic. Jake is still listed in critical condition. He's regained consciousness, briefly, but nothing since then. His vitals seem to be stable, however, so there's hope he will make a full recovery."
"I really want to stop finding my friends almost dead in the desert."
"Well, it would be better than not finding your friends and they become absolutely dead in the desert."
"I know, but I guess I more meant I wish that something in my life could change so that my friends weren't in so much danger, from themselves and otherwise."
"Keith. It's life. It's dangerous and messy and wonderful and scary. It's not supposed to bring us through the other end alive."
"Thank you, Buffy. I need to go."
"Say hi to Gretchen for me."
I passed the message along to Gretchen, who was chatting in the kitchen with Rachel, and headed out to the garage to begin really practicing 'Eine Kleine Popmusik.'
The guys, with their girls this time, showed up around noon.
"Hey guys. Former bassist is in the hospital and may never play again. I wrote a new song we should practice."
"Wait, what?" Guthrie was a bit shocked.
"Yea, you can't just drop this one on us, Keith. I'm not sure we were even aware he was back."
"He got back a week ago, right before I had to really practice for my Juilliard audition. He had planned to commit suicide, and I thought I talked him out of it. He attempted to kill himself last night."
"Wow. That's sucks."
"Yeah, Guthrie, especially since I was the one who found him."
"So sorry to hear that, boss-lady. If you want to cancel. . . "
"What? I need to work right now. Besides, new song. . ."
"Oh, I got so caught up in the first part, I missed the second,"
I handed them their copies of the sheet music I'd printed out.
"Snazzy. Printed and everything."
"Way to go boss-lady."
"I had to snag a program I used to use for sheet music so I could get my audition piece done in time. Figured I could use it instead of my chicken scratch I normally hand out."
"Boss-lady? No offense, but you have the prettiest handwriting I've ever seen from a guy."
"Davey, do you realize how weird that statement sounds?"
"Yes, I do. Doesn't make the sentiment any less true."
We played through the music a couple of times then I began to sing. We were about halfway through when Guthrie stopped playing.
"What's wrong?"
"That is the freakiest damn song I have ever heard, and I thought that 'What You See' was disturbing."
"What, Guthrie, couldn't handle being the monster in the closet?"
"More like the thing from outer space based on the lyrics."
"It's okay, wittow Guthrie. The big bad monster isn't real," I said.
"Thanks. . .Mom."
We all had a laugh at this and got back to practicing. We were taking a water break when I broke the news to them.
"We have a gig at a little bar in Denver."
"When?"
"Later this week. Think we can have 'Eine Kleine. . . ' done by then?"
"Boss-lady, 'Eine Kleine. . .' is done now. Truly scary song in my opinion. Not because of the words it uses, but because of the tools it uses. It treats it like a movie. Without the proper musical tone, a scene means nothing to you. With the proper tone?"
"Yeah. The words aren't scary at all. It's the undertone that gets to you," Guthrie added.
"Ok, then we debut 'Eine Kleine. . .' in Denver." I said.
My phone rang, and Susanne's number was on the caller ID.
"Hello, Keith?"
"What's up, Sooz?"
"Wanted to let you know that you saved Jake last night."
"It was a joint effort."
"He'd been out there for a couple of hours, Keith. Even though he only got the one wrist, it just meant that he was dying more slowly than he could have. They don't know what he used, but he cut himself deeply enough that he nicked the bone. They're afraid that he might never use that hand again."
A sense of loss overcame me, and the other guys went in to give me a moment.
"Thanks for the information, Sooz."
"Thank you again for helping me find him."
Jake, Bobby and I had spent years in Jake's garage. We'd practiced there a lot, hoping that we'd be able to make it to the top someday. Music was a huge part of all of our lives. I felt like I was in one of those cautionary tales. The ones where they try to scare young children out of doing something.
You don't want to be a rock star kiddies because your friends will wind up in jail or attempt suicide. Stalkers will come out of the woodwork to make your life miserable.
Jake had always loved the bass guitar. We would smile and joke about everything, and then push our pain into our music. I could see him on stage with me at Gothpolosion again.
It had been our one and only concert together. Bobby, he'd always been in the background to a certain extent. Always behind the two of us. Jake? He was in the spotlight with me. We were the band, and then Jake quit me.
Logically I understood that. Logically I knew that Guthrie and Davey were much better musicians than Jake or Bobby, and probably even better than I was in most regards.
Logic didn't matter to me right now.
I wanted Jake up there with me. He was my best friend. Well, second best. I would die without Gretchen. Without Jake it just wasn't as much fun as I'd hoped it would be.
Yes, I loved being on stage and the sound of the crowd cheering. I loved being loved.
But it seemed hollow without someone who had worked just as hard as I had to get there. Bobby I could do without. He'd broken not only my trust, but the law as well.
Jake on the other hand?
I felt arms gather me into a hug from behind, and a cheek pressed against my back. I put my hand on hers and felt the ring.
"Does my girlfriend know you're out here?"
"I certainly hope not. It could be awkward for you since I'm your fiancée."
"Well, that's good then. Hey, Etch."
"Hey, Keith. You okay?"
"As okay as can be expected."
"That's not sounding too good. What is it?"
"I never really thought I would be famous, Etch. It was all Jake and Bobby. Jake mostly. He pushed and pulled and dragged us to demo recordings and contests and whatnot. He is the reason that I'm somebody and he'll likely never play again."
I cried silently as Gretchen held me. The pain overwhelmed me. I've heard somewhere that boys shouldn't cry. That it's not manly.
Well, screw manly. Sometimes crying helps. When there is no other way to get the emotion out, then it is perfectly okay for boys to cry.
I cried for a while, and eventually I was well and truly cried out.
"Thank you, Etch."
"For what?" She asked, her face still buried in my now wet back.
"For being you. I love you."
"I love you too, Keith."
"Can you head in and tell the guys I'm done being a girl for the moment and we need some serious practice before our gig."
Gretchen giggled at me and left.
I quickly called Richard.
"Hello, Desi."
"Hey, Richard. When, exactly, is our concert?"
"We've finalized it for Wednesday."
"Tomorrow! I thought you meant 'LATER' later in the week."
"Well, I did. Unfortunately they've had bands booked for Thursday and Friday of this week for the past month or so."
"Anyone I know?"
"Thursday is Meaningless Death Imagery, corporate tools."
No, this wasn't a mental replacement. He'd actually said this one.
"So, I've never thought to look. How good are they really?"
"Well, apparently they're about to lose their contract."
"What? Why?"
"They only sold three hundred thousand copies of their first album."
"Isn't that pretty good for a first album?"
"Sure, but here's the thing. That is only the first half of the equation. They've had people requesting refunds on their concert tickets."
"Can they do that?"
"Normally? No. They like to have all sales of concert tickets final. Thing is, when you have over fifty percent of the people who bought tickets trying to return them. . .it's getting a little ugly."
"Why are they returning tickets though?"
"Well, it's rumored that you're going to be playing every one of the cities where MDI is scheduled to play, except a month later."
I heard the smile in his voice and the barely contained laughter.
"You didn't," I said a little shocked.
"Well. . .yes, I had to. After how you were treated in the press after Gothplosion, I began working on a plot to destroy MDI. I know. It's not anything you would have asked me to do. It's also the reason I started working with the bar to get you out there for real. MDI is trying to use your famous non-appearance there to one up you."
"Famous non-appearance?"
"Have you been to your fan site recently?"
"No. . .been sort of busy being a rock star."
He snorted at this, "Well, most people have decided that the information from Hole in the Wall was an elaborate publicity stunt to get people interested in Desdemona before Gothplosion. The fact that it had that effect doesn't hurt either. You literally came out of nowhere. If it wasn't for Sarah Carerra you'd own the market right now."
"We're not even going for the same audience."
"You weren't going for the same audience. After 'Daddy's Little Girl'? Especially the version on YouTube where you and Carrie Underwood are singing it? You two are sort of head-to-head right now."
"Richard, I don't need this sort of thing."
"Probably not, but it is up to the public to really decide what they want. There are even some stories set to go out when 'Daddy's Little Girl' hits the top of the charts about a grudge between you and Sarah."
"But they won't be true."
"It doesn't matter if they're true or not. It will give both of you publicity and that's usually good. Catfight of the century and all that."
"Richard, if you even think about pursuing this further, I'll out myself."
"You wouldn't."
"Watch me. Also, I've been thinking about something. Not all the time. Just when I have nothing else to worry about. I'm thinking that if no one has clued into the fact that I'm a guy by the time 'When you love somebody' goes to theaters, then I will be letting everyone know. I remember why I originally decided to pretend to be a girl, and it doesn't matter anymore. It hasn't really mattered since we signed with Spotlight and my own fears have kept me back."
"Why wait that long?"
"Because letting people know scares me. It scares me a lot."
"But a lot of people already know."
"That's what scares me."
"There are simply some things I'll never understand about you."
"Mostly, I'm scared for the people I care about when this comes out. What will happen to Gretchen when people start really digging into her life."
"Ok, here's what I think. Let's give it a couple of more weeks. We'll have the tickets for your concert tour go on sale. See how things are going. Then, on the second of August, we hold a press conference and out you to the world. We let everyone know that you, Keith Robison are the same person as Desdemona."
I felt the bottom go out of my stomach, but I knew this was the right thing.
"Make sure that something is printed on the tickets to the effect that exchanges or refunds will be accepted. Even if I have to pay for it out of my own pocket, I don't want my fans to be betrayed by me in any way."
"I'll contact Mr. Praetor and we'll get this hammered out. And hopefully we can get this sorted so you don't have to pay out of pocket for those tickets."
"Thanks, Richard. Kisses."
"Good luck, Keith. You're going to need it."
The boys had come in while I was speaking, and we got back to work practicing our songs. We were about to completely lose track of time.
"You know, we need a love song." Guthrie said out of the blue.
"What?"
"Yeah, we need a love song. Even if it's a Goth one like 'Bring Me to Life'," Guthrie replied.
"That's not a love song."
"Not a traditional one, no, but Guthrie's right about it being a love song."
I thought about the lyrics, and realized they might have a point. I wasn't granting it out of hand, but they might have a point.
"So, we going to sing a duet onstage, Guthrie?" I said as I batted my eyes.
"Hell no. I heard what you were talking to Richard about, and there's no way I'm going to have people thinking I'm gay. . .no offense, Keith."
I chuckled at this.
"I understand your position, Guthrie. I was joking anyway. Look, I've written most of our songs. Don't you guys have anything?"
"You're the composer, boss-lady."
"I don't do words, but. . ."
He handed some tabs to me, and some sheet music to Davey. I looked at the song and he had titled it 'Unconventional Love'.
I picked out the song from the tabs and it sounded so sickly sweet all the way through. Well, my portion of it did. When we added in the drums and bass, I saw where he was going with it.
The guitar, and whatever melody I added, were supposed to be pop. They were girl-next-door. They even seemed to be at a different tempo than the bass and drums.
Those two parts really seemed to be all rock. Much like 'Daddy's Little Princess,' this song began pop and went rock.
That was the only real similarity I could see.
The bass and drums were pounding, rushing, pulling the girl in a direction she didn't want to go. I began a little smile. The title helped me into it.
This wasn't a girl's song at all. This was my song. This would be me. A boy with the voice of a girl. Trying to show the world his love for music in this unconventional way.
The words came to me one after the other. I'd never felt this strongly about any of my music, as I'd always been writing for someone else, even if that someone was Desdemona. This song was Keith.
I adjusted the tempo a bit, and used the girl-next-door guitar harmony as a counterpoint for my I'm-a-guy melody.
When I began to sing the words I was feeling, Guthrie stopped playing and began to write them out.
Without specifying my gender, I sang about how I wasn't accepted by society. I sang about how I struggled for a place amidst stereotypes and labels. I spoke of my girlfriend.
I called her my girlfriend.
As clearly as I could, without saying I was a boy, I let my fans know in that song that I wasn't what I appeared to be. It could be written off as just another song, should people want to do that, but it was so much more than simply that to me.
I bared myself to my audience, and it truly left me naked for everyone to see.
It was after ten o'clock when we finished.
"So, see you guys for the plane flight out tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow?"
"I forgot, sorry. We play Hole in the Wall tomorrow."
"Okay, good to know. Night, boss-lady."
"Night, Keith."
"Night guys."
I read through the words and realized that everyone was going to believe I was a lesbian after this. And unless I really looked, most of my references to being a boy were obscured behind the love story.
Well, time would tell if my fans hated me for this. Time would tell if I had any fans after I released it.
I went upstairs to go to sleep. Gretchen was in my bed again.
"Etch?"
"Keith. I know. I really do. I understand why you are so hesitant to move forward."
"Etch. . .I'm not ready for this."
"I know." She had tears in her eyes.
"Etch? What's wrong?"
"Keith? I am so worried that you don't see me as a woman. I've talked to Dr. Allen about it, but I am so scared. What if. . ."
"Shh. Etch. Stop. I think of you as a woman."
"Really? Have you even looked at me naked since I had my surgery? I mean really looked at me?"
Before I could say anything she threw back the covers and I saw her. To say I was shocked would be an understatement. She climbed out of my bed and walked over to me.
"Am I the woman you've dreamed of?"
I took her into my arms, if only to stop seeing her. I had no idea what to do, so I lead her to the bead and lay down next to her.
"Etch, we can't do this."
"Yes we can. I want you, Keith. I need you."
I couldn't say anything to that. I had no idea anymore what exactly I'd been holding out for, but I was still holding out for it.
"Etch, I love you."
She began to cry, and I just held her.
"Why won't you just have sex with me you idiot?"
"Etch?"
"I ache. I've been so good for you. I just want you to jump me and get it over with. Then we can get to the part where you realize this was all a mistake and leave me like everyone else."
"Gretchen, I don't plan on leaving you."
"That's what they've all said. I begin to get comfortable and bam, they're gone. I know you'll leave me too, I'm okay with it. I at least want to know that you were the one who made me really feel like a woman, though. Can you give that one thing to me?"
"Etch, where is this coming from?"
"I'm not real, Keith," she was sobbing and barely understandable. "I'm just a facade. I'm not a real woman, and I never will be. Someone else will give you children. I can't. You'll love someone else enough to make love to them every moment you're together. You'll have sex with her when she throws herself at you."
"Stop, it, Etch. Please? I'm just not like that."
"You could be. I want you to be."
"Why?"
"I need to feel that I did all of this for a reason."
"Gretchen, I want our first time to be. . ."
"Cut the crap, Keith. There is no such thing as special where sex is concerned. I was five years old my first time and it hurt like hell. There is what feels right, in that moment, and there's nothing else."
"Gretchen, leave my room, please."
"Oh come on. I know you want me."
She reached her hand down and grabbed hold of my erect symbol of manhood.
"GET OUT!"
She was shocked, but so was I. I never knew I had this much rage in me. She fled from my room, almost in tears. I didn't know what to do, but I was so pissed, and afraid of what I could do to her that I locked my door and did nothing. I knew that Gretchen had serious issues where sex was concerned.
I was so far out of my depth and sinking fast.
I spent a fitful night sleeping, or at least trying to sleep. My alarm on my phone told me that the night was wasted and I needed to start getting ready. We would be arriving in Denver at around noon.
As I was beginning to move around, trying to remember what Linda had told me about my look when there was a knock on my door.
"Yes?"
"It's Linda. I hear you have a concert to prepare for."
I opened the door with a smile on my face. "I need you. Get in here."
"What would your fiancée say about that?"
At seeing my change in expression, she looked a little uncomfortable.
"Bad time?"
"I guess. What have you got for me today?"
"Well, I really like the black and pink motif, so I thought. . ."
She hung a garment bag on the back of the door and opened it up for me. Inside there was a black cotton dress with a pink sequined hear just above where my left breast would be, and another on the right hip.
"It seems a little small."
"It's supposed to be a little small."
"Well, give me a moment to get changed."
I slipped it on like a tee shirt, since that's the only way it seemed to work and pulled it into place. It had a tight collar and was sleeveless. It hugged my body in a way I wasn't entirely sure I was comfortable with, and it was short. Very short. Almost, but not quite, short enough that I was afraid I would be showing panty to people closest the stage.
I tugged at it, trying to make it stretch just a bit longer.
It made me feel really vulnerable for some reason.
"Ok, have a look."
Linda came in and looked me over.
"Ok, just get your maroon leggings on and you'll be complete.
I let out a sigh of relief. "I was feeling a bit exposed."
"You thought. . ? Oh, that's rich. That wouldn't really have been Goth-next-door. More Goth-on-the-corner."
I stuck my tongue out at her.
I got myself situated in some almost flats, pink with an inch heel, and put on some makeup. We actually went porcelain doll with the makeup and it didn't look too bad. I paid attention to instructions so I could reapply it before the show, and then removed it and put something a little more normal for traveling.
We drove to the airport in Davey's van. The three of us would be going out alone. We waited in the lounge, like normal, and then found our seats for the flight. My pink hair and shoes caught people's attention, and so I signed a number of autographs. Mostly of people walking past us to get to business class or coach or whatever they offered on this flight.
By 'a number' I mean I hit #102 before the flight attendants got a little fed up over the delay.
"We understand that you're some sort of celebrity, but could you please not block the aisle with your fans?"
"Look. . .Monica? I really am sorry that I'm causing such a big nuisance, would it be better if I waited till we were in the air and signed autographs then? Moved about on my own?"
"Well, we normally don't like. . ."
"What would you suggest, then, Monica? Haven't you ever had someone that you really wanted to see, and then there he or she was? I mean, you're on a lot of flights."
"Well, okay. I can see where you're coming from."
"Then what do you suggest."
"How about we let people who want an autograph come visit you one at a time?"
"That would be great. Thank you so much, Monica."
The rest of the boarding went much more smoothly, and I even told people I'd be able to get them an autograph later when they paused for a moment.
We got everyone aboard, finally, and then they closed the door. We taxied and were on our way.
Just a side note, my favorite part of any flight is when the airplane begins acceleration for takeoff. The entire cabin seems to tilt with the force we are being pushed back into the seats. Looking out the window, it seems like the whole world is tilted a bit.
So, we got into the air, and the captain came over the intercom.
"We are now at our cruising altitude, and will be descending into Denver in a little over an hour. If any of you were not able to get an autograph from the lovely Desdemona, let one of our Flight attendants know and we will get you up to see her one at a time."
As I was signing autographs, I wondered idly if I was setting a record for number of autographs signed while in mid air.
I wondered if there was even a Guinness world record for that at all.
I was avoiding the subject that really bothered me. I had never had a real fight with Gretchen. Sure, we'd squabbled and had psychotic episodes, but we'd never actually had a fight. I finished with, #127A mile high heading toward Mile High City, and looked at my watch.
I still had another twenty minutes.
I picked up the in air courtesy phone, slotted in my credit card, and made a call to Gretchen.
"Hello?"
"Etch, can I apologize?"
There was no answer over the phone, but it still seemed to be connected so I continued.
"This is as touchy a subject for me as it is for you, Etch, and I should have been more careful about how I dealt with it. I know you've had your share of horrible experiences. I know this.
"Look, I can't make any promises, and I would love to be able to. I will at least try to. . .see your side of this when I get home, okay? I would prefer to go out first, but that's up to you. You make the plans and I'll try to be receptive."
"Keith, did you just say that you'll have sex with me if I ask you?"
"I told you I would do my best. I'm preemptively not turning you down. If you want it, I will be there with you. If it's a choice between getting everything I want, and losing you, then I don't lose you. Life without you would be a little less."
"A little less?"
"Less colorful. Less happy. Less enjoyable. Yes, less."
"Oh. Wow. I was really pissed at you last night for rejecting me so completely. And truth be told I'm still mad at you. But. . .I need to think about this, Keith. Okay? When are you getting home?"
"Sometime tonight. Or tomorrow morning actually," I was looking at the return flight information, and it had us getting in to SLC at 1:25 am.
"I should be home by about three-thirty or four o'clock."
"Okay. I'll definitely let you sleep, then. I'll figure out what we're doing tomorrow and get back to you. Chances are you're taking me to the Mikado."
I winced but admitted I probably deserved that. Gretchen and I had a thing for sushi, and the Mikado was rumored to be the best sushi in Utah. It was supposed to have prices to match.
"Whatever you decide, Etch. This is your night from beginning to end."
"I love you, Keith. I really do."
"I love you too, Etch. Kisses."
I hung up the phone and we descended into the airport. By the time we had our rental and were out of the airport on our way to the bar, it was already one-thirty. A combination of a headwind and long lines for car rentals had put us an hour and a half behind schedule.
We arrived at the bar and went inside. Contrary to the images the name conjured, the Hole in the Wall was quite a large place, at least without anyone there. The stage was a foot high riser along the wall furthest from the door. Everything was low ceilings and dark wood until about twenty feet from the stage. It opened up a bit there and the ceiling went up to about fifteen feet off the floor.
"You must be Desdemona. I'm Brice, but a lot of my friends just all me Canyon."
I looked at him a little blankly, and he shrugged, "well, I thought it was funny. So, I need you out here at 6 to do a couple of sets. I hear your instruments should be here shortly? Here's a key to the green room so you can lock them up 'til the show. Good luck. The crowd can be a little rough."
We collected our instruments from the private courier when he arrived, and got them properly tuned. Davey had to leave his drums on the stage.
"Brice. Davey will leave his drums on stage. Can you keep an eye on them."
"Sure thing. Thanks for doing this."
"No problem."
We hung around a city that didn't seem to offer much in the way of tourist attractions, and made our way back to the bar about four o'clock.
I got on my game face, and we were onstage by quarter to five. We did some final tuning, and then promptly at six we started in on 'Bodies'.
We were only halfway through the first verse when things just started going horribly wrong.
"You suck!"
"Get off the stage so a real band can play!"
We pushed through, but when we started playing 'My Life With You is Hell' they began to throw things onstage.
We continued to play, hoping that the bouncer or something would actually step in. We continued, that is, until a beer bottle struck me in the head.
I stopped playing, and Guthrie and Davey came to a ragged stop.
"So, is this what we can expect coming to Denver? A rude welcome, punctuated by insults and thrown bottles?"
"Go back to Utah you little t$%#. You should make babies, since you suck as a musician."
"Well, that's fine with me. You guys fine with never playing in Denver again?" I asked of my band mates. They were pissed and nodded to me.
"Ok, see you in hell, Denver since it's going to freeze over before we come back."
We walked off the stage and right out the door. "We going to need to replace your drums, Davey?"
"Nah. That was my backup set. I'm good until the next time I need a backup set."
We chuckled at this, and called for a cab. While we waited I called Richard. "Richard, I made a promise to the crowd that I would not play in Denver. Make sure that we never do."
"What happened? Other than splitting my eye open with a beer bottle? I'm heading to an emergency room and getting it cleaned up, then we're on a plane back home."
"I'm so sorry about this, Desi."
"Don't be, Richard. Looks like we're going to make the famous Utah rumor true for Denver."
"What Utah rumor?"
"Oh come on, even I heard about how supposedly U2 was booed off stage in '83, which is why they didn't do a concert in Utah until '97. Well, I'm sorry, but if Denver is going to be that rude, they deserve not to get a concert."
"Desi, think about this."
'No, Richard. I will not subject my band to this kind of behavior. I need a courier service to meet me at the hospital to get our instruments back. Just the bass and my 12-string. Davey decided to leave his drums."
"You're serious. You got booed off the stage."
"Yes, cut over my eye from a beer bottle."
"Ok, you win. No concerts in Denver."
"Thought you'd see it my way. Get the service there, and can you see if you can get us an earlier flight back?"
"It might be coach."
"I'll survive. The sooner I can shake the dust of this city from my shoes, the better I'll feel."
"Ok, Desi. See you."
"Kisses, Richard."
The cab arrived and we piled in. "Nearest hospital, please."
"Yes, ma'am."
We were dropped off at the emergency entrance, and made our way inside. I got to tell my story about a hundred times, and I'm still pretty sure that half the people were assuming a domestic disturbance was what actually caused the cut.
Wasn't it obvious to these people I was in stage makeup?"
It took two stitches to close the gash, so nothing too severe, and we were on our way to the airport.
Our flight would get us to Salt Lake by ten, and I hoped to be home by midnight. Maybe I'd be able to surprise Gretchen when I got home. Seeing her would be enough to fix a lot of what ailed me.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
The events depicted in this story parallel those depicted in 12-String: 7
This story is not necessary for the understanding of the 12-string series. It may be skipped.
Desdemona. What a name. What a face. And that hair? To die for. Ok, so I admit that I have a thing for hair. I love hair. No, just head hair. It completes a person. It can be short or long. Full or thin. As long as it fits them, their personality and everything, it's fine.
It takes a really special person to have pink hair. Some people can pull it off, and some people can't. Then some people are like Desdemona. They wouldn't be the same without it.
Her very name has a sensuality to it, and I could say it forever, and be content with just the sound of it in my own ears.
When we met, we shared a connection. She didn't even need to look at me, but I felt her eyes on me while I left. It made me blush.
I spent part of the day watching from the doorway, but I had other duties at work, and had to get to them.
I followed her car to the motel. She looks so confident booking her room. I can almost imagine the two of us out together. I have to chuckle at myself because we are out together. Sure, she pretends to be oblivious of me, but I know she has to feel me watching her. Our connection from earlier was that strong. We're meant to be.
She goes to her room. I watch for a few minutes through a crack in the window. A patron asks what I'm doing, and I have to make up a story about looking for my room. He tells me that the rooms are numbered, and I thank him. I tell him it must be a blond moment. He chuckles even though I'm a brunette. Some people really show their stupidity.
I head home to pick up some of my gear. I figure that she's not going anywhere for the immediate future. Everything's in my bag, so I don't have to gather anything up. I do check it twice before leaving anyway, making sure that I have everything.
I drive back to the motel, and quickly look through the windows before I begin. She's nowhere to be seen. I take out my lock picks and quickly jimmy the door. A new speed record for me. Desdemona, you should really have put the privacy bar across the door. Anyone could get in here. I hear the water running in the bathroom, so I set about my tasks. I set up the cameras and microphones in strategic places.
After making sure that none of them are easily visible, and checking that I am getting a good strong signal, I head out to my car, quietly closing the door behind me.
I set the signal amplifier in a bush with a concealed outdoor outlet. This will give me a three mile radius to receive the signal from. I drive a couple of blocks away, and plug my laptop into my cigarette lighter.
Soon, I can hear the water turning off, and I have eight views into her room. She is glorious as she leaves the bathroom. I didn't realize how much of what she appeared to be wasn't real. I'm sure that as soon as we get together, we can change that. She is so different without the hair.
Her body excites me, even as it is now.
I listen to her conversations, and realize that I have an opening into to her life. She has something precious to her. Something I can take for her. Something I can protect from her.
She talks until she is tired and then goes to sleep. I watch her sleep for a long time, and then come to a decision. I call my favorite flower shop, and leave a message. They open early enough that I can get the flowers to her before she goes to work tomorrow. I will have to be there before her. It will be another wonderful day.
I call her, but she doesn't get to the phone before it goes to voicemail. I had to snag the number from work before I left. I wait an hour before I call again. This time she answers and I just listen to the sound of her voice. Even now, I'm amazed at how feminine it sounds. When she sings, it's obvious who she is inside. Only a real woman could sing like that.
She tells me to call back. I feel a slight thrill. We're making another connection. I know exactly what I'll write on her note for her flowers now. I really hope she likes her flowers. Of course, all girls like flowers. Will she bring them into the studio today?
I wait another hour to call her again. I talk to her this time, to let her know I understand our connection. She hangs up, and get's ready for her day. I go and get her flowers. I knock on the door exactly one hour after the previous phone call.
I'm back in my car, and I rewind a bit to get all the action. Her image walks over to the door and looks out through the peep hole. She doesn't see anyone of course. She takes the flowers and closes the door. She threw the flowers away. What is going on? Have I been wrong? No, I can't have been wrong. Maybe she still feels a stronger connection to her Treasure than to me? I need to show her that I am the one for her. She needs to realize this more than anything else.
I go in to work, but my heart isn't in it. Plans flow through my head. First I need to figure out where this Treasure is. I chat with the secretary, who lets slip that Desdemona lives at her girlfriend's house. I get the address from the form on the desk. The secretary doesn't even realize she gave it to me.
Desdemona talks to me, and doesn't recognize my voice. How can she not realize? Still blinded. I make a decision and leave work at lunch. I've gotten what I wanted from this job anyway.
I don't even tell anyone that I'm gone. It will take longer for them to connect me with my Desdemona that way.
I drive south to her house. Her Treasure is beautiful. I can see why Desdemona is blinded.
I convince her I'm from the studio, and with my ID it's not that hard to do. I lead her out to my car, and offered her a bottle of water. I'd put some sleeping pill capsules in the water I offered her. It put her quickly to sleep. For a moment or two I'm worried that it had been too much, but I noticed her breathing, so I stopped worrying.
It was Desdemona. She wants to change her hair permanently to pink. I agree with her that it's a good idea. She never once guesses that I'm not her Treasure. Maybe this will work. I squeal when I get off the phone with her, and do a little dance.
Tomorrow, I will talk to Treasure about giving up her claim on my Desdemona.
The events depicted in this story parallel those depicted in 12-String: 10
This story is not necessary for the understanding of the 12-string series. It may be skipped.
Next time I'll just have to leave fewer clues.
The image of that poor actress running for her life from the police is something I'll keep with me for the rest of my life. It will fill the empty moments between prey.
"Why are you doing this?" Holly's sobs are almost enough to make me want to think about caring. The moment doesn't last long before the irritation sets in.
"My dear Ms. Hansen. I do this because I can. I do this because I enjoy it. And if you let yourself, you might find yourself enjoying it as well."
I don't tell her that she will likely be dead before she can get to that point, but I can see in her eyes that she knows.
That was why I picked her in the first place. That look she could give a person. The ability to bare her soul to anyone just by opening her eyes.
I would be careful to preserve her eyes during our future play so that I could preserve them forever. I know that they'll soon lose their luster but looking at them will remind me of the girl they once belonged to.
Thinking about her eyes on my shelf is enough to make me shudder in anticipation of the acts I am about to perform. She shies away from me. I feel my power over her and it arouses me.
There will be time for that later.
"Let's see. . .what should I do to you. It gets so hard to find a new way to play with my toys, after so many. Skinning alive was satisfying, and I haven't done that in a while."
I can see the fear awake in her eyes.
"No, I might damage your mind before the end. That one was completely gone even before he died."
Revulsion appears on her face and I allow a smile to grow until she shrinks away in fear.
"Starvation was about the most boring way that I have ever watched someone die. I almost just strangled the person to get it over with. That is one I won't be doing again."
I look at her and think of the blood as it slowly flowed over Desdemona's toy. A smile slowly, and without any thought on my part, grows until it consumes my face. It will take all of my skill to do, but it will be a masterpiece when I'm done.
I can almost envision the light slowly leaving her eyes.
I turn off the camera, as what is to follow will be an intensely personal moment.
The enjoyment I've received from this is almost enough to make me want to develop a signature and perfect this one method.
I don't plan on getting caught, however, and too much repetition will bring me to the attention of people with whom I'd rather not get acquainted.
I leave her there on the floor. I've already retrieved her eyes. All that remains is for me to make sure that I've left nothing behind of myself and call 911.
They are so good at cleaning up my messes for me. How many has that been over the years?
I take a moment to count all of my past toys, human, and otherwise. Forty-nine. Desdemona will make my fiftieth toy.
I need to begin planning something very special for her.
Detective Jensen.
He is getting entirely too close to me. It might be coincidence that he is here, but I doubt it. Something has tipped him off, I'm sure of it. He's onto me.
Suddenly I'm torn between going to New York to be with my newest toy, and staying here and removing Detective Jensen.
Finally I decide that this requires more patience than I've needed to show since I played with my parents. They were my first human kills.
Numbers twenty-three and twenty-four. I should have waited so that my first would have hit twenty five.
Five is a very mystical number. It holds power in it.
I'm still unsure which one died first. I had timed it so well. I should have had medical equipment running to monitor it.
I disconnect from the video feed and pack a bag to take with me to the airport.
I'm using a new identity.
There is always a slight thrill of fear when I first use a new identity. Especially in some place as public as an airport.
They accept me without question, and I even get a few appreciative stares from the male security guards.
For the first time I become aroused without the need to control the object of my lust. The images of the guards tied up, and making the small cuts to their skin is enough.
I banish those thoughts.
I have to remain in control. Loss of control is loss of freedom.
A young couple in love is already sitting in the lounge when I arrive. I amuse myself with imagining playing with the two of them at the same time.
It's been a while since I had two toys at the same time. Then it hits me. I have two toys now. I was planning on taking my toy's own toy away from her, but this will be much more satisfying. Especially if I can get my toy to play with her toy in front of me.
I orgasm at the thought of it.
I am embarrassed for the first time in public and hurry to the washroom to clean up.
I take some cleansing breaths, adjust my dress, and go back out to the lounge to wait for my flight.
I hate to fly. Unfortunately I hate other types of travel more.
I get to New York and for the first time in seven years I feel lost. I have no clue where to start looking for my toy. She's here to be on Saturday Night Live.
I'll start at the studio. I've gotten some sleep on the plane, so my sleepless night isn't affecting me as much as it could be. I wander around Rockefeller center, always keeping an eye on the door to 30 Rock. I get picked up a couple of times, but I politely decline.
It is so much easier for a woman to hunt than a man. I could have had any one of those men at my mercy. They would have walked blindly into my lair.
I would have to have some meaningless relationships for a while after I got done with my current toy. Maybe I could get up to seventy-five or even a hundred within the next year.
That would be quite an accomplishment.
I'd have to start keeping better track of my methods if I did.
Keith came down and got into a cab and was gone before I could react. He'd given me the slip today, but he had to come back to this place tomorrow, and I'd be ready.
Renting a car should have been my first priority upon reaching the city.
I took care of it and then found a room for the night. I would be up early and waiting for him to arrive at the studio. While I waited, I would find out if I could still get tickets to the show.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
The events depicted in this story parallel those depicted in 12-String: 8 and follow the events depicted in Obsession: 1
Lyle looked around the precinct, wondering what he'd done to land this case. He wasn't entirely sure that Gretchen Anderson had been abducted, but he had a lot of powerful people breathing down his neck to make this case happen.
"Why me?"
"Lyle, it was you because you finished your last case too quickly. Take a note from me: Slow down. Relax. Solve your cases at a more leisurely pace." Tony Kowalski was a good cop who liked to pretend that he wasn't. In the six months that they'd been partners, Lyle still hadn't figured out what made Tony tick.
Lyle shook his head. He knew that he wouldn't be able to do something like that. Finishing cases to the best of his ability was part of the reason that he'd become a cop. He wanted to help people and to prevent crime where he could.
But this case. . .
His phone rang. "Detective Jensen."
"Hello, Detective. My name is Richard Fields. I'm Gretchen's uncle."
"Look, Mr. Fields. You need to just be patient about all of this. She hasn't even been gone for more than a couple of hours. Usually we only allow reporting of missing people twenty four hours after the fact."
"And we explained this already. She recently had major surgery and wouldn't be able to go out on her own. All of her friends are accounted for, and none of them helped her to leave."
"Her boyfriend probably. . ."
"Her girlfriend is in California, and before you ask, yes she left without Gretchen. We called you all because her girlfriend told us that she has a stalker that we didn't know about previously."
"Most stalker cases involving regular people. . ."
"Her girlfriend is up and coming rocker Desdemona."
Lyle had no idea who Desdemona was, but figured that he couldn't put this off any longer. Not that he wanted to, really, it's just that it was too soon according to most protocols, and he like fitting things into their proper contexts.
"Ok, start from the beginning."
"Desdemona signed with Spotlight Productions yesterday. She spent all day in the studio, and was then scheduled to come in today to work on her debut album some more. Last night she realized that she had a stalker, who delivered some flowers to her motel room."
"How does she know it wasn't just a new fan?"
"Stalker was her term, and she mentioned something about knowing her schedule. I can give you her phone number if you like."
"Not right now. Ok, so who had access to her schedule?"
"The other two members of her band and the Spotlight staff."
"Well, thank goodness for small favors. I assume you just mean the local staff?"
"Yes."
"Thanks for the information. Is there a number where I can reach you?"
"Yes, it's. . ." Lyle wrote down the number and hung up. He sat there for a moment thinking about his next move.
"Hey, Kowalski, you ever heard of a Desdemona?"
"Isn't she some sort of goth punk rocker that all the kids are talking about?"
"Of course. I should have known that if it was underage and had boobs that you'd know all about it."
"Hey, a guy has to have standards."
"Yeah, low ones."
"I resemble that remark."
"The prosecution rests."
They both chuckled a bit before Lyle continued. "Seriously. You think she would be the type to stage a kidnapping for publicity?"
"Well, consider this, Jensen: Did they tell the media?"
Lyle considered for a moment, and then spoke. "Not that I know of, especially since Kate hasn't given me a call." Kate was a friend who worked for the Salt Lake Tribune on the crime desk. If this story was news, she would call him to find out about it. He still had nightmares about the phone call after the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping.
"If they didn't call the media, then what publicity would they get out of it?"
"Good point." Lyle looked up the local number for Spotlight Productions and gave them a call.
"Spotlight Records, this is Mindy speaking."
"Hello, Mindy. My name is Detective Jensen with the Salt Lake Police Department. I'm interested in some information regarding your employees. Apparently, one of your clients is complaining about being stalked by what seems could only be one of your employees."
"It's not Holly Hansen complaining again is it? She is a bit paranoid and. . ."
"No, it's Desdemona, but I'll be interested to talk to you about Ms. Hansen later."
"Desdemona?"
"She apparently signed with you yesterday?"
"Let me check. . .ah here we are. Wow, a full use contract. Not too many of those yet. Why would she think someone here was stalking her?"
"Apparently the person knew her schedule, and only herself and her band members knew that."
"Hmm. Let's see. The sound tech knew it. Mr. Praetor of course and. . .apparently one of our interns knew her schedule as well. Angela quit today, though, so I'm not sure it would be her."
Lyle had a thought. "Did this Angela also have dealings with Ms. Hansen?"
"Now that you mention it, yes she did. Angela started working here just before Ms. Hansen started complaining about being stalked."
"Mindy, your company better hope that these incidents aren't linked, or you may be criminally liable for the abduction of a young woman."
"What would the police have done even if we had reported it?"
"Whether or not we did anything would be our responsibility. Your behavior quite possibly put Ms. Hansen at risk, and allowed a dangerous person to remain unnoticed. Do you have a home address for Angela. . ."
"Angela O'Hare. Yes I have one, but I'm not sure that I should be giving it to you without a warrant."
"Ok, we will pursue other avenues while we wait for that. Thank you for your time, Mindy."
Lyle hung up the phone and Kowalski tossed his jacket at him. "While you were sweet talking the receptionist, I found the motel that Desdemona stayed at last night. I've already called the forensics team and they are on their way. We should meet them out there."
Lyle drove and they pulled into the parking lot. The area was already cordoned off, and the lab techs were going in and out. "Henry, what have you got?"
"I've told you I prefer Hank, Lyle. This room was bugged. Something definitely happened here last night. Ms. Desdemona never actually checked out of the room, so no one came in to clean it. That's both good and bad for us at the same time."
"Give me some good news."
"The card that came with the flowers has three sets of prints on it, so we can assume that one set is from the florist, another is probably Desdemona, and the third would be our stalker."
"Get those to the lab to be analyzed."
"Already sent them off and they are being checked as we speak."
Hank's phone rang and he picked up. "Hello? Hank speaking. . .uh huh. . .ok. . .I'll let the Detective know."
"What's up?"
"No hits on the other two sets of prints yet, but we have someone on their way to the florist to get a set of elimination samples. One of them just came up as a Keith Robison. Apparently he was printed as a child."
"Thank goodness for small favors. We have an address for mister Robison?"
"Yeah, they already texted the address to your phone."
"Wow, that's a long way out there. Thanks, Hank. We have to run. Kowalski, let's go."
They went out to their car and drove out of town. This would be out of their jurisdiction so they called the Juab county sheriff's office on the radio about the time they hit Provo.
"County Sheriff. How can we help you boys?"
"We're pursuing a lead in an abduction case down in your neck of the woods and wanted to give you a heads up. We're heading to the house of a suspect."
"Just give us the address and we'll meet you out there."
They made good time, as they weren't even trying to obey the speed limit, and pulled up behind the an SUV with a sheriff's decal on the door. "Sheriff Wyman." The man who got out said as he offered them his hand.
"I'm Detective Jensen and this piece of work is my partner Detective Kowalski."
"You guys want to take lead on this, since it's your case?"
"We have no problem with that," Kowalski replied.
They walked up to the door and knocked. A pretty, middle aged woman answered the door. "Hello, ma'am. I'm Detective Jensen, and this is Kowalski. Is a Keith Robison here?"
"What did he do this time? I knew hanging out with that Anderson kid would lead him to no good."
"He knows Gretchen Anderson?"
"Yes, they are 'involved'."
"Thanks for your time."
Lyle took out his phone and dialed Mr. Fields' phone number.
"Hello, This is Richard."
"I just had an interesting conversation with a Mrs. Robison who told me that a Keith Robison is Gretchen's boyfriend. Would you like to revise your earlier statement?"
". . .Keith is Desdemona."
Lyle blinked a couple of times, opened his mouth to speak, closed his mouth again.
"Detective Jensen?"
"Wait, Desdemona is female right?"
"Ok, just listen for a moment, and say nothing. We are trying to keep as few people as possible in the loop. Eventually it will likely get out, but until then, we'd like to try to at least keep this private. Keith Robison is a natural male Soprano. He took on the persona of Desdemona to perform. It is a legal alias, so I broke no laws referring to him as Desdemona."
Lyle shook his head. "Ok, this information would have saved us a run all the way out the BFE to Keith's house."
"While you're there, you may want to look at the crime scene. As far as we can tell, she was abducted from her home next door."
"North or south."
"North."
"We'll check it out." Lyle hung up the phone and walked next door to Gretchen's house. "Kowalski, apparently our victim lived next door. Keith is a non starter."
"What. . ."
"Don't worry about it. Trust me. It's a lifestyles of the rich and famous thing. You really don't want to know."
"Ok, well, let's take a look around."
Kowalski walked up to the front door, while Lyle looked around the bushes. "Hey, Kowalski. What was that intern's name again?"
"Amy. . .Andrea. . .no Angela."
"Bingo. Looks like we have a winner. You happen to snag an evidence bag while you were chatting up Lanie at the motel."
"What else is Lanie good for, Jensen."
Lyle turned the bag inside out around his hand and used it to pick up the badge from the ground. He then pulled the bag carefully around the badge and sealed the bag.
"Let's get this back up to the lab."
They drove their new evidence up to the lab and then awaited the results, even though it was beginning to get late.
They dropped off the Id badge.
Lyle made a quick call to the county clerk.
"It seems our warrant for the address on Angela came through. Let's go get it."
The Spotlight Productions building looked like any other building on the block. Nothing about the outside suggested that it was the home to a recording studio. Lyle suspected that this would be the case for many such establishments.
They walked in and up to the front desk.
"I'm Detective Jense, and this is my partner Detective Kowalski. We have a warrant to obtain the personal information for a former employee of yours, an Angela. . .actually I never got her last name."
"I have it right here for you detective. I'm sorry that I couldn't give you any more information over the phone, but privacy issues. You understand."
"Unfortunately. Thanks for your time."
They drove to the address listed, which turned out to be a long term hotel near the freeway. They lights above the managers cage were yellowed and created more shadows than anything else.
"We're looking for an Angela Harrows. She listed this as her residence."
"You boys are too late, I'm sorry to say. Angela moved out last week, not that she ever really lived here. She would show up once every couple of days to collect her mail, but that's about it."
"You remember her specifically?"
"A guy doesn't forget tits and ass like that," the manager said with a leer.
"Thanks for your time." Lyle really would have preferred never to have dealt with the manager at all, but sometimes there was no avoiding the seedier element when pursuing justice.
"Well, that was a bust. So, Jensen, back to the lab to await the results?"
"Nothing better to do right now. Lead the way, Kowalski."
"Lyle?" Asked Hank as he came into the lounge where the two detectives were waiting.
"Yes, Hank?"
"Fingerprints on the ID match the third set of unknowns on the card that came with the flowers. If we had something to match them to. . ."
"You've done enough on this, Hank, why don't you go get some sleep."
"Sometimes I really wish that reality was like a TV show. We'd catch a break right about now, and everything would resolve before the final commercial break."
"Don't I know it. Unfortunately, more often than not we're just not able to save the victim. Or we get there too late. Or any of a number of other problems that we are faced with that those cop dramas aren't."
Lyle and Kowalski went their separate ways home: Kowalski to his wife and kids, and Lyle to his dog. It's not that he didn't want a family, it's just that it had never been the right time for him. Something had always gotten in the way. Like this case now. He found himself wondering if Tracy Robison would mind going on a date during the middle of an investigation involving her son's girlfriend. . .
"Stupid idea, Lyle, and you know it," he said aloud to himself. He sat down next to his dog and scratched her between the ears while watching reruns of shows he hadn't wanted to watch when they were new.
"You know, girl, sometimes I wonder if this is it. Is this all life is meant to be? Going to work. Going home. Going to sleep. Day in and day out? Shouldn't there be some deeper meaning to it all? Makes you want to find religion, doesn't it."
After a valiant effort to get into the current sitcom offering, Lyle went to bed. He slept fitfully, his dreams trying to make sense of a case that was simply lacking in enough evidence to solve.
It was nearly ten o'clock before any new leads in the abduction came across his desk.
"Lyle, our stalker seems to be a creature of habit. Over the past year he purchased the same setup from the video store on six different occasions. As luck would have it, the first time he visited the store, he filled out a contact card, so we have his telephone number and email address."
"He?"
"Yeah, he started cross-dressing about seven months ago, but facial recognition software has confirmed it as the same person on the surveillance footage in the store."
"Ok, let's get this bastard."
Three hours later, warrant in hand, Lyle, Kowalski, and a bevy of other officers arrived at the address associated with the land line that had been left at the store.
"This explains it."
"Explains what, Kowalski."
"Well, Jensen, it explains everything. Only a rich prick would buy the same top of the line equipment repeatedly and leave it on site. He probably never even considered it would lead us right to him."
Lyle began handing out pictures of Andrew both in and out of his "Angela" disguise. "We're going to try to get him to let us in there voluntarily, but we will break in if we have to." With that Lyle, followed by Kowalski, walked up to the front door. The door chime resonated.
Andrew answered the door. "Sir, can I ask you to step outside please."
"Is there something wrong?"
"We have this warrant to. . ."
Andrew turned and ran. "I hate it when they run." Lyle said as he and Kowalski watched him disappear. "Don't they know that this isn't a cop show?"
They heard a scuffle from the far side of the house and walked through it in time to see Andrew being lead away in cuffs from his own back yard.
"It's like they think we would actually leave him a way out."
"Yeah, Jensen, some people are just ignorant that way."
They searched the house for twenty minutes but couldn't find any sign of Gretchen anywhere. Lyle kept returning to the rear corner of the basement. "Kowalski, something just seems off here. The geometry doesn't match."
"That and this room smells like fresh paint."
"It does? I must be catching a cold or something, find something and let's get through this wall."
The sheetrock gave easily, but right behind it they found a brick wall.
"This definitely doesn't seem standard. I have a really bad feeling about this, Jensen."
"Me too. Get someone to being a ram in here. We need to get through this wall as quickly as we can."
A couple of good hits and they'd broken a hole through the brick wall. It was pitch black in the other side.
"Someone get me a light," Lyle said and a flashlight was thrust into his outstretched hand.
He shone the light into the darkness and saw the unmoving form of a naked girl. Her thighs were covered in blood.
"Get this wall down now!"
It took precious minutes to get a hole in the wall big enough to permit anyone to get through, and Lyle was the first one in. The air tasted a little stale.
He rushed to Gretchen's side and checked for a pulse. Her chest rose and fell, and she had a weak, but steady, pulse. He let out the breath that he hadn't consciously been holding.
"Get the EMTs out here! We need to get this girl moved and safe. Someone get me a blanket to cover her with!"
Twenty minutes later, as the ambulance raced away with Gretchen in the back, Lyle considered everything that had happened over the past twenty four hours. If Mr. Fields hadn't insisted they do something. . .
If they hadn't been able to track the video equipment. . .
If the little shit hadn't filled out that contact card. . .
"Remember that conversation we had last night, Kowalski?"
"Yep."
"I'm glad that sometimes we get lucky."
"Me too, buddy. Me too. I hope she makes it."
"So do I."
Ok, so here are a couple of songs I wrote for 12-String, when I was still writing songs. They're actually the two I lost and just ended up saying screw it about writing the songs :). The first one is the song that Keith wrote while sitting and waiting out in Nashville. Think of it as country twang with a rock beat. Yes, there is a LOT of sarcasm in this song.
My Own Person(You're Not for Me)
Spoken: Momma always said there'd be guys like this.
Here I am, in the foot of your buildin
All I can do is think, I am wonderin'
How a guy like you can leave me sittin', waitin'
What about this feels like love,
What about this feels like honor
You will do your best,
But baby, it's not good enough.
What about this made you think
that you were good enough for ME!!
I am smart enough to know when you're no good
You're not for me.
Something in your eye said love
When you called down from above
All my heart did need was a little shove, my dove
What about this feels like love,
What about this feels like honor
You will do your best,
But baby, it's not good enough.
What about this was the clue,
that made you treat me like you do
I sit here in my room and think about you
You're not for me.
Am I your little brainless fool
did you think I'd touch your tool
Dirty man, I'm still in school, and I'm cruel?
What about this feels like love,
What about this feels like honor
You will do your best,
But baby, it's not good enough.
What about this made you think
Here was someone old enough to drink
I try and try to wash your taste from my mouth
You're not for me.
The second, well, I'm not even sure where it really came from and I had no clue where to work it into the story. It would likely have replaced the descriptions of Daddy's Little Princess (a song I might eventually actually write :) and become that song.
What you see is what you get (Dance for you)
I put on a dress for you
It's tight and shows my curves
Its red, or black, or white, or blue
And makes me want to dance
My hair is styled just right
My lipstick shade is there to tease
And when I meet you late at night
I get out on the floor and da-ance!
I dance to show you how I feel,
I walk and strut and tease,
Everything I show for you
Is this look a lie? Please!
(pause/dead air)
What you see is what you get!
If boots are made for walking
These heels tear through your soul
And so you know that I'm not mad
I get out on that floor and dance
I'm a very simple girl
I never meant you any harm
Sitting her next to you, Boyfriend
Only makes me want to da-ance!
I dance to show you how I feel,
I walk and strut and tease,
Everything I show for you
Is this look a lie? Please!
(pause/dead air)
What you see is what you get!
The works being presented by Faeriemage for the year of challenges by Melanie E.
The boots he handed me were. . .well, they were perfect. They were a red leather, with similar tooling to the boots I held in my hands, but they were long and had a zipper up the side. They had a three inch broad heel. They were also obviously women's boots.
"You haven't heard the last of me! I'll sue you over this!"
"Sir, please, this just isn't becoming."
"But the shoes don't fit."
"If they were purchased in this store, then they always fit. Have a nice day."
I startled a bit when the door was slammed, well as much as a door on a hydraulic hinge can be slammed. The bell was loud at least.
I took a deep breath and sighed. "Maybe this store isn't for me."
What was I doing? A friend at the law school had suggested that I come in here for a pair of boots. He'd told me that they had the most wonderful fit, and wearing them just brought out a sense of personal. . .wholeness. Well that's how he described it.
I looked around the store and wondered if I had the right place. The boots all seemed to be in women's styles, so I walked outside, and, sure enough, the sign read Henry Harrelson's Custom Fit Boots.
The older gentleman stood there looking at me expectantly. Taking a deep breath I stepped forward. "Mr. Harrelson I presume?"
"Oh, so formal. Henry is fine, dear."
"Um. . .I'm a guy." I'd gotten this confusion a lot recently. I don't know why everyone else assumed incorrectly, but I could tell who I was when I looked in the mirror. Well, it was obvious to me. It's also part of the reason I'd taken to wearing a two day growth of stubble on my face.
Unfortunately I'd shaved this morning.
"So sorry, it's just. . ." He looked around the store, as if trying in vain to see a pair of men's boots.
Well, that's what I was doing.
"My friend suggested I get a pair of boots here."
"Yes, Robert was a joy to fit. Don't get many like him in here, but there aren't many like him, are there? I understand he's quite a catch. You should consider yourself lucky."
"Um. . ." I blushed bright red. "I'm not gay."
"I never said you were, dear. I'm so sorry. I usually don't get so ahead of myself. My wife tells me I need to be more circumspect in my dealings, but it is just so much fun here."
The smile he gave me was so beatific that for a moment I thought I saw a halo of light surrounding his head. I blinked and it was gone. Just a trick of the light, I'm sure.
"So, Andrew, what will we get for you. . .You know, I do have the perfect pair of boots for you, but if you're not ready for them, then they could. . ."
"The perfect pair?" I was a little skeptical that there could be anything in this world perfect for me.
"Like I said, if you're not ready. . .that's my concern. Let's step back here a ways, and yes, here we are. I pride myself on a perfect fit. Unfortunately you don't seem like the perfect fit type of person."
He handed me a very nice, manly, dress boot. It had some tooling on the side, and a low heel. For a moment I found myself wishing that the heel were a little higher. I'd always thought that 5'3" was much too short, and not just because I was a man.
"It fits perfectly." I said after I'd slipped them on and walked back and forth a bit. I'd never had a pair of boots, or even shoes, that felt the way that these did.
"I never said I couldn't find a pair of boots that fit your foot perfectly, dear. I simply said you weren't ready for the boots that fit you perfectly."
"What's the difference?"
"Come back over here, and I'll let you try on the perfect boot for you."
The boots he handed me were. . .well, they were perfect. They were a red leather, with similar tooling to the boots I held in my hands, but they were long and had a zipper up the side. They had a three inch broad heel. They were also obviously women's boots.
I'd never seen a pair of boots I wanted to try on more, and almost before I knew what I was doing I had both of them on and zipped up.
I stood up and walked around in them a bit. I was 5'6" for a moment. It was beautiful. They boot was so comfortable that it almost felt as if it weren't there at all. It completely supported my calf, and even thought I was almost on tip toe, or so it felt, I didn't feel the pressure pinching my feet.
A smile spread across my face, and I almost pranced back and forth in the store getting the feel of the boot.
The smile vanished all too quickly from my face, however. They were women's boots.
Sadly I took them off and handed them back to the shopkeeper. "I'm sorry, Henry, but I can only afford one pair of boots."
"You haven't even heard the price yet."
"Robert said you charged him about two hundred dollars."
"Ah, but he purchased a different pair of boots. Both of these are only a hundred dollars each. And I happen to be having a two for one special right now."
"Oh but I couldn't." I looked longingly at the red boots. Maybe I could get away with wearing them. They were so comfortable feeling. Maybe once in a while. . .
"I'm not sure." I felt the normal indecision falling over me.
"That's the best reason for the two for one sale. You don't have to choose now. Get both pair of boots. Some days, if you feel like the one, wear it, and some days, if you feel like the other wear that."
I paid for the boots.
"Would you like to wear one of them out of the store?"
I looked longingly at the red boots. They fit me so well, but I went with the others. They fit well enough, I supposed.
I looked at the time and rushed out of the store with a passing, "Thank you, Henry."
I'm not sure if he answered me.
I tossed the red boots in the back seat, and drove to the campus. All the way there, I kept looking at the boots on the rear seat.
What would it hurt? They were just boots after all. I was wearing jeans, and they would easily cover most of the boot. I could get away. . .
No, I'd know. It was a women's boot. I was a man, or at least I tried to prove to everyone I was.
But they felt so good. . .I almost crashed into the back of a truck stopped at a red light just outside of campus, so I decided to make the rest of the drive with my eyes on the road.
I tried not to think of the sirens in the back seat calling to me, but I couldn't help it. They were so. . .pretty.
I smiled at the thought. I'd never been considered pretty, and wondered if I could pull it off. Wait, it was the boots that were pretty, not me.
I knew that they'd go with my outfit. I usually wore neutral colors, trying to avoid attention, but those boots would draw attention. And I would be 5'6". Sure, that's still short, but. . .
I'd made up some time, and was not nearly as behind as I thought. Before I could stop to think about it, I threw off the other bots and slipped on the red ones. I felt a thrill as I zipped them up, and then I slid my pants leg down over them.
For the first time this semester, I smiled as I entered the law school building. I walked looking around at people, and I heard a number of classmates call out to me. I answered them, still smiling. Had they always been this friendly, and I'd just never noticed.
I waved at acquaintances and generally strutted down the hall. Either no one noticed I was wearing women's boots, or they just didn't care. My confidence built as I continued down the hall to the classroom with my first class of the morning.
The teacher had a novel approach to teaching, and expected us to sign in at the front of the room. I wasn't used to the added height, so I bent over a bit to look for my name, and sign.
"Who's the hot new girl?" I heard one of my classmates say from behind me as he waited his turn.
"I don't know, but she has one fine ass." I heard a familiar voice say.
"Robert!?" I said in shock as I turned around.
"Andrew? Oh god, I'm sorry. It's just you were. . .I mean it looked like. . .man, I'm sorry."
They were both blushing furiously.
"Look, guys, I understand. I'm short, and petite, and I do have slight features. Don't worry about it. I don't think anything can ruin my mood today."
I finished signing and went to take my usual seat in the middle. Something in me wouldn't let me sit down, however. I went back up to the front of the room and sat down. I'd always preferred being 'right in the action' so to speak. The problem was I'd been afraid of people behind me looking at me while I answered questions. I did a lot of that.
Always before the middle of the room was a compromise.
I figured something needed to change. I didn't need to hide from attention, and I would have people looking at me every time I went to court. "time to get over your insecurities, Andy."
I'd stopped using that nickname in high-school, because I'd been afraid of its gender ambiguity. I thought I could probably handle it now.
"There's something different about you, Andrew."
"Look, Robert, we've known each other for a long time now. Call me Andy. It's easier."
"But I thought. . ."
"People change. I had a very interesting morning, and figure it's time for me to make a change."
"Ok, Andy. So, what happened this morning?"
"I stopped by Henry Harrelson's"
"Really? That's so cool. So, did he get you the perfect pair of boots?"
"I think he did." I blushed as I said it.
"Really, can I see it?"
"Sure. Let's have lunch after class and we can talk about it."
I sighed and got myself out of the car. We chatted as we went into the restaurant, and he held the door for me. I blushed even though we sort of did that for each other. It just felt different this time for some reason. More. . .personal? I guess that's it. More personal.
"Robert. Andrew. Classes out for the morning then?" Mary had a smile for us as usual. We came in here a lot. I can't tell you how many times they had to kick us out at the end of a long night of studying.
"Yes, Mary, and if you don't mind, I've decided to give Andy a try for a while."
"Of course, Andy. There's something different about you, but I can't place what it is."
"I did shave this morning."
"I noticed. . .but it's something else. No matter. I'm sure I'll get it eventually."
We were seated at our normal corner booth, and the waitress, Lisa this time, got us our usual mid day drinks, water for me and a lemonade for Robert, and went to get our meals.
It was a Thursday, which meant that I would have the steak and garlic potatoes, with a nice side salad, and Robert would have the Salmon. Most of my steak and potatoes would go home with Robert, as usual, but I didn't mind. It was more about the company and atmosphere than anything esle.
"So, about those boots. . ."
I unzipped one of them and slipped it off. I handed it to Robert with a slight smile.
He had a shocked look on his face. "Those are. . ."
"Women's boots? Yes, I know."
"No, what I was going to say is those are the boots that I saw in the window of the shop. Those boots are the reason I went into the store in the first place. I told Mr. Harrelson that I wanted to by those boots for a friend but we wouldn't sell them to me."
"Why not?"
"He said that you can't buy someone else's boots for them. They have to make their own decision on fit."
"So, why did you send me there?"
He blushed bright red and wouldn't look at me. I took this opportunity to put the boot back on. I felt naked without it.
I had zipped up the boot, and adjusted my pant leg, and was looking at him expectantly when he finally started speaking.
"Remember the first time we met?"
"Of course I do. You walked up to me a kissed me full on the lips, saying something about being dared to kiss the most pretty girl in the class. Something I might add that your other friends all deny ever doing."
He blushed, but not as br4ightly this time.
"That was a couple of weeks after I first saw you. We were still in our first semester of our first year at law school. To me, you were the most pretty girl in the class, even with your boyish haircut."
"Dude, I was a boy. I mean I am a boy."
"I know that, now, but I couldn't help it. I developed a crush on you. I still have a crush on you."
"Wait. . .what?"
"Hear me out. You don't act like one of the guys. You have great fashion sense, and you are so easily startled. You always hold to the background and support the decisions of others. You are emotional and caring and one of the sweetest people I know."
"This still doesn't explain. . ."
"I'm getting to that. I'd told myself that I just needed to go over and talk to you, get you out of my system, and I could move onto another, more approachable girl."
"I'm not unapproachable."
"You had the nickname of ice princess, before we all realized you were a guy."
"Oh. . ."
"It's not that. It's just that you were so collected, or at least seemed so from our perspective. You kept to yourself, and seemed in your own little world ruled by you."
"I was just so shy. . ."
He put his finger on my lips in a shushing gesture. It was one of the more intimate contacts we'd had, and I blushed and pulled away.
"Andy, let me finish, okay. I know the your story, I need to let you hear why. I decided that you were going to reject me, since you weren't dating any of the guys in the school and we figured it was because you were just focused on school."
I opened my mouth to speak, but he reached out his finger again. I closed my mouth and intercepted his hand with my own. I would be good, but I kept holding his hand to keep him from putting a finger to my lips again.
He covered my hand with his, and it felt good to just let him hold my hand.
"Since it would be my only opportunity, I figured it was then or never. I wanted so much to feel what it was like to kiss you. It would be a memory I would cherish for the rest of my life. It is a memory I cherish."
"I gathered up my courage, I walked over to you, and I kissed you. I know you kissed me back, because I felt you melt into me."
"I was just so surprised."
"I know. I kissed you because I was falling in love with you, and I'd never once talked to you."
"Robert. . ."
His smile faded and he continued, "I know. You're not gay. Neither am I. When I saw those boots, they reminded me of the girl I'd seen. They reminded me of the ice princess, but not that the same time. I thought of fire when I saw them, but you don't call someone a fire princess. . ."
"Oh. . ."
"Yes, I wanted those boots for you. For the memory of you that I carry with me since that first day that we kissed. I couldn't ever forget. . ."
In that moment, seeing him look like that, I couldn't help it. My heart melted and I did something I never thought I'd do. I kissed him. He kissed me back.
"Took you two long enough."
We pulled apart, and I blushed furiously. "We're not, I mean I'm not, I mean. . ."
"Girl, you've been making eyes at this man since the first day I saw you two in here."
"Lisa, but I'm a man."
"I know you keep saying that, but you're the only one who believes it. Let me tell you a little something about myself." What happened next was the strangest thing in my life. The voice coming out of Lisa was hers, but not the one I was used to hearing, and the disconnect between what I saw and what I heard was jarring to say the least. "I was born Peter."
Robert's jaw dropped open, which I could see because I'd looked over at him at this revelation. My jaw was on the floor as well.
Lisa continued in her normal voice, "You two keep circling each other, which I think is sweet, but you really need to get over your preconceptions. Robert has been in love with you forever, even if you seem unsure whether you want to be loved by him."
She turned to Robert, "Andy is in love with love, and has some strange ideas on who she should be with. She thinks society will look down on her if she admits that she wants to be in love with you."
Robert put his arm around me, and I couldn't help it, I cried. I grabbed onto him and just cried. They weren't tears of sadness, however. They were tears of relief and joy and a comfortable pair of boots.
Lisa gave me a card for a good psychologist who I still see periodically today. He helped me to understand who I was, and I have to say the boots helped. Every year I go back to Henry's shop, and buy another pair of boots on my birthday. No, not the actual day I was born. The day I got my first pair of boots.
I would like to say that everything between Robert and myself was perfect, but unfortunately life isn't a story. We've had our ups and downs, and he even left me once for another woman.
But we've been married now for ten years, and we have three beautiful children, all adopted of course.
And all of this is because of a red pair of boots.
The suns glow slowly faded from the clouds as I sat there on my island. I say my island, but I shared it with the crew of the small sailing vessel on which I was a seaman.
It was a small, square sailed, boat, and there was not much room aboard to move, let alone find any privacy. Here, on the island, I had a moment to myself. We were fishermen, and it was the only life that seemed to fit me. I'd tried my hand at many other trades but my slight size and lack of musculature limited my options.
Here though, I found a place with people who were more similar to me than I'd been willing to credit before I found myself in their midst.
Even in their cooperative work there was a real sense of independence here.
And they let me have my sunsets.
That was all I asked, really. A sunset once a day and work to take my thoughts from the things in life that would not change.
"Akakios, are you done watching Apollo's chariot yet? I think even the god no longer worries about it."
That wasn't my name, but it's the one they gave me. Innocent one. Not evil. I guess I could see why they gave it to me, but I was unsure whether or not it really applies to me. I'd refused to give them my real name for fear I would be found out.
"No, Kleon. It's just gotten to the good part."
There was some laughter at this. They were a rough bunch without any formal education, but they were a family to me of a sort.
"The wind begins to change. We need to go now if we want to get back home, lads." That was our captain Epiktetos. He was new to his trade as captain, but we didn't hold it against him. He had a gift, usually, to know exactly where the fish would be schooling.
The haul on the way out had been lacking, but we hoped to get something on our way back in. We did this every day. Sail in lazy arcs out to the island, wait for the wind to change, and then sail back.
The final member of our crew, Irenaeus, made his usually quiet way to the ship.
With how well all of our names fit, I doubted a single one of them was the one these men had been born with.
Kleon for the man who saw glory in everything around him. Brash and open.
Epiktetos the man who'd newly acquired his command.
Irenaeus the peaceful.
The meaning of the name a description of who we were. They thought me innocent.
I tried to pull my weight, but I simply could not build the muscle that they had. They left me to the steer board at the back. That job I could do. I followed the direction given me by Epiktetos and led us from one school to the next on our way back.
We filled our boat with the fish that allowed us to continue our journey each day. That allowed us to be free from the ties that the land would impose upon us.
We arrived home just into second watch. As usual, I would sleep on the boat. It helped me to hide my shame from the others in our little family. Epiktetos went home to his young wife, while the other two went to their hostels.
I unbound the strips of cloth about my chest so that I could breathe. The size of my breasts was such that it was becoming harder and harder to hide. I was sure that in a few weeks time it would be impossible for me to hide my gender any longer.
Or lack thereof.
Below, for the most part, I seemed to be male. I had a penis at least.
Above, however, I was becoming female.
It was my shame that I'd hid from everyone. Everyone since my father.
I'd only just begun to grow breasts when my father came in on me one morning. He accused me of asking for this change. Said that I'd asked Aphrodite to become female.
It was nothing of the sort. I worshiped Apollo primarily. I loved to watch the sun chariot as it crossed the heavens. I tried to tell him, but he'd stopped listening. He came after me with a gelding knife.
If it was good enough for his horses.
I was never strong. I tried to pass between his legs and get away, but I tripped him instead. He fell into the corner where he'd trapped me, and didn't get up.
I turned him over, and he looked up at me in horror. The knife was buried up to the hilt in his gut.
"I didn't do this, Father. I'm a faithful son of Apollo."
"There is more Demeter in you than Apollo. For what you've done to me, you shall never find rest under any man's roof."
And I hadn't. It wasn't until I found the crew that I'd been able to sleep an entire night without being kicked into the street. I'd begun to worry that I would spend the rest of my life a destitute beggar until I'd run into Kleon.
"Hello, little one. Looks as though you've lost your last coin."
"I need work, not charity, hairy one."
"Oh, the boy has teeth, does he. Well, come then, Akakios. Come and see what the world can do for you."
"My name's not. . ."
"It can be, if you let it. There is no guile in you, child. Come."
I followed the bear of a man to the ship.
"Have another for you, brother. That gives us the four we need."
"The last one you brought seems a bit slow, and this one's a runt."
"Akakios is special, not a runt. He will be a real asset to us in the future."
"And how do you know than Kleon?"
"Because, Epiktetos, you may be able to see fish at a mile, but I can see what people will become."
"Oh, and what will Irenaeus become?"
"A senator in Rome."
"And the little one?"
"Well, that would be telling and he doesn't want me to."
"Ok, so how do you know Irenaeus is going to be a senator?"
"I know his father. He was sent here to gain some real world experience."
"Rumors, Kleon. All you have is rumors."
"The trick, brother, is to know which rumors count."
Epiktetos laughed at this, and I assumed that I was accepted as a member of our strange crew.
That didn't change the fact that I wasn't as guileless as Kleon thought me.
I lay there looking up at the constellations, naked from the waist up.
I was nearing the age when I would have to join the military, and become an adult, but I did not want to do that. I wanted to stay with the ship.
"Akakios, are you there, lad."
I scrambled to find my shirt, but Kleon climbed over the side of the beached vessel.
"Oh, don't worry, lad. I know. I've known all along, and so has my brother."
"Know what?"
"That you're a girl."
I blushed, but he wouldn't know that in the darkness.
"I'm not a girl, Kleon."
"Yes, I know that you have a great male thing between your legs, but that doesn't change how you act, or the mounds of flesh you try to hide."
I couldn't help it and I began to cry.
"Child, relax. I'm not here to hurt you."
"But, I am not normal. I'm no man, nor can I be it seems. I'm also no woman. No man would take me like this. I can bear no children."
I cried some more and Kleon gathered me into his arms. I leaned my head on his chest, and cried.
"I turn seventeen in two months."
"Born in Hekatombion were you. You never told us that."
"And I will be expected to enter military service."
"Women are not expected to enter service."
"Will some man marry me then?"
He said nothing and just held me. My sadness was overwhelming and I cried some more. He rubbed my back and made quieting noises.
"You would not last a month in the military, lass. It nearly broke me, and I am a mountain of a man, as you've said in the past."
"Put on your shirt. I have those that owe me."
I didn't understand his meaning, but I followed him through the nighttime streets of Athens. He led me to one of the larger houses, and then inside. I hesitated at the threshold, but he took my hand and dragged me bodily across it.
He took me into a room lit with hundreds of lamps. To my dark accustomed eyes it approached the brightness of day.
"Well, Kleon. Brought another of your strays to me?"
"This one is no stray. I need you to examine her for me."
The physician, for that is what I assumed he must be, turned toward me. "Strip lass, so I might get a look at you."
I blushed, but did as I was told. He walked around me, looking at my entire body. He made some measurements, and prodded my breasts a bit.
"Hmmm, very much has the appearance of a female, doesn't she. If she didn't have the one defect, I would be sure."
"Would you be willing to swear before the governor that this person is female?"
The physician look appraisingly at Kleon. "This would square us, you know that. A life for a life."
"Yes, it squares us old friend."
"I'll still look after your strays, you know that. But this would be the last favor."
"Do it then, old friend. It is worth the loss."
"How old are you, my dear?"
"Almost seventeen."
"You're going to have to get her married off, Kleon. She's quite the old maid."
"I'm working on that, old friend."
There was a startled look on the physician's kindly face, and he looked appraisingly at Kleon, "I do believe you might be at that. I will need both of you there to swear before the governor tomorrow."
He took me home to the boat and left me there with my thoughts. I had no idea what was going on, and I didn't believe what I thought I was hearing.
"Kleon, we can't do this. I'm not. . ."
"Shh. We can. I just need to discuss this with your father. I need no dowry."
I began to cry. "My father is dead. It's my fault."
"Shh. Dear. It's all right. Who was your father when he lived."
"Antonius."
"Antonius. . .you don't mean. . ."
"Yes, the former governor from Rome."
"Oh. . .then Antonius, the current governor. . ."
"Is my brother."
"Then we need to meet with your brother before we appear before him to swear to you being a woman."
He dragged me off into the night. I liked the feeling of his strength being exerted over me.
We came to the gates of my home, and he pounded on them until someone answered.
"Go away, we have no need. . .Apollonius? Where have you been lad?"
"We need to see the child's brother."
"It is highly irregular, but he has been looking for this one for months."
I was becoming more and more afraid. These halls were so familiar to me, and I expected to see my father come through a doorway at any moment.
"Apollonius, where have you been? We have been worried sick about you. When father was found dead, we were sure that someone had abducted you."
"Antonius, father tried to castrate me."
"Why would he do that?"
"Because of these."
I dropped my shirt and Antonius couldn't help but stare.
"Ye gods. Is this real or a dream?"
"I have seen no signs of Hypnos anywhere about, brother."
"It would seem that we should rename you Dianna."
"Brother!"
"Thank you sir for returning my brother to us."
"I did not come to return her to you, but to ask for her."
"Her?"
"A physician will be swearing her gender before you tomorrow."
"I see. This isn't some ploy to get a dowry out of me, is it?"
"All I ask in dowry is the girl herself."
"Do you accept this, Apollonius? You know what it would mean, marrying a Greek, and as a woman at that."
"I accept this, brother."
"Then, I'll hear this physician tomorrow. Tonight, though, I witness your betrothal."
I was taken at that point by the slaves so that they could prepare me to appear before my brother's court.
I looked at myself in the bronze mirror when they were done. I could see my mother's features in my face. The makeup I was given accentuated it. I was dressed in a female's toga and sandals.
Then I was rushed to the audience chamber.
It went in a blur, and before I even knew it, the physician was leaving, and many of the people were walking out.
When it was just Kleon and my family, my brother turned to us.
"The dowry you have asked is beyond value. It is everything that I have to give you."
"It is all that I ask. Your sister is the one who will make me a rich man."
"The value is acceptable then?"
"It is acceptable."
"Then accept the dowry."
That was normal for Athens. No formal declaration. I was a woman and married in the same day.
We walked out of my brother's house, and I felt content.
"So, we need a new name for you, since Akakios won't really fit."
"Then call me Akake."
"Akake it is, my innocent one. What should we do today?"
"If we hurry, we can still get the boat to the island before the calm."
My husband, Kleon, took my hand and we ran off to the rest of our lives.
"You're going to be a handful, aren't you, Akake."
"If I have anything to say about it? Of course."
What happens when the closest person to you in the whole universe reveals that she's not who you always thought she was?
"Jake, honey, could you come in here for a moment?"
"Sure thing. Mom."
I dropped my books in the hallway like normal, and went in to see her. Like usual she was baking. She seemed to love to bake in the afternoon when I got home from school, and today it was fresh bread. It seemed like most Mom's these days were either working outside the home, or content to just buy their bread at the store. Mine baked.
I smiled at the thought. A lot of the guys were jealous of me, which is why they would walk home with me. There is nothing like fresh baked bread when you get home from school and something rotten just happened.
There's nothing like warm cookies and milk.
There's nobody in the world like my Mom.
"What's up?"
"Jake, there's something we need to discuss with you, your father and I. We're worried about some of your friends. More specifically, we're worried about some bullying we've heard going on with one of the girls in your class."
"William isn't a girl, Mom."
"Have you been harassing Amy?"
"No, I haven't, but I'm not going to stop it either. That's what he gets for coming to school in skirts and makeup."
My Mom looked really sadly at me, and for a moment I thought she was going to cry. "I thought we'd raised you better than this."
I went out to the living room to play some Halo with my friends, but those words kept echoing in my head, "I thought we'd raised you better than this."
It's not like I actually did anything to her. . .him. . .whatever. It's not like I did anything for her either.
"Guys, I need to get some homework done," I told them not half an hour later. They'd all gotten their dose of bread and I wanted some time to think before my Dad got home.
I went up to my room. The walls were not a single color. They were my masterpiece. Some portions of them were thick with paint as I'd gone over them numerous times trying to get it all just right. I started painting the white walls of my room when I was seven.
Long ago I'd pained the sun rising over some distant hills on the window. Dad had helped me with the right mixture of paint so that it was translucent and lent a yellow cast to my room every morning. The rest of it was roiling clouds that changed as I painted. Someday I hoped to have it perfect, but there always seemed to be something missing, so I pained whenever I needed time to think.
I was on the ladder that I kept in my room to reach the ceiling when my Dad came in.
For the first time there was something other than clouds on my roof. I'd started painting a hole. I could see the blue sky.
"Jake, your Mom and I would like to have a talk with you." He seemed really sad about something.
"Okay, Dad. I'll be right there."
I went downstairs to the dining room and it was full family council mode. Mom and dad were on one side of the table, and I was on the other. Sometimes I wished that they'd been able to adopt more kids so I wouldn't be stuck alone on this side.
"Jake, honey, I'm really disappointed in how you've been treating Amy."
"But Mom. . ." I let a little whine creep into my voice.
"No buts, Jake. Haven't we taught you that everyone deserves a chance to express who they really are?"
"Yes, but. . ."
"And doesn't Amy deserve that sort of chance?"
"I guess. but I haven't done anything."
"Honey, sometimes that's enough. If your father hadn't done anything, I might be dead."
"Wait, what does this have to do with William?"
"I was born male, Jake."
I jumped back out of my chair. I looked from my Dad to my Mom and back again. "You're kidding, right? You're just trying to prove a point? It's not funny!"
My Dad sadly looked at me, "this is no joke, Jake."
"But, how could you be a guy, Mom. You're the perfect Mom. You've always been there for me, and comforted me. All the other guys are jealous of me."
I was hurt and confused. My parents had always let me know that I was adopted and why. Mom couldn't have any kids. They loved me as their own, and I felt that.
I thought I knew my family.
"I've never been a guy, Jake. I was always a girl inside. I never felt right with the world seeing me as a boy. I was about Amy's age when I transitioned myself."
I thought of Mom walking around like William, and suddenly I felt sick. I couldn't take this. I ran to my room and locked the door, and began to paint.
I climbed the ladder, and got out the white, and starting at the center of the two foot hole I'd created, I started to fill in the sky.
She was my Mom
But she was a guy.
I couldn't bring myself to think of her as 'he' even with this revelation. I knew she was a girl. I'd occasionally seen her naked. Not intentionally of course, and not recently. I remembered getting baths as a little guy, and accidentally walking in on her once or twice. She started locking the door on me when I turned five, but that was a Mom thing.
I remembered her bringing cup cakes and cookies to soccer games.
I remembered all of the fresh bread.
I sat down at the foot of the ladder and cried. When I looked up again, I realized that I'd not been painting clouds, but an angel with its arms open to embrace me. The edges were rough so I finished them, and then began to work on the face. I'd tried faces often enough in school, but never on my walls. And in the space I had it wasn't very big. so mostly I just gave the impression of a face, with a beautiful smile.
I lay down on my bed and looked up at her, my angel. When I turned my head one way, it seemed to look like my mother. When I turned my head the other it seemed to look like. . .Amy?
My heart started to race as I sat there and looked up at that beautiful face. Yes, in the quiet of my room I could admit that I thought she was beautiful. I guess that is part of the reason that I'd not done anything for her. I was afraid how the other guys would take it. Afraid they'd think I was into guys or something.
Would that be so bad if it was for her?
I smiled a goofy smile. I didn't even know if she was into guys.
When I was younger, I'd wanted to find someone like my Mom to marry. I always thought that she was perfect.
Maybe now, I would.
"LOKI!"
"Yes, Odin? Great one-eyed god?" And all around party pooper.
"What is this?"
The 'this' in question was of course one of my more clever constructs. The humans all seemed infatuated with it for some reason. Don't they realize it was all a joke? I mean information super highway? Puh-leaze!
"A series of tubes connected with string? Information is piped through them in little trucks too tiny to see. . ."
"I know things, Loki, and trying to convince me that electrons passing along copper wiring are trucks. . ."
"Photons in glass, actually. Most of the internet is fiber-optic these days."
"Regardless. So, this 'internet' is supposed to help us how?"
My, for a god of knowledge, he sure is dense.
"It's supposed to help the humans, not us. We don't much matter any longer."
"What?! How can you say that when we haven't even had our apocalypse yet?"
"We missed the boat on that one, Oady-baby."
"Do I need to remind you the price of insolence?"
"With you sitting here in a three piece suit, and the two of us in middle America? Odin, you're a washed up has-been. Me? I'm a tech magnate, or I was until that whole little anti-trust thing."
"Will you give it up already, Loki? Or do you like 'Bill' better?"
"Watch it. I'm retired. Loki is fine."
"Well, Loki, then as the one with the most real power left, I suggest that you make people believe in us again."
"Odin, it is about time we all faded into the past. I mean do you REALLY want to be around when Thor finally hits theaters?"
"Thor has resurfaced?"
I did a mental face palm at this.
"Okay, Oday. It's time I was going. See you next week, okay?"
I waved to the orderlies and nurses as I left. They recognized me of course, and thought the old man was my father suffering from dementia. Or as you folks like to call it today Alzheimer's.
The thing is, I really used to be Loki. I used to be a god. Notice the small G. I think there might really be a God out there, but if so he has one wicked sense of humor.
So, here I was on a quiet Saturday afternoon, wondering if people reading this in English realize how much the Norse really affected their understanding of the universe, and it sort of hits me: Why can't I do something to help these people?
So, I began scanning through wishes, which as any former god knows are non-denominational prayers.
"I wish I were rich."
Too easy.
"I wish she would notice me."
Too boring.
"I wish I had a $$$$ the size of. . ."
Too blasé.
"I wish I were a girl."
Too. . .wait a minute. Oh, this was going to be fun. Fun like I hadn't had in a gods age.
So, looking in, it was almost perfect. Too perfect. I'd need to verify this one, make sure it wasn't a cross-wiring fluke.
I stepped through the wall into the guys room. "Hi, I'm Loki."
"You look a lot like B. . ."
I interrupt him, "Yeah, I get that a lot. Was the only way I could get you people to construct a joke for me."
"Joke?"
"Sorry, it's Norse thing. You wouldn't get it. You lack the cultural references."
"Okay."
"So, Scott I believe your name was? Right, did you mean what you said back there? You wish you were a girl?"
The big guy blushed. Let me give you a before image of Scotty boy. Big, and I mean Free-Willey big. Greasy long hair. Pimples. Kid can't be more than sixteen. Oh, yeah, and he's destroying a pair of size 6 panties. Unfortunately for me, that's all he was wearing.
"Yeah, I wish I was a girl with all the right clothes so I could feel more like, well, myself."
Himself was a size 6? Wow, and people call me delusional. Oh well.
"I now cede the stage to you, Scott. This is actually your story after all."
I moved toward the window. Moving through walls always gives me a headache.
"Oh, by the way, wish granted."
In this one, I was about three-hundred pounds again. I still had my freckles, but the pimples, which are long gone, were back with a vengeance. My long hair is quite a bit longer than it was back then, when I really wished that I could have been born different.
It was when Bill Gates showed up and looked at my underwear that I realized that I was wearing my sisters panties again.
He said something about being Loki, and granting me my wish.
Let me mention something before I go on. I have felt out of place my entire life. I was always. . .different from my peers. I grew up feeling like I was a girl. Hence all the weird dreams. I was born male, even though most people now find that hard to believe.
I let out a slight moan as I sat up, and two things felt different. The first was that I was a lot lighter than I remembered. The second was that my voice was higher pitched.
I put my hand to my throat, and felt a couple of scratches. I looked intently at my hand, and realized I had perfectly manicured nails. There was a light purple polish on them.
"Okay, that's different." Again, the higher pitched voice issuing from my throat.
"Hey, looks like Scott scored big last night. What's your name, hot stuff?"
"Mark, I am Scott. What are you going on about?"
"Scott doesn't have a pair like that."
Most nights I slept in the nude, and this was no different. I bothered my roomie, Mark, no end. I mostly did it because I had a bit of a crush on him. I wanted some kind of reaction out of him. Anything at all.
I was getting that now in spades. I didn't even try to cover myself, as I was enjoying the reaction my nudity was finally getting.
"Mark, dude, it really is me."
"Prove it."
"How?"
"If you were really Scott, there's no way you'd kiss me."
"Actually, Mark, I've had a crush on you since we moved in here the beginning of freshman year."
"Scott?"
"You knew?"
"Everyone knew, man. I'm not gay, but I was flattered."
"Would you believe that I'm not really gay either? I always thought of myself as female."
"Well, your outside matches now."
I blushed, and for the first time since waking up, I was bothered by my nakedness. I dove under the covers, and hid my face. I felt someone sit down beside me.
Then a hand touched my shoulder.
"I'm sorry, Scott. I didn't mean to embarrass you. I think you are lovely, and I'd really enjoy getting to know you better."
"You mean use me and discard me like all your casual conquests?"
"No. I mean get to really know you. You are one of the smartest people I know, and there's no way I'm going to keep calling you Scott. It's too weird."
"Well, what would you like to call me instead," I said, very shy all of the sudden.
"Well, it's really up to you, but you seem kind of like a Jane or Janet to me."
"I could live with you calling me Jane. But I think I'll take a middle name of Carol."
"Jane Carol Hayward? Sure. Ok, I'm going to leave you in here and you can try and find something of S. . .yours that might fit."
I popped my head out of the covers. "Wait, Mark, please don't go. Turn your back if you mut, but don't leave me here alone."
"This is totally freaking me out, dude. I need some air."
I began to cry a bit, "Please?" I said very softly.
He sighed, "Fine. I'll go look out the window."
I giggled and as soon as his back was turned I went to get a pair of underwear. Where I expected to find boxers, I found lace and satin, with a touch of cotton here and there.
I gasped.
"Jane is something wrong?" Mark said as he began to turn around.
"Mark! No peeking!"
I slipped the panties up my legs and realized that they were hairless. I smiled to myself. They fit perfectly, and the feel of them on my skin was luxurious.
Next to my panties I found some bras. I rummaged through them a little 'til I found a matching pair of light purple with a touch of lace. Same as the panties. In satin like the panties.
"Well, that's convenient."
The second drawer down still had tee shirts, but they were girl's tees.
"What's conve. . .wow."
"Mark!?"
"Sorry, I couldn't help it. Where'd you get the lingerie?"
"My drawer. Apparently my clothing changed as well."
He came and stood next to me and I could feel the warmth of him, and I leaned into him as he looked through my lower drawers. Girl's jeans. A couple of denim skirts.
"Well, get something on. I want to see you in some of this."
I picked a pair of hip huggers and a midriff baring tee. If anything his boxers were even more tented than when I was naked. I smiled, but he didn't notice as he wasn't looking at my face.
"Well, looks like I really did interpret your tastes well from all your conquests."
"Huh? Oh, sorry. You just have a nice wiggle as you're pulling on those jeans."
"You could help me out of them again if you liked."
"Jane!"
"Mark, I have never had sex, not as Scott, and never as Jane, of course. I ache to be a part of a union."
"Jane, I don't. . ."
"Aren't I pretty enough?"
"that is so not it, Jane. You're not the sort of girl I mount and the boot out the door. You're the sort of girl I take home to momma."
"Um. . ."
"Jane, I know you pretty well. You've been there for me, and apart for the nightly strip tease, which never did anything for me, you never pushed your need on me."
"A lot of us knew that you loved me, but we also knew that you respected me too much to do anything about it."
"Mark. . ."
"No, Jane, I can't be worthy of you if I don't show you that same respect."
"Worthy? I don't understand."
"Jane, look, Lately I've been realizing that the main thing that has been missing from all of my relationships was you."
"What?"
"Last night, before we went to bed, I made a wish. I wished that I were a girl for you."
"But, how?"
"I felt that you were such a manly guy, that you never would have changed yourself for me, so last night, I wished that I could change for you."
I couldn't help it. I began to laugh. "Me manly? It was all an act, Mark."
"I know that, now, but I realized that over the last couple of years I've grown from simply your friend, to wanting so much more. I know this is sudden, but on the other hand we've been circling each other since we both arrived."
He dropped down on one knee before me, and from somewhere pulled out a ring box. "Jane Carol Hayward, would you. . ? I mean could you. .?"
I kissed him to shut up his fumbling for the right words.
"Does this mean yes?"
"Of course it does."
He kissed me back, and then put the ring on my finger.
"Originally when I bought it, it was a simple gold band. Looks like all of your clothing changed."
It was a very pretty engagement ring, and I loved how it sparkled on my finger.
"So, can we do this all sooner rather than later?"
"Of course, Jane. We've already been living together for two years after all. Besides, you were always the one with the self control, if we don't get married soon, I think we might end up doing something I might regret."
"Thank you Loki."
"Who?"
"Apparently he invented the internet."
"Loki did?"
"Yeah, Loki. He also granted your real wish. He made me into a woman for you." I smiled up into my fiancé's face, and he kissed me again. Then he lead me for the door.
"Where are we going?"
"My parent's house. I told you that you're the sort of girl that I bring home to mother."
"I'm not wearing anything that would be worthy of meeting your mom."
"Sure you are. Loki made sure of it."
Well, it made me feel strange to see the two of them walk off hand in hand, laughing and generally flirting. I figured it must be a case of heartburn.
Now, who is the next person out there who wishes they were a girl. Or boy. I'm not picky. Just so long as I can get more people to believe.
I was nineteen when I first realized that something was really off about me. Not that other people hadn't noticed it before, but that I'd simply never noticed it about myself.
I was already a poor starving student, which lead to my slight build. Not that I was, or more correctly considered myself, effeminate, just that I was wiry.
I don't now remember where I initially heard about them, but storage auctions were my main source of income. Storage seems to be one of the most commonly rented property in the US. People always seem to have more stuff than they know what to do with, so they rent these garage looking things and just toss it all in there.
Occasionally, people fail to pay their bill, which is where I come in. Once a week, usually Saturday, I would make the rounds of the storage companies to see what was up for auction. Then, when you won, they'd cut the lock and you'd get to see what was there.
Tables and chairs, antiques if you're lucky, and lots of clothing.
I made a pretty good living at it, but most of it went to my schooling. MIT is not a cheap school, and I wasn't quite smart enough to qualify for a scholarship.
Even with student loans, I would need to come up with part of it. Eating ramen noodles I was able to go to school and buy my textbooks and not have to get a loan for school.
I figured that when I finished school, I would be ahead of most of the poor schmucks that would still need to pay off their loans before really living their lives.
Saturday morning, I arrived at one of my more favorite places in the world, or at least for work: Adamantium Secure Storage.
The reason it was my favorite was that I had lucked into antiques the last three times I'd bid here. That had paid off a couple of short term loans I'd taken out, as well as swelled my bank account enough to cover the next two semesters of college. Too bad Adamantium Secure Storage only auctioned once every month or so.
As soon as I had enough saved up to cover the rest of school, I'd either continue working to get me some better food. . .or stop working and pick up a heavier course load to help me finish school faster.
I'd probably opt for the second.
"We're opening the bids for this unit at five hundred dollars. The previous owner opted to insure this unit, and there is a good possibility of a reasonable return."
"500." said a middling pretty, middle aged woman.
Having done this for a while, I knew how to get the amateurs, those who usually made the lowest bid, and stepped up in small increments, to quit or step up.
"1000 dollars."
"1001," again from the woman.
"1500" said Stan, one of the other bidders I was well familiar with.
"1501," from the woman.
"2000," from Stan.
The woman looked nervous. That wasn't normal for a newbie. She had a stake in this. I've got it.
"2001," she finally said. There was hope in her eye.
"5000."
Stan gasped. I'd never made that big a jump, but he wanted a piece of the action.
"5500."
"6000," from the woman. She was starting to get it. But I had quite a bit of savings I could use on this.
"10,000." I said.
The managers eyes bugged out. Stan cursed. The woman teared up a bit, and began to walk away.
The manager cut the lock, and I immediately put on one of my own. I wanted to have the truck I'd rented here so I could start moving things into it. The small crowd of bidders followed the manager to the next unit for the day, and I went out to get my truck.
Opening the storage locker, my eyes were met with stacks of boxes. I'd sort them out later, well, the relatively light ones I would. I kept an eye out for markings of 'fragile' as I moved the boxes into the truck.
Antiques. A lot of them. The other reason I liked Adamantium was the size of their storage lockers. This was one of the largest at fifteen feet wide and thirty deep. I didn't trust myself to move any of this on my own, so I called my antiques broker and then unpacked the moving blankets.
He brought some employees, and we got everything in the van and over to his shop without any new damage. My estimate was a bit high. His appraisal put the total at right around $300,000.
We made the normal arrangement for the usual fee.
I went home, dropped off the boxes, and returned the truck.
I began to go through the boxes, and found clothes. Nice clothes, sure, but probably destined for Goodwill or another charity shop. They were in my size, so I began to look through them determining what I would keep, and what I would donate.
I was about halfway through the boxes when I ran into something truly shocking. There were a pair of breasts in the box, just looking up at me. The box was filed with underwear. Women's underwear.
I picked up the clear plastic bag the breasts were in, and noticed a piece of paper in with them. It was instructions on use. Breast forms.
I dropped them in the box like a hot potato, and moved on to the next box. Blouses and skirts. I opened box after box and found more women's clothing. All in all, only nine boxes had women's clothing in them. I continued to sort the clothing I thought I'd wear. But the feel of those breasts kept coming back to me. I wondered what it would be like to wear some of those skirts as well. Something with a cute matching top. I thought that I'd seen. . .
I shook my head to try and get the images of coordinating tops out of my head, and it worked, mostly, until I finished sorting all of the boxes of men's clothing.
I took a deep breath, and before I lost my nerve, I dove into the first box. I took our the breast forms and a bra and panty set. They were a pretty pink color. Simple high cut cotton panties, and a matching cotton bra.
The panties were easy enough, but the bra gave me a little bit of difficulty. I got it on, and then got the breast forms situated. I picked out a blouse and skirt and slipped them on as well. I went to look at myself in the mirror. The clothing complemented my form, and accentuated the slight widening of my hips. I'd never been a really hairy man, but the hair on my legs was visible, and I hadn't shaved my face this morning either. I quickly shaved both, and looked at myself again. I'd let my hair grow a little long, so I had some there to brush out, and I used some of my roommate's hair spray.
The look seemed to work for me. I air kissed my image and went back to the work of sorting, this time the girl's clothing. I was thinking it might not hurt to find what was still in style and what wasn't.
I heard a lock in the door and assumed that it must be my roommates coming home. I lived with five other guys at the time.
"Hey, babe, is Jake in then?"
I froze. I'd been so comfortable, that I'd forgotten that I was in women's clothing. I turned around shocked.
"Wow, Jake really scored this time. You meet him at the storage place? My name's Brad."
"I know who you are, Brad."
"Do we have a class together?"
I was shocked. "Brad, I'm Jake."
"That explains so much," Seth said.
"Huh?"
"Well, you never wanted to play football with us, and the only other girl out there is butch. "
"But I'm a guy."
"Jake, even if that's padding up top, you never really acted like a guy."
They helped me move the girl's clothing to my room and removed the guy's clothing. They let everyone on campus know that they were there to protect me, like they were my brothers or something. Somehow, it never really bothered me. Transitioning into a girl full time was a blessing, and I used a good portion of my money to complete the change.
The guys don't play football on Saturday any more. I think it's because Brad fancies me. He is over at my new dorm room every night, and maybe I'll have to ask him out, if he won't get up the nerve to do it on his own.
I sat in my room and looked out the window. So many choices lay before me, and I didn't know which one to take.
The past couple of weeks had opened up so many possibilities to my mind, and now, things that I took for granted were no longer the stable and permanent things I thought them to be. It was as if I'd sunk my foundation into bedrock only to find that it was clay instead.
I guess I should start at the beginning of the tale.
I hadn't wanted to go to the sorority party. There were rumors on campus as to how they got new members, since they never participated in rush week. Even so, they had new members every year. They were the only sorority I knew of on campus that even had seniors join it.
I figured that there would be a lot of cute girls there, and being a hot-blooded American male, or so I considered myself, I wouldn't pass up the opportunity to get with a girl or two at a sorority party.
Yes, I was of two minds on the subject. What convinced me to go was the fact that no one I knew was going.
I know, it seems counter intuitive, but there it is.
I'm not explaining this well. I need to go back a couple of days before the party to really give you a feel for what is going on.
I was just getting out of my morning session in the gym when one of the prettiest girls I'd seen on campus walked up to me and handed me an envelope. My name was embossed in gold leaf and it was sealed with a lipstick kiss on the back.
I looked up to ask the girl what this was for, but she was gone already.
"Brian, you coming?"
"Just a minute, Cody." I put the envelope in my gym bag and promptly forgot about it.
I went to breakfast with my friend, and then to the rest of my day. School was pretty normal for me that day. I flirted with my lab partner, Becky, and played some x-box with my roommates to wind down.
I was engrossed in an intense fire fight when one of my friends who wasn't playing tried to get my attention, "so, what do you think about it, Brian?"
"Huh?" I was killed just as I looked up to try to understand the question. "Dude, Steve, what the ****. You just got me killed."
"Sorry, man."
I set down the controller and looked over at him, "now that you have my undivided attention, what did you want?"
"I was just thinking that the four of us should try for a fraternity next fall."
"Why would we do that?"
"Plasma television for one," Cody chimed in.
"Better parties for another," Steven seconded.
Andy just shrugged at me and turned back to the game.
"Guys, we discussed this earlier this year. Two of you chickened out at the last minute."
"Yeah well," Steve said looking at the threadbare carpeting, "I thought it would be worse than it was. Cody and I spent this year checking out the different fraternities and seeing what they expected of new members."
"And now since you have a little knowledge you're less scared?"
"Exactly!" Cody exulted. "We know we can do this."
"Ok, I'm game if you guys are."
With that settled I went back to my game.
I was awakened at two in the morning by my cell phone going off.
"Hello?" I answered groggily.
"Did you get a chance to look over the invitation?" A sultry voice said over the phone.
"Invitation?"
"Amber said that she delivered it to you this morning. We thought you would like the time to think it over."
"Crap. . ."
I fumbled through my things trying to find my gym bag. I reached in and found the envelope.
"Look, can I call you back. It slipped my mind and I haven't had the chance to look at it yet."
"Don't take too long, handsome."
Her voice sent chills down my spine where they settled for a moment before shooting out into my extremities.
I opened the letter and looked over the invitation.
New horizons open with Nu Beta Nu.
A party at Nu Beta Nu and I'd been invited. As far as I knew, the Nu Beta Nu girls went to parties, but never held them at their house.
I spent the next couple of days trying to determine who else would be at the party and I got everything from derision to disbelief in the people I questioned.
Well, everyone except for Becky.
"The Nu Beta Nu parties get pretty wild."
"Huh?"
"Yeah, they are really exclusive as well. Only members of Nu Beta Nu and a few select invitees are allowed to come to them."
"Come. . ."
"Didn't you know? I'm a member of Nu Beta Nu."
Yeah, that was the moment I went from indecisive to 'hell yeah I'm going.'
Becky wasn't, nor would she ever be in my opinion, gorgeous. She was more of a girl-next-door type. Wholesome and cute, with the right amount of sex appeal to remind you that she was all woman.
So, I called the number of my mystery caller right after the lab ended.
"You certainly took your time responding, Mr. Forsythe."
"Sorry, I wanted to see what I was getting myself into. I'm still not sure, but if someone as nice as Becky is a member of your sorority, then I figure I can't go too far wrong."
"Pleased to hear it. We will be by at eight on Friday to guide you to the event."
I dressed in some of my party clothes and played some video games while I waited. It always seemed that I was waiting for someone when I went out on Friday nights.
There was a soft knock at the door and I opened it.
The redheaded Amber and Becky were at the door.
"Hey, Becky. I'm ready when you are."
"We just need you to put this on." She handed me a black blindfold, which I put on with a little thrill of anticipation.
When I was done, and they were sure I couldn't see anything, they each took me by the hand and led me out into the night.
If you've never been led around a college campus on a Friday night by a couple of beautiful women, then you should try it some time. I was having some difficulty walking by the time we stopped walking, due to the tightness in my jeans.
"Step up here," I heard Becky say, and with only a couple of stumbles I got up a short flight of concrete stairs. Then I smelled perfume and wax and a door closed behind me.
"Step up again," Becky said, and we headed up a much longer set of wooden stairs. One of the girls was pressed to my front, and the other was behind me. I could only assume that it was a narrow staircase.
I was ushered into another room, one that echoed slightly, and brought to a halt. I could hear the rustling of dresses and the shuffling of feet. I had no idea what I was in for, but I would soon find out.
"Gentlemen, welcome to the inner sanctum of Nu Beta Nu." It was the voice from the phone. It was even more sexy now.
"I want to let you know that everything you do from this point forward will have to be your choice. Some of you we know belong here in Nu Beta Nu. Some of you, on the other hand, we're not quite as sure about. Our sisters have scouted each of you out, and we've selected the thirteen students who have the opportunity to join our ranks this year."
"I haven't been a gentleman for quite a while," a feminine voice said from somewhere to my left.
"Samantha, we know. I was mostly saying this for the other guests. And before you ask, no you can't take the blindfold off yet. We have rituals to go through, the same each of us went through in the beginning."
"Um, rituals?" This was asked by another voice, this one definitely male.
"Nothing like you're obviously thinking Robert. We do everything here in a certain order. It protects our sorority, and in turn allows us to protect our sisters."
She paused for a moment as if trying to find her train of thought, and then continued, "As I mentioned before all of this is voluntary and at no point will that change. This is our initiation and pledge all in one. You are being offered a place with us."
"Wait, what?" I think that was me, but a number of the guys spoke up at this.
We quieted down a bit and someone yelled into the silence, "boys don't join sororities!"
There was general giggling at this. It was at that moment that I realized we were surrounded by girls.
"At one point every member of Nu Beta Nu stood where you stand now. We did our weekend trial and then joined the ranks of the sisterhood. We have never had every member of a pledge join us. The most we've had is five, and once we had an entire pledge group fail to complete the weekend."
She paused for effect before continuing, "before you decide, let me explain the nature of this weekend to you all. It is an opportunity for you to see what life is like from a different perspective."
"Does that mean you're all gay?"
"Of course not. Many of us are hetero. Only a few of us like girls."
There was chuckling and giggling at this.
This was a different world than I'd ever thought I'd be in. It scared me shitless.
"You will be spending the entire weekend with the sister, or sisters, that guided you here. They are your sponsors. At some point they may decide that you just don't fit with the precepts of Nu Beta Nu. At some point you may decide that the precepts don't fit you."
"This is a weekend of discovery for all of you, and we hope that you enjoy it while it lasts.
"Girls, if you'll please escort our new ladies to your rooms, we can begin."
I heard a few minor protests, but everyone went peaceably, or at least so it seemed. I was still blindfolded.
I felt when we entered the room. I could just sense the pink. It was strangely comforting, and relaxing. Course it might have just reminded me of my older sisters room, at least by the smell.
"We need for you to remove your clothing and then we'll present you with your name for the weekend." Amber said.
"Name?"
"Every girl needs a name, Brian. For the weekend, you will be a girl," Becky said into my ear.
I was in a room with two women, and they'd just asked me to remove my clothing. Of course I complied.
I wasn't a god, but neither was I ashamed of my physique. I was a little small for a guy at 5'8", but that didn't really matter much to me. I'd always been able to find girls shorter than I was.
They measured me, and I felt myself becoming aroused at the contact. This was the sexiest. . .anything I'd ever been to. Even if I left here this evening before anything else happened, this would be a memory that I carried with me forever. One that would be in my dreams forever.
The door opened and closed. I felt something pressed against my chest and I took hold of it. It was a silky material of some sort.
"Put this on, Chastity. Becky's gone to get you something to wear for the evening after we've finished with you." Her voice didn't quite match her face, but it was still pretty. She sounded as if she'd be an alto if she sang.
"Chastity?"
"It's your name, isn't it?"
"Yeah, I guess," I said trying to make my voice sound a little higher pitched. She giggled at me. "What's your name?" I asked.
"Amber."
I mentally face palmed myself for that one. I'd heard her name before.
"Is that the name they gave you when you came here?"
"No, my parents named me Amber."
"Um, but. . ?" My confusion was evident.
"My parents are of the opinion that children don't get the option to pick their names, so when I told them what I was planning on doing, they told me that my name was going to be Amber if I went through with it. I did, and now it is."
My parents. I'd been so aroused that I hadn't been thinking clearly. I take that back. I was thinking clearly, just not about anything other than sex with two beautiful girls.
I had no idea what my parents would think about this. Neither could I believe that I was taking any of this seriously.
"How come you sound so natural?"
"Lots of practice. And voice lessons. I always had a slightly higher pitched voice, so that came in handy when I went through my transition, but learning the way a girl speaks didn't hurt."
"The way a girl speaks?"
"If you haven't noticed, men and women speak differently from each other, for the most part. Learn the mannerisms and you learn the part."
"You sound like my high school drama teacher."
"I am a drama major. I played Juliette last semester."
"No kidding. . ."
"Chastity, Amber, it sounds as though you two hit it off." Becky said as she entered the room.
"When can I take the blindfold off?"
"When we are done with everything but your face."
That didn't really answer my question, but I let it slide for now.
"At each stage of this process, we give you the option to go no further. This has to be your choice, Chastity."
"Ok, Becky. What's first."
"We wax your legs."
"You what?!"
"Oh, don't be a baby. We know you're a swimmer and shave your legs before every meet. This is just a little more than that."
I closed my eyes, even thought they were blindfolded, and nodded. "Go ahead."
I have to admit that I was intrigued. Yes, like she'd said, I was a swimmer, and I shaved my legs before meets. Well, not only that, I shaved every inch of hair on my body before a meet. Head to toes. I'd even considered getting a Brazilian. . .
I felt something being spread on my leg, and enjoyed it for a moment. . .before it was ripped off. I would never suggest a girl get her legs waxed. . .ouch. . .again.
I winced every time that the wax went on my legs, but I was determined not to make a sound. They finished the backs of my thighs and buttocks and moved down to my calves. They then flipped me over and worked their way up. They were completely thorough and removed every scrap of hair, or so I thought, from my neck down. By the time they were done, the room felt a lot colder, and the robe I'd been handed earlier felt a lot better against my skin.
They then sat me in the chair and worked on my hands and feet. I began to get into the chatter, and they began to instruct me in the fine art of sounding like a girl.
It was kind of fun. I could see why some businessmen liked manicures.
I smelled the chemical smell of nail polish, and knew what was coming next, but they asked me anyway.
"Chastity, may we paint your fingernails and toenails?"
"Yes, Becky, you may."
They painted my nails, and let them dry before they went on to the next task.
"May we put underwear and breast forms on you, Chastity?"
"Yes." I tried this time to sound as feminine as I could. I think I did a passable job.
I felt something being slid up my legs, and just before it was pulled into place, one of the two tucked my willie between my legs. The panty was snugged into place, and the growing erection had nowhere to go.
It was a bit uncomfortable for a moment, but then I took a deep breath and relaxed. It slowly went away.
I felt something cool being put on my chest, and then the straps of a bra were put into place.
They removed the blindfold, and I could see the room for the first time. Yep, pink.
My fingers were in a sort of mint green, but I couldn't see my toes in the position I was sitting. They began to work on my face. More waxing. My facial hair and some of my eyebrows went this time. Then they really went to work.
They worked on my makeup, putting it on, and then taking it off, looking for my colors I supposed. Eventually they decided that they had it just right. They stood me up and took off the bathrobe from around my shoulders. They carefully pulled a nightgown over my head, and then touched up my makeup for me. Last, they put a wig on my head and got it situated just so. They pinned it in place with bobby pins, and then turned me to see myself in the mirror.
I was at least as good looking as either of the girls standing next to me. I made a kissing face at the mirror, and the three of us giggled. They helped me to remove the makeup, and the three of us collapsed on the pillows on the floor.
They spent a while telling me their stories, and I told them about my sister.
We were the best of friends while I was growing up, even though she'd been ten years older than me. No, I'd never thought about trying on any of her clothing. That was her stuff, and snot nosed brothers just didn't do that.
I'd had a special relationship with my sister, and it was a really hard think for me when she'd died her first year of college. Her name had been Chastity.
"We can change it if you want. None of us here knew."
"No, it's alright. I don't mind it that much."
We went to sleep cuddled on the floor. I had some very vivid dreams that night, most of which seemed to involve either Becky, Amber, or both. We needed to change my panties the next morning.
The rest of the weekend progressed as more of the same. Time with Becky. Time with Amber. We even went shopping at the mall. While we were there, a guy I'd seen once or twice at the college walked up to us.
"You seem really familiar to me. I've seen you a couple of times in the mall today, and I just can't place where I know you from."
"I'm attending the college. The same one you are."
"You're not going to give me any more than that, are you?"
I just shook my head and smiled at him.
"Well, the least you can do is let me take you on a date tomorrow night."
I was about to say no, but Becky spoke up before I could say anything, "She'd love to."
"Yes, I'll go with you tomorrow night."
"It's a date then."
"What are you doing?" I asked as soon as he'd walked away.
"Not all of us get the opportunity to try dating before the end of our weekend. It's a perfect way to get the whole experience."
"What if I would prefer to be a lesbian?"
"Well, that's just something that you'll have to figure out, but don't shut yourself off to possible experiences."
The look in her eyes, though, told me something different. She had sponsored me because she liked me as a person, and wanted to see if me being a girl would spark a more physical attraction for her. Apparently it did.
"Becky, if you'd prefer. . ."
"Oh no, you go on this date. Please? It is a really special moment for any girl. Her first boy/girl date."
"Okay. I'll do it for you."
We went back to shopping, only this time we had a purpose. We were looking for the perfect outfit for tomorrow. We got heels and a dress, and for a moment I even considered getting my ears pierced. That was just a bit further than even I was willing to go for a girl.
We went back to the chapter house, and I spent the rest of Saturday, and most of Sunday, working on my mannerisms. It was a crash course on girl.
He came to pick me up, and he was a perfect gentleman. He held the door for me, and sat me at the table. It was. . .a very special evening. Becky had been right. I flirted with him, and even held his hand briefly during the movie. When he put his hand on my knee I disengaged. He removed his hand from my knee, but I didn't hold his hand for the rest of the movie. He was still pleasant to be with.
It was like being out with the guys, but with an added zing of sexuality mixed into it. I have to admit I kind of liked it.
When he dropped me off at the Nu Beta Nu chapter house, we talked for a bit, and then he kissed me. I let him, but I didn't reciprocate. I wasn't sure what I wanted from it all.
"So, how was it?" Becky asked as soon as I got back up to the room.
We rehashed the date, and I told her about the kiss.
"Was it anything like this?"
She kissed me full on the lips, and this time I didn't even hesitate to reciprocate.
We kissed for a while before a breathless Becky pushed back. "So, was it?"
"Nothing like that, Becks. Nothing at all." I sighed, and both of us giggled. I changed out of my girly clothes, and back into the clothes I'd worn on Friday when I first arrived. I cleaned off the makeup. I put the blindfold back on. I got a bit of a wedgie from my boxer shorts without the normal friction from the hair. I had to keep picking it out, all the while wondering idly if this is what a thong felt like.
"Gentleman, and lady, you are the only ones who are left with us after the weekend. You now have a decision to make. Join Nu Beta Nu, or go back to the rest of your life. Your escorts will lead you back to your rooms throughout campus. We give you to the end of the week to make your decision."
They led me back to my room, and I went about my normal week, with one minor exception. There were more giggles between Becky and I during our labs. More overt flirting, and some slight touching.
The time of the deadline came upon me before I knew it.
I sat in my room and looked out the window. So many choices lay before me, and I didn't know which one to take.
Edited by the ever patient Julia Phillips.
Some things in this world are easy decisions to make, and some on the other hand are not so easy.
I had always considered myself to be the consummate actor, able to play any role. Unfortunately the critics never agreed with me. They thought me wooden and lackluster. Or they thought me to be melodramatic and over exuberant.
The only thing they really agreed on was that they thought I stunk like week old beef in the hot Texas sun.
If you couldn't hear it, yes, I have a Texan accent. It doesn't usually come through in what I write, but listen closely, and you might just hear it.
Since few of you will remember me from the show, since even fewer of you watched it, I will take a moment to tell you a little about myself. First, let me assure you, that contrary to the rumors. . .you know what. I'll begin at the start of the tale and work my way from there.
I was married, and I loved my wife more than life itself. That was never more apparent than when I was looking down the barrel of my shotgun and considering how I was going to pull the trigger while pointing it at my head.
She was dead and the only thing in this world I wanted was to join her.
We wrote our own personal vows. We had promised that we would be joined for eternity. I told her I would never love another woman as long as I lived, and I intended to live up to that promise.
Some would say that I was too young to get married. Too young to know what love is. In my opinion, nineteen is not too young.
Sixteen isn't too young either.
The teen who was driving the vehicle that broadsided us was only sixteen. Aimee and I were both twenty three.
I visit him periodically to see how he's doing. I think he is more surprised by my change in circumstances than even I am.
So, back to me in a darkened apartment, my wife's clothing spread around me, the fifth of scotch empty on the floor, and the TV blaring in the other room in a probably futile attempt to drown out the gunshot.
That's when I heard the commercial. Everyone in the Dallas area will have heard it, as well as people living in any of the other sixteen markets where it aired, but for those of you who didn't hear it, I relate it here.
"Ladies! Reality TV producer Mark Shurtleff is looking for the most lovely single ladies for the opportunity of a lifetime. Do you have what it takes to be the next reality TV star? Do you want to be on a show similar to the Bachelor or Joe Millionaire? If you said yes then contact us now at the number 707-555-1432. Only the first thousand callers will have the opportunity to sit in a screening with Mark to see if you might just be the next reality TV star."
I admit. I was drunker than a skunk and as nervous as a whore in church when I made that call. Now, I have a natural tenor voice, and I played my share of female roles up on the boards, so I put on my best lady Macbeth, without the horrible British accent, and said, "I saw your commercial on TV and I was wondering if I might have been one of the first thousand callers."
"Miss, if you look anything like you sound, then there should be a spot for you. We are obligated to ask if you are now married, or if you are in a long term relationship and may become married within the next six months." The woman on the phone sounded like a bit of a hag. I imagined her to be overweight with wiry gray hair, and red lipstick.
"No, I'm not married, and I'm not in any sort of relationship at the present time."
"Perfect. What's your name, hun?"
"Your name?"
Name, name, name. . .crap! I looked at my DVD collection and the first thing that came to eye was my director's cut of Barbarella.
"Barb. . .ara"
"I need your last too name, honey."
Frantic I looked around, and there was my empty bottle of scotch on the floor. "Scott. My name is Barbara Scott."
"Ok, Barbara, I have an opening tomorrow at five, can you be here?"
"Sure, I can be there."
"Great, and wear something slinky and sexy. The producer will likely want to see how much fire you can ignite on the small screen." This last was said in a bored manner, as if she were reading from a script. For all I knew that is exactly what was happening.
It might have stopped there had I not lay back on the bed and felt my wife's clothing against my bare back. She'd loved the feel of satins and silks and I'd covered our bed with them for my final moments.
But what if I could keep them close to me for a longer period?
Well, this role would take more than just tossing on clothing, or I would look like nothing more than a man in a dress. It would take preparation.
My last role was in the film "Huguenot." I'm not surprised if you never heard of it, since I heard it ended up going direct to DVD. The reason I mention it is that I was required not to cut my hair during the entire two years we were filming. It was a contract thing. It was a bone of, mild, contention with my wife and I. She was upset that it had grown almost twenty inches in two years. So, after filming, I got it trimmed, but no more than that.
That was almost six months before this point, so my hair was just over two feet from root to tip.
That put it just below my shoulder blades.
Long hair, check. It needed some styling, but I could hit a salon tomorrow on my way to the audition.
Hmm, I had facial hair, so that would have to go. I went into the bathroom, and reached for my razor when another thought hit me. I'd have to shave my entire body if I wanted to make this work. Or, I could do something a little more daring.
I picked up the phone again, "Hello, Julia."
"Donnie? What's wrong?"
"I'm drunk as a skunk. I just contemplated shooting myself with my shotgun. I have an audition tomorrow at five."
"Ooookay. Donnie, you know that Aimee was a friend of mine. Why don't I come over. . ."
"No, I wanted to know if I could come in."
"Um, I only service women, Donnie."
I snickered at that, I don't know why. "I know that, Julia. I need to be a woman for my audition."
"Donnie. . ."
"I know. It sounds crazy, and it probably is, but I thought it would keep me closer to Aimee, and I'm drunk. Did I mention that? And so I figured that I'd get a full Brazilian, and. . .I don't know."
"Ok, look Donnie. I figure that you're to drunk to know what you're asking me to do, but if you haven't sobered up, and if you pay me $120 up front, then I'll give you the wax, for Aimee's sake."
"Okay, I'll come right over."
"My last customer leaves at three. Come in about three thirty."
"Okay, Julia." I giggled again.
I figured her sober comment for a challenge so I went and got my last fifth out of the fridge and I finished polishing it off about two thirty. When I couldn't find my keys for ten minutes, only to realize they'd been in my hand the entire time, I figured that it was time to call a cab.
I'd called for cabs a lot to get home because I was too drunk to drive, but this would be the first time I called for one to leave home because I was too drunk to drive.
I giggled at the thought and waited for the cab on the curb.
I was dropped off at Julia's, yes that is the name of her establishment, at three twenty five, and I went and knocked on the door.
I was amazed I was even upright after the amount of alcohol I'd consumed in the last twelve hours. She got me into the room, and stripped me down. I was so sauced that I either couldn't feel it, or I didn't care. She left me the hair on my head, and a landing strip.
I must have paid, as she performed her duty, although to this day I don't remember having done so. Then she bundled me out the back and up the stairs to her apartment, I presume to sleep it off.
I remember her making a comment about me having drunk too much to be useful to her. I made a joke about scotch being the anti-Viagra which she laughed at. I remember glancing at the clock and seeing that it was five before I lost all consciousness.
I woke up the next morning with no clear recollection of what I'd done, and feeling strangely comfortable in my own skin for the first time in a while. The bedding felt really nice on my skin as I got up to use the restroom.
I was standing over the toilet, still waking up, when I really looked down at my legs for the first time. The really looked good. I wondered what woman was standing in the bathroom with me.
I was still half asleep at this point, but I woke up quickly enough when I realized the woman in the bathroom was me.
"What in the heck did I do last night?"
"Not enough, Donnie."
Julia came into the bathroom wearing a smile. She had a gorgeous body, but I didn't have it in me to love her.
Then something occurred to me, "We didn't, I mean you and I weren't"
"No, we didn't, Donnie."
"Oh, thank god." I smiled in relief, "That would have been a mistake."
Her eyes flashed in anger and she began hitting me. "Get out of my house, you bastard. Get the hell out of my house."
I ran out of there in my boxers and undershirt. I left my wallet and everything else in her house. I turned to walk back up to get them and she threw my pants down the stairs at me.
I slipped on my pants, and walked barefoot to the nearest payphone.
Now, I had a splitting headache, and the sunrise that chose that moment to start did so maliciously. I squinted against the glare, and called a cab first, and then my favorite person in the world.
I had worked with him off and on since my first slasher film "Sorority House Murders III," as 'unnamed dead male teen number 14'. Or was it 15. It's been four years, and I don't specifically remember. There was some confusion on set about that as well. Hey, it was my first movie as an "adult".
He'd done an excellent job on my prosthetics though, and I really enjoyed sitting in his chair while he worked me over.
Karl had told me to come on over to his studio and they'd work me in.
The cab pulled up in front of the converted warehouse. I paid the cabbie and got out.
"Donnie, up for another role that they need to you come in makeup for?"
"You could say that."
I explained my plan from yesterday, what I remembered of it, and as I was telling him I had no idea why I was still going through with it.
"So, how heavy are we going?"
"You're the expert. I need to pass up close and personal. I have to look 'hot'. We have to be able to apply it quickly and it has to last, I figure, 24 to 36 hours at a time."
"Sounds like you want me to use Second Skin."
"Huh? Never heard of that before."
"You wouldn't. People are still married to foam rubber or latex or silicone. That and this stuff costs about eight thousand dollars per cubic foot."
I still had eighty thousand dollars in my bank account.
"I can cover ten cubic feet, anything beyond that. . ."
"With Second Skin we don't need to worry. It has been tested for up to six months continual use."
"It doesn't have to be reapplied?"
"The material lasts that long, even the edges. Not the glue."
I laughed at myself for that one.
"Basically, we use the right glue and you will be able to do pretty much anything except for go swimming. I have some ideas of glues that might even overcome that."
"So, what's the plan?"
"Well, we'll have to go with your breast forms from 'The Transsexual Stalker,' for today, I even have one of your bras from the movie. I can get sculpting for the Second Skin prosthetic right away. I have a life cast of your face and torso still, so I should be able to come up with something really good."
The breast forms he was talking about had been cast in silicone and matched my skin tone perfectly. They fit my chest wall like a glove thanks to the life cast of my torso, and in fact was the reason the life cast of my torso had been done. They had to look like my real breasts on screen, and you can even see about thirty seconds of 'nudity' with them fully exposed. For those of you with a morbid curiosity the scene runs from 1:21:42 to 1:22:11. I think it might even be on Netflix.
I even wore them home for a little role play with my wife during shooting once. That is one of my fonder memories with Aimee.
See, I wasn't worried about my top. It's the down below that worried me.
I was still worried about it when Ilene walked into the room. I had one on and one off at the time, and she did a double take of my body. "Damn, Darko, you had a lot more body hair the last time I saw you in that chair getting that prosthetic attached."
She is punishing like that. I think it was a reference to how often I got horror roles. I first met her when I played the monster in "Catastrophic Failure." Well, you know what I mean if you've seen the film. If you haven't then all I can say is: not my best work. She usually handles 'Special Wardobe.'
"Donni will need a gaffe, and if you could show him how to wear it."
"Sure think, honey."
They got married shortly after "Catastrophic Failure." Ilene was hands on like that. Not that she really thought anything of it, just that she liked to show rather than tell.
So, he attached the breast forms to my chest, and I felt their familiar weight again. Hey, I spent three years, off and on, filming that movie. When all was said and done I'd spend almost six months total wearing them.
The slightest smudge of makeup and the line completely disappeared. There wasn't even enough there to really transfer to my clothing. These, unfortunately, would be a one use appliance. Unfortunately the really good silicone prosthetics were all one use.
I slipped into my red satin and black lace bra and settled my babies in place. I was starting to feel it again, and let my hips gently way as I went in search of Ilene.
Now, I've since done a little research online, and there is little in common between what she fitted to me and the undergarment of the same name. They did the same job, but what she fitted onto me was a flesh-toned entrapment device designed to go seamlessly under another pair of underwear.
It went on, during which procedure I paid close attention so I could do it next time, and then slipped on a pair of satin panties that matched my bra.
I stepped out to go find a mirror. I was frankly a bit surprised, not that I should have been. I'd gotten a number of roles because of my effeminate looks.
My face was on that body, but it wasn't me. I felt myself becoming aroused, but the gaffe held everything in place with only minor discomfort.
"There's no way I'm letting you out of here in what you came in wearing. It would be indecent."
"I have just the thing for him, honey."
"Wait, I wanted to wear one of Aimee's dresses for this."
"That can come later, when you land the role. Ilene is right. We need you in something that kills them dead."
Words almost fail me when describing this dress, but I'll try. Black. It had a turtle neck that covered me to my jaw line, but left my shoulders and back. It had a keyhole in the front. It was long enough, barely, that it still covered my panties when I sat, but not from a shallow angle.
I was sad to take off the bra, as it was one of my favorites, but for that dress, I would do just about anything.
"What are your plans for face and makeup?"
"Well, I thought I would do my own makeup and then a salon for my hair."
"There's no way that Barb is going anywhere the first time without the full treatment." Kirk said.
"Um. What?"
"Look, two appliances will cost you between $12k and $18k. Professional make up application and training will cost you another $5K. Diction, speech, and behavior training another $5k. We might go with a little cosmetic surgery, like your Adam's Apple, but yours is hardly noticeable in the best circumstances, and it will require recovery time that we don't have. That could be a little expensive, but from my figures, worst case, that leaves you with more than $50k for the surgery."
"What are you going on about?"
"Look, do you want to simply enter this contest, or do you want to win it?"
"Well, I guess win it."
"Then you need to be the most feminine girl possible, period. You have to think woman, eat woman, be woman."
I thought about things I'd gone through in my life trying to prove I was a man. I thought about failed relationships and nights alone crying until I'd met Aimee, who actually asked me to marry her. Would it be so bad to be the woman for a while, or even to admit that it was more me than this male facade I'd presented to everyone else?
I took a deep breath and smiled, "Let's do this."
The rest of the day was a whirlwind of activity as Karl and Ilene called in the experts. I got crash courses in diction and poise. Walking in heels. My hair was impeccably styled, and my makeup was applied to perfection. At four we did last look in front of the mirror, and I was impressed. Really impressed. I didn't recognize myself at all.
Instruction on how to touch up my makeup were given and a leather clutch thrust into my hands.
Then I was out the door and into the back of Karl's car.
We drove over to the location where the audition would be, and realized that it was a cattle call.
"Crap, I'm not ready for this. I have no ID or guild number or anything."
"Look in the clutch."
You called in Giorgio didn't you?" I said looking at the contents.
Movies attracted some of the strangest people you would ever imagine.
Giorgio was unique even amongst all this variety. As far as I was aware I was the first person to use one of his props in a real life situation. Basically Giorgio was the guy that shows like CSI or Castle called when they wanted a realistic looking ID.
Giorgio also has a consulting job with the FBI teaching how to spot fake IDs and describing the processes used to create them.
I hadn't noticed them taking a photo of me, but there was Barb Scott looking back at me in a traditionally bad DMV photo.
They even gave me a new birthday to make me seem a little younger. Okay, I could work with that. I wear my heels to look taller, because I want to be noticed. I'm afraid of the notice at the same time. Texan to the soles of my shoes. Smart? Yeah, smart. No ditz here.
I walked in and the moment I started walking I became Barb. There would be no calls of cut here. I could not break character for a moment.
"I walked confidently into the building, and then stopped for a moment as if looking around. Act a little startled that there are so many people. . .yes, receptionist there.
Hmm, if that's the woman from the phone she is fairly good looking. Got the wiry gray hair and red lipstick though.
I walked up to her stopped for a moment waiting for her to notice me, and then cleared my throat softly.
She looked up, and then did a double take. "Hi," I said with what I hoped was a blinding smile, "I'm Barbara Scott? I had an appointment for an audition?"
"Hi, Barbara. I actually thought you were pranking me and were actually a drunk man."
I blushed at that, as it was in character, and I really was a bit embarrassed.
"Well, hey, people tell me that I sound like a fat old woman over the phone. I think you out-did me for difference in appearance. Look, after this is over, want to get a drink?"
My mouth dropped open a little.
"All the hot ones are hetero. Mores the pity. If you're ever curious. . .well, this is what's called a cattle cal, sweetie. Mostly their just going to want you to get up there and look pretty, but you've got that in spades, hun. They might want you to say something. If they do they'll ask you a question. Think of it pageant and realize that sometimes 'world peace' is the best answer. Better to look inscrutable than stupid."
I'd never had anyone help me this much at a cattle call before.
She must have seen my confusion and misread it, thankfully, because she continued. "Hey, don't worry, hun. You'll do fine. Just try not to make everything a question, okay?"
"Okay. Thanks for the help."
"You're welcome. Good luck, Barbara."
"I prefer Barb."
"Good luck, Barb. Heat through the door right there and get in line. They'll give you a number as you get closer."
I have to say that I felt sorry for everyone else the moment I stepped through the door. Not a single one of them had even close to the same preparation as I'd had. Most of them had thrown some little black dress from the dark recesses of their closet with their best three year old makeup and a scrunchie in their hair.
There were a few that showed preparation and a salon hairstyle.
There was only one other girl who I was worried about. That was because I could tell that she'd had professional help for today's meeting as well.
She was also the only other girl here who wore a backless dress. Hers was red though.
I ignored her as we wound our way back and forth through the studio until I was ten people away from the stage.
"You'll be 496."
"Thanks!"
"Don't mention it."
While the other girls were watching their competition, I did what I always did. I watched the judges. No matter what you call them, when you're at an audition you are being judged. The secretary, or receptionist, or whatever had given me some key pieces of information as well.
I read their body language, watch what they responded too. I had most of what I needed on my body. The rest would have to be my act.
"Next."
And I was up.
"Wow, there's a lot of you out there."
And then I flashed my smile. That smile would come to be one of the biggest draws that they had for the show.
"Ok, so 469, You're trying out for a show called the Real Prince Charming. Basically, what we're looking for is girls who look good on screen but also come across as being genuine. This is more than just a pairing contest, though. There will be sixteen men as well as sixteen women. Only one of these men is the catch he appears to be, and it will be through the choices the women make that will slowly eliminate them as well as the fake princes.
"How would you determine who the real prince charming was amongst so many?"
"Whether or not a man is a good catch is not about his appearance or the size of his wallet. It's about who he is as a person and how he treats others when he doesn't believe he is being watched. I would need to talk to him one on one, and listen to what the other girls thought of the matches."
"Anything else?"
Think fast, they're bored. . .
"You can tell a lot about a man by the way he kisses you, and how he treats you when you decline a kiss."
"Thank you 469, you may go."
That perked up their interest. It would also get me the nickname of the Ice Queen.
I headed toward the back entrance when I was stopped by one of the omnipresent techs and given an envelope.
I waited 'til I got outside before I opened the envelope. It was an invitation to be on the show, as well as a contract for my agent to look over and fax in. Should I choose to be on the show I was under a non-disclosure agreement until the show aired or a period of two years had passed from the date of the end of production.
Standard reality TV stuff. I was an alternate for Survivor a few years ago. As Donnie of course. No one decided to drop out before filming, mores the pity.
Filming would begin in two months. I opted for laser hair removal instead of plastic surgery.
Well, you all know what happened on the show, or at least most of you do. I'll give the short version for anyone who didn't catch "the scandal."
So, basically each week each of the girls tried to pick Prince Charming. They boys would go through a contest of one sort or another. You know, feeding the homeless, animal rescue, that sort of thing. They were on camera the whole time, but unbeknownst to most of us, so were all the girls when watching this. That was how they chose who would be eliminated. One or two girls caught on early, and tried to swing it to their advantage.
Anyway, the top 'winners' of the competition were safe from elimination, but we weren't told who won until after we made a pick.
The supposition was that Prince Charming would always win these contests of character.
So, we would be told who the top contestants were, and then who the bottom contestant was. I still laugh when I remember when Brianna, Katie, and Susan all picked Aaron when he was the 'bottom' guy in the contest. I found out later they'd been trying to eliminate Brianna that day, the other two just picked the wrong guy.
And I'm sure you all remember the scene where James grabbed me and jumped into the pool. That was one of the more scary moments of my life, and I didn't act my anger at him. I really thought I was undone.
So, I'm sure all of you remember how I picked Sean every time. That's because I saw his heart that first day before we began filming. A lot of the other guys were acting like prigs or prima donnas. Not Sean. He held the door for all sixteen of us, and thanked us individually for coming. Yeah, he really was that sweet.
The other girls kept seeing the chemistry between the two of us and steering clear. Each of them had their own agenda. Their 'plan' for the game.
I was letting the sweetest guy in the world woo me.
Since it never aired due to concerns about its content, I'll share the final choice with all of you. You can watch it on you tube, though, or hulu. If you remember we ended up with three girls and five guys.
Amanda, the girl in the red dress from the cattle call, chose James. She'd been having sex with him for the week prior to that, which they never let anyone know. I told her she was an idiot for giving it up which sparked our now famous catfight.
Tamara chose Colin. She's a lesbian by the way and had planned on telling that to Prince Charming if she ended up with him.
It was revealed that not only was Sean a nice guy, but a real prince.
I felt like such a heel revealing that I was a man. My statement shocked everyone and they demanded I prove it. They shut of the cameras at that point and I stripped.
Tamara actually asked me for my number. I think she liked the idea of a girl with a living dildo.
Oh, sorry, I've got to call this short. My husband just called me from the other room, and I think I've got exactly what he wants. I did get my surgery five months ago after all.
There's the rest of the story as used to be said on the radio. Oh, did I actually marry Sean as has been rumored all over the internet recently?
No, I married my real prince, Mark Shurtleff. How else do you think I scored the lead role in 'Sorority House Murders IV"?
It wasn't all for money. I do love him.
You've got to remember I'm not quite the cold-hearted bitch I was portrayed as on TV. I managed to keep my promise to my wife, and still find another love for my life.
I stood at the top of the escalator and took a deep breath. I allowed the steady stream of passengers to bypass me, for which I got a few strange, and a couple of hostile, looks.
Of course, that could also have been because of my American clothing. There is a distinct difference between clothing purchased in Russia with a foreign style, and clothing purchased in another country.
Wearing a dress didn't help. Sure, it helped me, but not the situation.
I knew this escalator, one might say intimately. In the mid 90s I'd gone down it a number of times. The problem was that I was wearing sensible male shoes and a suit when I did.
That's not the real problem. The real problem was the length of the escalator, and the speed of descent.
I'm not explaining this well.
Russians do not stand on escalators in the metro. There are two reasons for this: They move too slowly for a person to ride their sedate pace and still make their connecting train, and they are as likely not to be moving at all as they are to be moving.
So, you get used to, well, flying down the escalators. Did I mention they are steep?
The one I was looking down right now dropped about a mile in the period that it moved forward a quarter that distance. I may be exaggerating, but only a very little. Exaggerating the length, not the angle.
Why did I have to wear heels today?
I wasn't worried about going down on tiptoe. That was my normal mode of descent when I'd been here before. Sort of a controlled fall down the face of this almost cliff. You hit each step with your toes, just exerting a bit of control as you fly.
Falling with style and grace.
But never in three inch heels. I may have had my heel lifted as I did it in the past, but probably never more than one or two inches.
I'd started the day wanting to emphasize the changes to the friends I would be visiting, and now here I stood in the middle of a transit between the green and brown lines and wondering what I'd gotten myself into.
I took a deep breath. . .and got into the slow lane. I was in the midst of grandmothers and small children.
I took my steps one at a time, and ached to be joining the flow traveling downward faster than thought.
I took a breath, took another, and stepped out into traffic, figuratively. The ground dropped out from under me and I was flying down with the rest of the insane. I was beginning to enjoy myself when my foot slipped on the tread.
I stumbled the last twenty feet, and walked over to the side of the tunnel to avoid foot traffic as I regained my breath. Well, I fell with a little style, but no grace whatsoever.
"Помогите, пожалуиста. Помогите!" Help me, Please. Help me!
I looked a little way ahead and I was a grandmother leaning against the wall. There was a little blood on a spot above her head, and she seemed to be having trouble standing up. The steady stream of people ignored her as they walked past.
I realize something of Russian culture, at least the culture in Moscow, would be good here. There is no separate word for grandmother and old woman. In essence that makes every old woman your grandmother. In practice that makes every grandmother just another old woman.
"I'll help you." Yes, I spoke in Russian, but since this entire story is not written in such, it will probably help to translate.
"Oh, come here, girl." This is not rude in Russian. In fact it started a warm glow in my heart. She'd just accepted me how I was presenting myself.
I walked over and helped her to her feet, and then steadied her as she wobbled a bit.
"Will you be okay, grandmother?"
"Yes, girl, thank you. Are you from the Baltics?" Most Russians either mistake a real American accent for German (we are hitting our consonants too hard) or the Baltics (generally slurring our words and pulling off the consonants too much).
"No, I'm an American." Her look made it feel like I was going down the escalator again, and the blood left my face. Crap, did I make a mistake?
I'd said американец (americanyets) instead of американка (americanka). That was the equivalent of saying. Hi world. I'm really a boy. I am fluent in Russian, or at least I was so in the mid 90s. I'm a little out of practice. Here's the thing. I say certain phrases without thinking. And those phrases refer to me in the masculine.
"I'm sorry, I meant to say I'm an американка."
She looked at me with a knowing smile and patted me on the arm. "It's ok. I couldn't tell until your slip, girl. You are very pretty."
I blushed, but that wasn't to be the end of it. I smelt him even before I felt the tap on my shoulder. People say that vodka is odorless, but that's only before it is processed by the human body. Someone who is a frequent abuser gains a certain scent to himself. I didn't need to see the bloodshot eyes or hear the slurred speech to know I was in trouble.
"Did I hear you say you were an американец?"
"Hey, you leave the girl alone!"
"Thank you, grandmother, but I can handle this. Do I look like an американец? Really?" I flashed my best smile at him, confident in my body and appearance.
We'd begun gathering a crowd and he was getting more belligerent.
"You're the worst kind. An американец and a faggot." Aren't you impressed? I actually understood it when he called me a faggot in Russian.
"You tucked your #### between your legs like a dog." Ok, so I didn't know exactly what he'd said there, but I could assume from the context.
I heard a gasp from the grandmother and he groped me. Between the legs. Before I'd known what was happening he'd flipped his hand under my skirt and slipped his had all the way to my panties
I stood there for a moment frozen, but then I pulled away. How could even he have done such a thing. I felt the anger begin to boil up inside me even as the grandmother began hitting him with her bag.
No, that wasn't something comical like it would be in the states. Most Russian grandmothers I've ever seen are built like linebackers and about that strong. Their bags would put most hiking backpacks to shame. And she was swinging it like it weighted nothing.
I put a hand on the grandmother's arm. "Grandmother, this one is mine."
The bums body was turned away from me, and his arms were up covering his head.
"Ауу." Which is pronounced Ah-oo-oo, I like it a lot better than the English equivalent of 'yoo-hoo' or 'hey, you'.
With it being only three vowels, it was really easy to use my most feminine voice possible.
He turned toward me curiously.
I pulled back and decked him. Three years of hormone replacement may have destroyed a lot of my muscle mass, but not any of my muscle memory.
He went down like a sack.
"Nice right hook, little daughter."
"Thank you, grandmother."
I helped her over to the next escalator, got her situated in the slow lane, and decided to jump down in the fast lane myself. I don't know whether it was simply standing up for myself, or the fact that I still had adrenaline rushing through my body from that feel up, but I hit every step without stumbling.
I didn't have any problems for the rest of my trip, but that scene stuck with me, and I related it to the friends I'd come to see. We all had a laugh about it, and had a couple of drinks in honor of the drunk. It's a Russian thing.
I've made a distinct effort to change my thinking with Russian since then, and haven't ever made that mistake again. My life isn't perfect, nor would I really want it to be. But now when asked, I am sure to answer clearly, "Я aмериканка!"
Joe: I'm not really a millionaire, but I really love you.
Contestant: I'm not really a woman, but I still love you.
Ok, so I liked it. The problem was, I started coming up with too much content to fit into the ~5k words of the contest. I tried to shoehorn it in, but I ended up with 'The Real Prince Charming', which, although it told the story, it really didn't satisfy me. I was introducing too many characters and I had so many plans for all of them.
But I just plain ran out of room. I had about 500 words left, and I hadn't gotten to the point.
So the ending ended up completely rushed, even more so that the rest of the story.
Now, let's see what I can do with infinite room.
As was suggested, I needed a bit of build up before the first scene, thanks Barbara. Hope you don't mind sharing a name with my character ;)
One thing you will quickly learn about me is I'm a bit ADD. Friends have called me flighty, and I have even been called a ditz a time or seven. Take this paragraph for example. I introduced the action and then went directly to talking about myself. Yeah, I'm like that.
My wife and I had gone out for our seventh wedding anniversary. Luckily, at least in my book, we had no children, or the events that came next would have been a lot harder to handle.
Ok, I'm backing up again. I should start on a happier note. This is a fairytale after all, so why don't I begin with a traditional:
Once upon a time. . . there was an actor named Donnie. That's me. Now Donnie loved to act. He first caught the bug when he was in grade school during the infamous Sixth Grade Play. I say infamous because it was not only the first play that Donnie ever acted in, but it was also the first play that he crossed gender lines.
There was a shortage in girls that year, and they needed someone to play the Queen. No, the irony hasn't been lost on me over the years.
So, I had a few lines to say, and I said them okay, I think. My mother uploaded them to you tube, and you might even be still able to find them there. Do a search for Donnie the Queen.
Yeah, mom was never one to have a problem with any role I chose to play, and I know for a fact that she'd have preferred a daughter. She got her wish, but that part isn't for later.
So, I was an only child being raised by a single mother, and all I wanted to do was act. My friends thought I was great, but no one else seemed to agree. My mother refused to give up, however. I got my first screen time as an extra in 'The Life and Times of a Teenage Hypochondriac.' It was my first direct to DVD movie as well.
I ended up in a lot of those it seems. You see, when producers are desperate enough to cast their sister-in-law's cousin's son in a film because no one they really want will consider them, that's where I came in.
Contrary to some things people have said, there are only three types of actors: A list, B list, and everyone else.
I admit now that before my awakening, I was one of the everyone else, but I wanted to at least be a B list actor.
I didn't want to be Tom Hanks or Ben Stiller or Bruce Willis or any of the other big name stars.
No, sir, my idol was Bruce Campbell, king of the B list actors.
I saw all of his movies. I watched 'Xena' just on the off chance I'd see him. I watch 'Burn Notice' because he's there.
Yeah, I had a crush on Bruce Campbell.
So, I aspired to hit the big times of the B list, but all I could get was everyone else rolls, or unnamed un-credited roles in the background.
Mom moved us to Hollywood from our home in Dallas, Texas when I turned thirteen. As she said, it was to give me more opportunities to be a star. It did get me my first big screen appearance.
I was the first kid to die in 'Arcade Rampage.' Total screen time about three seconds.
It was a big deal for the fourteen-year-old me. I was in horror movies, and I was happy to see the backstage makeup. I loved the way that a person could be converted from themselves into just about anything else.
I was growing up in Hollywood and having the time of my life. I even got paid for a few of my roles. The role that really changed my life was one for which I got no credit, and was again unnamed. Unnamed male teen #14. Or was it #15. There was some confusion on the set about it if I recall. I had just turned 18 so I was able to get into my first real slasher. Nudity, blood and gore. "Sorority House Murders III," Even though it was a B list movie I got to run around for most of it as one of the unnamed teens stuck in the house from hell.
Yeah, I know, that's not exactly what the storyline says, but hey, it's what the people on set called it.
I have to admit that I fell in lust with her the first time she took off her clothing on set. Well, I had the same feeling for pretty much all the girls there, but Aimee was different.
She asked me out after production concluded.
Of course I said yes. We took it so slow, and I didn't even kiss her until we'd been dating for five months.
She asked me to marry her, and of course I said yes. We were married thirteen months to the day after our first date. We thought it was funny being in the horror movie industry and all. We were both nineteen and nothing could get us down.
The other person I met while we were doing "Sorority House Murders III," was Karl Romano. Karl was a special effects god. He just enjoyed the environment of low budget slashers more than big budget blockbusters. Especially as the advent of digital effects was putting people like him out of business.
Me, I think I like a rubber mask so much more than a post processed digital effect.
More about him later.
Shortly after we got married, I got my first B list role, and got to work with Karl again. I think this was the first time I was ever Barbara, even though I didn't have a proper name for her yet.
Okay, so some of you remember the film, but most of you are clueless as to what I'm talking about.
"The Transsexual Stalker." I know the bad light it cast transsexuals in, and I have tried to get it pulled, but apparently too many people like it. It became a cult classic after The Real Prince Charming aired.
So, I was in the title role as a transsexual serial killer who stalked her victims and then performed the GRS that she was denied due to her psychopathy.
I was much happier about the role at the time.
Unfortunately to understand what happens later, it is important to know what went on during the filming of the movie.
Have I mentioned yet that Karl is a perfectionist?
He could have sculpted me a couple of breast forms using a generic mannequin, but that wasn't good enough for Karl. He had a lifecast of my torso done so he could get an exact match to my chest wall on the inside. He wanted those breasts to be a part of me.
I've never thanked him enough for that.
Ok, what is a lifecast you ask? It is a plaster cast of a living body, which is then turned into a positive, or stone onto which custom appliances, also known as prosthetics, are molded. Often, the stone is interchangeably called a lifecast as well. Now, I wasn't that hairy of a man, but even so, my entire torso had to be waxed. Yes, underarm as well.
When he was done, I had a perfect pair of B cup breasts. They looked perfect on screen and you can even see about thirty seconds of 'nudity' with them fully exposed in the film. For those of you with a morbid curiosity the scene runs from 1:21:42 to 1:22:11. I think the scene might even be out there on the web somewhere since the whole The Real Prince Charming fiasco.
I even wore them home once or twice, at Aimee's insistence. She really got off on it.
Yes, they were good enough that even during, um, rigorous physical exercise they didn't reveal themselves as anything other than part of me.
The only problem with them was that they only really stayed looking good for 12 to 14 hours of normal use. After that cracks would begin to appear and they would start to fall apart under their own weight.
Great for movies, but horrible for anything else.
Just getting the role in that movie was getting me roles in other movies left and right, it seemed. Which was a good thing because production spent more time stopped than otherwise over the next three years. There were weeks where I would spend Monday with breasts, Tuesday through Friday as a mutant monster, and then Saturday with breasts again. I would never have given it up for the world.
The first role I got after Transsexual started production was the monster role in "Catastrophic Failure." Well, you know what I mean if you've seen the film. Yep, that was me under all that makeup. Ilene Carr joined my circle of friends at this point.
She was in charge of 'Special Wardrobe.' I don't know if there's another one like her in Hollywood, but what she does is this: She provide the under garments and generic appliances that give you to proper line on screen.
Guys need to look like girls? Those breasts need to disappear for the death scene? That's what she does. She assists the special effects artist in making his creations work.
She was as much an artist as Karl in her own way, and so Karl decided to hire her.
The first two years after she was hired were some of the stormiest at Washed Out Bridge, Kyle's special effects studio, that I can ever remember. Every time I saw them, apart or together, they would argue about whose job was more important to the process of making an actor presentable.
Eventually they did the only thing possible to end the argument: They got married, and have been blissfully happy ever since.
So, it took all of nine months of principle photography to finish "Catastrophic Failure," which has to be one of the more apropos movie names I've ever heard. It was out of theaters before the end of it's opening weekend. No one went.
Then I was in "L.A. Horror Story." You know, the one about the psychotic plastic surgeon? No, not the lead this time. I played the boyfriend Hank who ends up killing the evil surgeon.
I was completely ripped apart by the critics for that one.
The last movie I filmed while still doing 'Transsexual' was my only romantic movie role, and no, I will not be telling anyone, ever, what the name of it is.
They hired me to be the female lead.
I went up for the male lead, just for the fun of it and they hired me to be the female.
I was so embarrassed when I explained to them that I was male.
I think it was the shaved legs and shorts that did me in on that one. I'd just come from the set of 'Transsexual' and well, you know how it goes. Before I knew it I was reading for the girl. Cody isn't that feminine of a name, and I had no idea at the time, honest. I did think it was kind of a strange scene for a supposed hetero romance film, but I was a bit out of it after sixteen hours straight of filming.
Oh, yeah, I was so out of it that I'd forgotten to remove the breast forms before leaving the set. That also might have contributed to the confusion.
I don't think that IMDB has caught onto the fact that Dawn and Donnie are the same actor. Crap, now you're all going to look up Dawn Leary on IMDB and find my movie.
Yes, I am an attention whore.
So, Washed Out helped me with the makeup, and I got lessons in acting like a woman acting a role.
More specifically I learned how to present myself as a woman.
This was my true awakening. I enjoyed that role completely and was truly sad when principle photography was done. They had to re-shoot a couple of scenes over the next couple of months. And then Dawn made another appearance at the SAG awards. I actually got nominated for Best Actress in an Independent Film. They showed the film at both Sundance and Cannes, but it received no awards.
Unfortunately, that film was when things started falling apart for Aimee and myself.
I was out of work for almost two years after we finished filming the unnamed film, but I wasn't worried too much about it. Residuals from the unnamed film were keeping us afloat and slowly filling up our joint account.
Being out of work wasn't what caused the most friction. It was the fact that I'd gotten a role as a woman. . .in a movie that my wife had auditioned for.
We even separated for a while during this time. We never got divorced, but she went home to live with her mother for a while. My getting a role on "Huguenot" fixed things. I think playing a renaissance French Soldier instead of another female role helped. I never told her that I tried out twice for the movie. Once each as Dawn and Donnie. Yes, I have dual membership in the screen actors guild.
One of the stipulations for the film was that I never cut my hair. The movie was to take place chronologically over a two year period, and my character apparently made a pact with god to protect him in his crusade against the French Protestants.
So, it took two years to film the movie.
If you haven't guessed it yet, I was the villain of the piece, and I got a truly spectacular death scene in the last five minutes of the film.
It's on Netflix, if you're interested.
The scene is at 2:25:06.
Really cool, huh? I especially like how I fall off the wall after being shot with the musket and then get dragged away by the horse.
She was upset that my hair was longer and thicker than hers without my even trying, but she lived with it for the duration of the principle photography.
That was six months before our anniversary. I'd gotten it trimmed a little, but that only seemed to convince my hair to grow more. I'd averaged about ten inches a year, and my hair was just over two feet long from root to tip.
I would pull it into a high ponytail every time we went out. Which would start an argument.
That night, we went out to a fancy restaurant and were asked if we 'ladies' would like anything else, not once but three times, at which Aimee got so angry that she loudly informed the restaurant that I was a man.
Well, that sort of killed the evening.
We went out to the car, arguing the entire way. We stopped at a red light, and continued yelling at each other.
She said some things she didn't mean. I said things I never intended. She suggested something untoward. I told her it would be more satisfying that a similar act with her.
The light turned green and I slammed on the gas.
A sixteen year old was driving home from the prom with his date. They were otherwise distracted and ran the red light.
Up until that moment, I thought I was really doing something for the environment by driving a 'green' car. Like most of the high efficiency cars of the time it was more plastic than metal.
The teen was driving a 65 Mustang rag top that he'd restored with his father.
The passenger seat and most of the rest of my car disappeared. Aimee was dead at the scene. It was a miracle that I survived. Literally. I took a piece of shrapnel to my neck which cut into my carotid artery and my larynx. The scrap of plastic plugged the hole it created or I would have bled out before the EMTs got there.
They patched me up and got me to the hospital. They were able to repair the damage to my neck, but I will have a light scar there for the rest of my life. It's especially visible in certain lights, like under the camera. What's no longer visible, as it received the most damage, was my Adam's Apple. They had to work to get it to look normal, and ended up just shaving it down.
No broken bones. Just the open neck wound. They deemed me a danger to myself and kept me in a state run asylum until I was fully healed.
They held of on the funeral until I was released.
Everyone we knew was at the funeral. It was a closed casket because they hadn't been able to make her presentable. I cried as if my heart was breaking.
At our wedding we had made vows that we would be with each other forever. She promised me that there was only one person in this world she wanted. I vowed I would never love another woman as long as I lived.
But after seven years, she was already abandoning me. How would I survive without her?
I decided there and then not to survive without her.
"Thanks for coming, Karl. I really appreciate it."
"You going to be okay, Donnie?"
"I'm going to be just fine."
Julia looked concerned. She was one of Aimee's oldest friends, and she and I had been friends because of that. "I could come home with you, Donnie. To help you through this?"
I was pretty sure I knew what she meant, but it wasn't going to happen, "thanks for the offer, Julia. Not this time, okay?"
"Donnie, we're here for you. You're not alone."
"I know. I'll be okay, everyone. Really. Good bye." I waved and went to my rental. I drove that to the dealership and dropped it off. I realized in that moment that I'd been preparing for this since I got out of the hospital.
The cab I'd had to call arrived and I quietly got in the back. "Where can I take you, miss?"
I gave him my address and didn't bother to correct his mistake.
I got to our apartment and locked the door. After turning on the TV and turning on the sound I stripped myself naked and spread Aimee's clothing all over the bed. I put on one of her dresses and went out to get some alcohol early the next morning. I hadn't yet gotten up the courage to end it, but I couldn't bear to be away from the feel of her clothing.
There were no comments over my appearance.
Scotch is my poison of choice, and I purchased a gallon of it. Five fifths for me.
I drank the first one shortly after arriving home, and I began to feel looser and more in touch with what was going on. Halfway through the second fifth, my neighbors called the cops on me because they thought me yelling at the ghost of my dead wife was a domestic disturbance.
I showed them my apartment, to let them know I was the only one there. They called me 'miss' on the way out the door. It must have been because I was still wearing the dress. I took it off and put it back on the bed.
I finished the second half of my second fifth and slept it off.
I woke up the next morning bleary eyed and hung over. There were still three fifths left, and figured they'd only go to waste after I was dead so I started into the third.
The dregs were all that remained when I got out the shotgun and loaded it.
I looked over the reminders of my life. The pictures of Aimee, of Aimee and me, of our life, our hopes and our dreams.
I started taking gulps from the fourth fifth, and then figured it was now or never. I spent the next half an hour trying to figure out how to pull the trigger while pointing it at my head.
Luckily I was too drunk for critical thinking.
As I was trying to get back up off the floor after my most recent attempt failed, I heard something on the TV blaring away in the other room.
"Ladies! Producer Mark Shurtleff is looking for the most lovely single ladies for the opportunity of a lifetime. Do you have what it takes to be the next reality TV star? Do you want to be on a show similar to the Bachelor or Joe Millionaire? If you said yes then contact us now at the number 707-555-1432. Only the first thousand callers will have the opportunity to sit in a screening with Mark to see if you might just be the next reality TV star."
I admit: I was drunker than a skunk and as nervous as a whore in church when I made that call.
As you may have noticed from this statement, I've never lost my Texas accent or mannerisms in the years since I moved to the coast.
I put on my best lady Macbeth, without the horrible British accent, and said, "I saw your commercial on TV and I was wondering if I might have been one of the first thousand callers."
"Miss, there should be a spot for you. We are obligated to ask if you are now married, or if you are in a long term relationship and may become married within the next six months." The woman on the phone sounded like a bit of a hag. I imagined her to be overweight with wiry gray hair, and red lipstick.
"No, I'm not married, and I'm not in any sort of relationship at the present time."
"Perfect. What's your name, hun?"
"Your name?"
Name, name, name. . .crap! I looked at my DVD collection and the first thing that came to eye was my director's cut of Barbarella.
"Barb. . .ara"
"I need your last too name, honey."
Frantic I looked around, and there was my empty bottle of scotch on the floor. "Scott. My name is Barbara Scott."
"Ok, Barbara, I have an opening tomorrow at five, can you be here?"
"Sure, I can be there."
"Great, and wear something slinky and sexy. The producer will likely want to see how much fire you can ignite on the small screen." This last was said in a bored manner, as if she were reading from a script. For all I knew that is exactly what was happening.
It might have stopped there had I not lay down on the bed and felt my wife's clothing against my bare back. She'd loved the feel of satins and silks. I loved the feel of having them close to me.
What if I could keep them close to me for a longer period?
What if I really did show up at that casting call? Sure, I should have used the name Dawn Leary, but before that moment, like I said, I had no real intention of going through with it.
My heart began to beat a little faster, and my breathing became shallow. Could I do this? The unnamed movie proved I could. I'd fooled a director before, even if it was accidentally. Could I do it this time on purpose?
I would need to prepare. I'd need to do something with my hair and get my breast forms from Karl.
I was absent mindedly rubbing my leg, and something felt off. Crap. Hairy legs. I'd at least have to get a full body wax before all of this as well.
I picked up the phone again, "Hello, Julia."
"Donnie? What's wrong?"
"I'm drunk as a skunk. I just contemplated shooting myself with my shotgun. I have an audition tomorrow at five," I giggled after saying this.
"Ooookay. Donnie, maybe I should come over like I suggested earlier. . ."
"No, I wanted to know if I could come in. I need a complete wax, and you're the best at this sort of thing, Jules."
"Um, I only service women, Donnie."
I giggled at that, I don't know why. "I know that, Julia. I need to be a woman for my audition."
"Donnie. . ."
"I know. It sounds crazy, and it probably is, but I thought it would keep me closer to Aimee, and I'm drunk. Did I mention that? And so I figured that I'd get a full Brazilian, and. . .I don't know."
"Ok, look Donnie. I figure that you're too drunk to know what you're asking me to do, but if you haven't sobered up, and if you pay me $120 up front, then I'll give you the wax, for Aimee's sake." She didn't know about my time in the unnamed movie.
"Okay, I'll come right over."
"My last customer leaves at three. Come in about three thirty."
"Okay, Julia." I giggled again.
I figured her sober comment for a challenge so I went and got my last fifth out of the fridge and I finished polishing it off about two thirty. When I couldn't find my keys for ten minutes, only to realize they'd been in my hand the entire time, I figured that it was time to call a cab.
I'd called for cabs a lot to get home because I was too drunk to drive, but this would be the first time I called for one to leave home because I was too drunk to drive.
I giggled at the thought.
I walked to the door and began opening it, only to realize I was completely naked. I went back into my room and got on my clothing from the funeral. Stumbling, I made my way outside and waited for the cab on the curb.
I was dropped off at Julia's, yes that is the name of her establishment, at three twenty five, and I went and knocked on the door.
I was amazed I was even upright after the amount of alcohol I'd consumed in the last twenty-four hours. She got me into the room, and stripped me down. I was so sauced that I either couldn't feel it, or I didn't care. She left me the hair on top of my head, and a landing strip. I think she did my eyebrows as well.
I must have paid, as she performed her duty, although to this day I don't remember having done so. Then she bundled me out the back and up the stairs to her apartment, I presumed to sleep it off.
I remember her making a comment about me having drunk too much to be useful to her. I made a joke about scotch being the anti-Viagra which she laughed at. I remember glancing at the clock and seeing that it was five before I lost all consciousness.
I woke up the next morning with no clear recollection of what I'd done, and feeling strangely comfortable in my own skin for the first time in a while. The bedding felt really nice against me as I got up to use the restroom.
I was standing over the toilet, still waking up, when I really looked down at my legs for the first time. The really looked good. I wondered who the woman, standing in the bathroom with me, was.
I was still half asleep at this point, but I woke up quickly enough when I realized the woman in the bathroom was me.
"What in the heck did I do last night?"
"Not enough, Donnie."
Julia came into the bathroom wearing a smile. She had a gorgeous body, but I didn't have it in me to love her. She tried to hold it against me.
Then something occurred to me, "We didn't, I mean you and I weren't"
"No, we didn't, Donnie."
"Oh, thank god." I smiled in relief, "That would have been a mistake."
Her eyes flashed in anger and she began hitting me. "Get out of my house, you bastard. Get the hell out of my house."
I ran out of there in my boxers and undershirt. I left my wallet and everything else in her house. I turned to walk back up to get them and she threw my pants down the stairs at me.
I slipped on my pants, and walked barefoot to the nearest payphone.
Now, I had a splitting headache, and the sunrise that chose that moment to start did so maliciously. I squinted against the glare, and called a cab first, and then my favorite person in the world.
Karl had told me to come on over to his studio and they'd work me in.
The cab pulled up in front of the converted warehouse which housed Washed Out Bridge. I paid the cabbie and got out.
"Donnie, up for another role that they need to you come in makeup for?"
"You could say that."
I explained my plan from yesterday, what I remembered of it, and as I was telling him I had no idea why I was still going through with it. I was still embarrassed over being the female lead for the other show.
"So, how heavy are we going?"
"You're the expert. I need to pass up close and personal. I have to look 'hot'. We have to be able to apply it quickly and it has to last, I figure, 24 to 36 hours at a time."
"Sounds like you want me to use second skin."
"Huh? Never heard of that before."
"You wouldn't. People are still married to foam rubber or latex or silicone. That and second skin costs about eight thousand dollars per cubic foot."
I still had eighty thousand dollars in my bank account.
"I can cover ten cubic feet, anything beyond that. . ."
"With second skin we don't need to worry. It has been tested for up to six months continual use."
"It doesn't have to be reapplied?"
"Of course it has to be reapplied. The material lasts that long, even the edges. Not the glue."
I laughed at myself for that one.
"Basically, we use the right glue and you will be able to do pretty much anything except for go swimming. I have some ideas of glues that might even overcome that."
"So, what's the plan?"
"Well, we'll have to go with your breast forms from 'The Transsexual Stalker,' for today, I even have one of your bras from the movie. I can get sculpting for the second skin prosthetic right away. I still have a life cast of your face and torso, so I'll be able to come up with something really good."
I wasn't worried about my top. It's the down below that worried me.
I was still worried about it when Ilene walked into the room. I had one on and one off at the time, and she did a double take of my body. "Damn, Darko, you had a lot more body hair the last time I saw you in that chair getting that prosthetic attached."
She is punishing like that.
"Donni will need one of your gaffes."
"Sure think, honey."
Karl attached the breast forms to my chest, and I felt their familiar weight again. Hey, I spent three years, off and on, filming that movie, and an additional nine months filming the other movie after Transsexual wrapped. When all was said and done I'd spend almost two years total wearing them.
The slightest smudge of makeup and the line between me and my breasts completely disappeared. There wasn't even enough makeup there to really transfer to my clothing. These, unfortunately, would be a one use appliance. All the really good silicone prosthetics are one use.
I slipped into my red satin and black lace bra and settled my babies in place. I was starting to feel it again, what it was like to be a woman, and let my hips gently sway as I went in search of Ilene.
What she fitted onto me was a flesh-toned entrapment device designed to go seamlessly under another pair of underwear, and nothing like the gaffes I'd worn for that movie.
It went on, during which procedure I paid close attention so I could do it next time, and then she slipped a pair of satin panties that matched my bra on up my smooth legs.
I stepped out to go find a mirror. I was frankly a bit surprised, not that I should have been.
I was beautiful. I'd knew I could pass as a girl, but my hair was currently loose on my shoulders, and with that underwear? Looking at myself in that mirror, I knew that the woman standing there was me.
"There's no way I'm letting you out of here in what you came in wearing. It would be indecent."
"I have just the thing for him, honey."
"Wait, I wanted to wear one of Aimee's dresses for this."
"That can come later, when you land the role. Ilene is right. We need you in something that kills them dead."
Words almost fail me when describing this dress, but I'll try. Black. It had a turtle neck that covered me to my jaw line, but left my shoulders and back. It had a keyhole in the front. It was long enough, barely, that it still covered my panties when I sat, but not from a shallow angle.
I was sad to take off the bra, as it was one of my favorites, but for that dress, I would do just about anything.
"What are your plans for face and makeup?"
"Well, I thought I would do my own makeup and then a salon for my hair."
"There's no way that Barb is going anywhere the first time without the full treatment." Karl said.
"What are you going on about?"
"Look, do you want to simply enter this contest, or do you want to win it?"
"Well, I guess win it."
"Then you're going to need a lot more than just Ilene and I to pull this off. You'll need a full support team. The appliance will be about $12k, with backup, but other than that we need a voice coach and a makeup team to get you in and out in the shortest period of time possible. And you will have to be a woman one hundred percent of the time.
I thought of my life up to this point as a man. I thought about failed relationships and nights alone crying until I'd met Aimee, who had to ask me out that first time, and ask me to marry her.
Would it be so bad to be the woman for a while, or even to admit that it was more me than this male facade I'd presented to everyone else?
I took a deep breath and smiled, "Let's do this."
The rest of the day was a whirlwind of activity as Karl and Ilene called in the experts. I got crash courses in diction and poise. Walking in heels. My hair was impeccably styled, and my makeup was applied to perfection. At four we did last look in front of the mirror, and I was impressed. Really impressed. I didn't recognize myself at all.
Instruction on how to touch up my makeup were given and a leather clutch thrust into my hands.
Then I was out the door and into the back of Karl's car.
Karl opened the door for me, and I gratefully slid into the back seat. I knew that I had to put my rear in the seat first and then swing my legs in. I'd actually practiced it for that movie.
You know what. Fine. I'll tell you, since it wouldn't be that hard to figure it out since I've already given you the name under which I played my role. "Love's Sunset." Yes, it was a truly tragic death scene for me at the end. Yes, it made me cry the first time I saw it. I mean having your heroine die of cancer after admitting her love for the man who had stood with her through three failed marriages? And yes it's probably the best movie I've ever acted in.
Happy? Good. Now we're moving on.
We drove over to the location where the audition would be, and I realized that it was a cattle call.
"Crap, I'm not ready for this. I have no ID or guild number for Barbara or anything."
"Look in the clutch."
"You called in Giorgio didn't you?" I said looking at the contents.
Movies attracted some of the strangest people you would ever imagine.
Giorgio was unique even amongst all this variety. As far as I was aware I was the first person to use one of his props in a real life situation. Basically Giorgio was the guy that shows like CSI or Castle called when they wanted a realistic looking ID.
Giorgio also has a consulting job with the FBI teaching how to spot fake IDs and describing the processes used to create them.
I hadn't noticed them taking a photo of me, but there was Barb Scott looking back at me in a traditionally bad DMV photo.
They even gave me a new birthday to make me seem a little younger. Ok, a lot younger. I'd only turned eighteen a week ago according to this.
It was time to create a character. First, it was time to figure out my motivations.
"Who am I? Born and raised in Texas. Prom Queen? No, but it was a close thing. I've never forgiven my best friend for putting her name into the running."
Ok, knowing your character's history helps you to know their motivations. Knowing their motivations makes it real.
"I wear my heels to look taller, because I want to be noticed. I'm afraid of the notice at the same time. Texan to the soles of my shoes. Smart? Yeah, smart. No ditz here. But I've personally got ADD. flighty. I'll be flighty. Smart, but able to loose track of my conversation in the middle of it. Now, hopefully I can remember all this."
Karl was laughing at me in the front seat, "You're mostly describing yourself, you realize this?"
I put on my female voice that I'd practiced so long and hard for "Love's Sunset."
"Karl, honey. Would you just get my door for me so that I can get this meet and great over."
His jaw dropped. He'd wasn't needed on set with me for "Love's Sunset" so he'd never met Dawn.
He snapped his mouth shut and just chuckled. "you're going to knock 'em dead, Donnie."
"Just so long as they hire me, I don't much care. And the name is Barb."
"Let me get that door for you, Barb."
The moment I started walking I became Barb. There would be no calls of cut here. I could not break character for a moment.
I walked confidently into the building, and then stopped for a moment as if looking around.
Act a little startled that there are so many people. . .yes, receptionist there. Notice her and walk up.
These were the thoughts that I had as I stood there, and these sorts of thoughts continued as I went through this meat market of the stars.
If the receptionist was the same woman as I'd spoken to on the phone then I'd horribly misjudged her. She had the wiry gray hair, but her face was almost unlined and she would have hardly been out of place amidst the rest of us lovelies.
I walked up to her stopped for a moment waiting for her to notice me, and then cleared my throat softly.
She looked up, and then did a double take. "Hi," I said with what I hoped was a blinding smile, "I'm Barbara Scott? I had an appointment for an audition?"
"Hi, Barbara. I actually thought you were pranking me and were actually a drunk man."
I blushed at that, as it was both in character and I really was a bit embarrassed.
"Well, hey, people tell me that I sound like a fat old woman over the phone. I think you out-did me for difference in appearance between impression and actuality.
"I was quite drunk, I'm sorry to say."
"Well, you're here. I have to say you sound quite a bit better now as well."
"One day sober. Think I might actually quit this time."
That's too bad because I wanted to ask you out for a drink after you get through."
My mouth dropped open a little.
"All the hot ones are hetero. Mores the pity. If you're ever curious. . .well, this is what's called a cattle cal, sweetie. Mostly their just going to want you to get up there and look pretty, but you've got that in spades, hun. They might want you to say something. If they do they'll ask you a question. Think of it pageant and realize that sometimes 'world peace' is the best answer. Better to look inscrutable than stupid."
I'd never had anyone help me this much at a cattle call before.
She must have seen my confusion and misread it, thankfully, because she continued. "Hey, don't worry, hun. You'll do fine. Just try not to make everything a question, okay?"
"Okay. Thanks for the help."
"You're welcome. Good luck, Barbara."
"I prefer Barb."
"Good luck, Barb. Heat through the door right there and get in line. They'll give you a number as you get closer."
I was about to step away when I stopped and turned back toward her. "Look, I wasn't shocked because of being hetero and propositioned. I was shocked because my girlfriend died recently and I'm just not used to being out without her. I'm not even sure if I'm attracted to guys, but I figured I'm an actress and I might as well get back to work."
"I've seen some of your work haven't I?"
Crap, why didn't I just give my name as Dawn Leary.
"And here I thought you were new to all this. You're good. You're really good. Probably a good thing you didn't give me your real name." She was cackling a bit as she thought over what I'd just pulled on her.
"What's your name?" I asked.
"Joyce. Why do you ask?"
"I'll join you after this for that drink, as long as you neither expect me to drink nor do anything other than talk?"
"Sounds good to me, Barb. Come see me after you get done."
"See you later, Joyce," I said and headed toward the stage door.
I have to say that I felt sorry for everyone else the moment I stepped through the door. Not a single one of them had even close to the same preparation as I'd had. Most of them had thrown some little black dress from the dark recesses of their closet with their best three year old makeup and a scrunchie in their hair.
There were a few that showed preparation and a salon hairstyle.
There was only one other girl who I was worried about. That was because I could tell that she'd had professional help for today's meeting as well.
She was also the only other girl here who wore a backless dress. Hers was red though.
I tried to ignore her as we wound our way back and forth through the studio. I looked hard, trying to see if there were any other cross-dressers. If there were, then they passed as easily as I did.
I kept looking over at the girl in red. She was going to make it. I was sure of that. I only wish I was a bit closer to her so I could size up my competition.
She was relaxed and confident.
After she got on stage, there was a lot less for me to do as I waited for my turn on stage.
While the other girls were watching their competition, I did what I always did. I watched the judges. No matter what you call them, when you're at an audition you are being judged. The secretary, or receptionist, or whatever had given me some key pieces of information as well.
I read their body language, watch what they responded too. I had most of what I needed on my body. The rest would have to be my act.
Even as I'd been watching the woman in red, part of my attention was split to see how the judges reacted to the things the other girls said.
When I finally got ten people away from the stage a tech hand approached me.
"You'll be 496."
"Thanks!"
"Don't mention it."
It was a short wait after that until I got on stage as each of the girls only stayed on stage for thirty seconds to a minute.
"Next."
And I was up.
"Wow, there's a lot of you out there."
And then I flashed my smile. That smile would come to be one of the biggest draws that they had for the show. She used it in all of their promotions, and in the opening montage.
"Ok, so 469, You're trying out for a show called the Real Prince Charming. Basically, what we're looking for is girls who look good on screen but also come across as being genuine. This is more than just a pairing contest, though. There will be sixteen men as well as sixteen women. Only one of these men is the catch he appears to be, and it will be through the choices the women make that will slowly eliminate the women. The fake princes will be eliminated based upon their performance in contests held every couple of days.
"How would you determine who the real prince charming was amongst so many?"
"Whether or not a man is a good catch is not about his appearance or the size of his wallet. It's about who he is as a person and how he treats others when he doesn't believe he is being watched. I would need to talk to him one on one, and listen to what the other girls thought of the matches."
"Anything else?"
Think fast, they're bored. . .
"You can tell a lot about a man by the way he kisses you, and how he treats you when you decline a kiss."
"Thank you 469, you may go."
That perked up their interest. It would also get me the nickname of the Ice Queen. I'll get to the full reason why later, as it has its place in this story.
I was headed toward the back entrance when I was stopped by one of the omnipresent techs and given an envelope.
I waited 'til I got outside before I opened the envelope.
You have passed through to the second stage of auditions. Please be here no later than eight am on Monday morning the 14th of August. We would request that all ladies seriously considering this role arrive in evening wear.
The first step was down. I had five days to get prepared for the next step. I walked back to the front of the building where Karl was still sitting, I rapped on his window and he rolled it down.
"I've been asked out for drinks."
"You got picked up at a cattle call? He must have been kind of desperate."
"She, actually. Receptionist."
"Well, be careful."
"I will. By the way, were on to stage two."
He smiled hugely. "I'll let the gang know. So, what time tomorrow should we all gather for our war council?"
"I think we can get started at seven or eight."
"Not planning on going home with the lady?"
"She's old enough to be my grandmother."
He laughed at this and drove off.
I settled my dress and then walked back into the office. The girls were all in the studio and it was quiet. Joyce looked up and smiled as I answered.
"They already let me know. Congratulations, Barb."
"So, are you ready to go?"
"Wow, you are so different than you seemed when you came in. I can totally believe that you are a lesbian."
"Yes, I am. I was actually married. Didn't want to voice that with everyone else here."
"She was the one who died, huh?"
"Yeah. I vowed never to love another woman as long as I lived when I married her."
"Oh, sweetie. Come on. Let's go someplace else. I'll drink and you can talk about it."
We got in her car and she drove us to a local club. Not a dance club, thank goodness, but a club none the less.
I appreciated the subdued air inside as we entered. Looking around the place at the other patrons, I realized I was the only man there. I should have expected this.
"So, tell me. If were at least going to be friends, what's your real name."
"Dawn Leary."
"That sounds. . .oh no. Really? There's no way they're not going to know you."
"I've only been in one film, Joyce."
"But what a film. You know that I've been looking for you for three years?"
"What?"
"Mark has had roles that he wants you in every time that he produces a new movie. He keeps telling me that you've got star quality. I've got to tell him this."
"Oh please, don't. I need this work."
"But you could have any role in this town you want."
"No, I can't. This is my last. . .I need this Joyce."
She looked at me for a moment, and then a look of horror came over her face.
"You were committing suicide when you called me, weren't you."
I felt naked before her, "how did you know?"
"You're too desperate for a bad role, especially with how good you are."
"I'm really not that good."
"You really are."
I knew it would probably destroy my chances of ever getting on this show, but for some reason I needed this woman to understand.
"I was born Donni Aldeman. My screen name is Donnie Leary. I'm a man, Joyce."
She began laughing. "Well, that explains why I could never find Dawn. I was looking for the wrong Leary."
"I'll go now. Sorry for all this."
"Dawn, you may be many things, but you're no man. Male, maybe, and I'd have to see proof before I believed that, but there's no way you're a man. There is no way a man made it to the next stage of this audition. Unless you are a truly great actor, and if you're the same Donnie Leary I'm thinking of, you are not a great actor."
She realized what she said, stopped, and got a thoughtful look on her face. "No, it's not that you're a bad actor. You're just horrible at acting like a man."
I giggled at this.
"See, that wasn't forced. Dawn, this is you. This hair, and makeup. This dress. I'm sorry it took such tragedy to really bring this out, but this is the real you."
"Well, putting the breast appliance back on did feel like coming home."
"Those aren't you? That is some of the best special effects makeup I've ever seen."
"Go ahead. I know you want to. I don't mind."
I felt the pressure when she poked them, and then touched them. She looked amazed.
"Touching them I can tell that they aren't quite skin, but that's makeup for you. But through your dress? They move like they should."
"I have an excellent friend in the field."
"Dawn. I'm going to do something for you that I would never consider for anyone else. I don't even know why I'm doing this. I'm going to not tell anyone your secret. Just promise me something. If you ever decide you can move on, please keep me in mind."
I looked at her shocked.
"But, I'm. . ."
"A beautiful and genuine woman, and one of the most talented actresses I've ever seen."
I smiled at her and said, "thank you."
We made an early night of it and I went home spent emotionally. It was funny, but I think the reason I didn't want to think about "Love's Sunset," and the reason that Aimee had been so pissed about it, was that I knew what Joyce had told me already.
Not consciously, but somewhere deep where I refused to let it out into the light of day.
Let's be serious. She was right about my career as Donnie. The only movies I did any good at were "Transexual" and "Love's Sunset."
They were the only two movies for which I didn't first have to put on a male persona.
She drove me home. I went up to my room and cried. Not tears of pain or loss. Tears of joy and self discovery. I WAS a woman. I wanted to shout it from the housetops and scream it on the streets.
The first step of proving it was winning this contest.
I decided to spend part of the night watching my two movies. I decided in that moment that until the end of this contest, I WAS Dawn or Barb. Donnie died on Monday. So, I watched "The Transsexual Stalker" first. My portrayal of that character carried the show through buckets of blood and cheesy lines. It is so bad all things considered, but I wasn't embarrassed that I was in it.
Then I watched "Love's Sunset" for the first time. I hadn't had the courage to watch it before that moment because I was afraid of what I would see. I saw it when I watched. I cried at the end.
I did not see a man in a dress on that screen. I saw an actress who believed in her lines.
I watched it again.
I was very bleary eyed when I arrived at Washed Out Bridge the next morning.
"I take it your date went about how I expected. What did she think about your extra equipment."
"Actually, Karl, I watched 'Love's Sunset'."
Ilene had just stepped into the workshop, "what!? I thought you said you never planned on watching that movie."
"Donnie never did watch that movie."
"What are you talking about?"
"If I'm doing this, Karl. I'm doing it completely. I am Dawn Leary, who I might add is apparently a sought after actress."
"What are you talking about, Dawn?"
"Mark Shurtleff, the producer of this TV show, has been trying to track Dawn down for the past three years."
"Does he know?"
"No, and I doubt he'll put it together. My character in the movie had curly red hair after all. I'm a straight brunette."
"There's a question. How straight are you, Dawn?"
"Enough to get turned on while filming the love scene in 'Love's Sunset.'"
They looked at me. I blushed. "I was wearing shorts under that dress. Very tight shorts."
"So what next?"
"Well, he asked me out afterward and wanted to know if I wanted to finish him off. I left him very frustrated. . .oh you meant today!"
I blushed very red at that, and couldn't speak for almost five minutes while they laughed.
Suddenly Ilene sobered up. "You didn't did you?"
"Of course not. I was married and I told him so."
Ilene was visibly relieved, "good, cause I'd have had to kill you for cheating on Aimee."
"Ilene, you've seen the movie?"
She nodded.
"Imagine that was you on the receiving end of that scene, even if you were wearing shorts."
She blushed bright red.
"My co-star had a serious crush on me, and was trying to use that moment to let me know how much. For a moment there everything but his need for me disappeared."
"No wonder Aimee was so pissed."
"No, she was pissed because of what she didn't see in that movie, Ilene."
"What?"
"A man in a dress."
"Oh. . .OH. Crap. Yeah, that would have pissed me off too."
Karl looked blankly at us.
"Just a little girl talk."
"But he's a guy!"
"No, honey, she's not. That is what this is about."
"You mean. . .dayum. You weren't kidding about Donnie being dead, huh?"
"No, I wasn't. I'm thinking that I need to go through some laser hair removal or electrolysis before this all begins. Waxing might work before, but during I need to be hair free on my face and chest."
"And if we start now then we'll have a better change of it taking. So, when is the next audition?"
"Monday."
"Four days before we have to have you presentable. I know. You're already drop dead gorgeous
"I've been thinking, Karl."
"What about?"
"Win or loose, I'm not going back to being Donnie, and I am pretty sure I can get more, and better, work as Dawn than I ever could as Donnie. What I'm saying is that I'm hiring Washed Out Bridge for the duration of the contest. If I don't make it in, then I don't and you still get the full amount. If I do, then you're work will be cut out for you."
"Full amount of what?"
"The $81,292.43 in my bank account. It's your inheritance from Donnie. He considered you to be one of his best friends, and I only hope that we can be friends as well."
Karl wrapped me in a hug, and after getting a nod from Ilene I tentatively gave him a hug back.
"I'm so glad to finally meet you, Dawn. Ilene and Donnie have told me a lot about you."
"So, you're the boss, Karl. What's the next step?"
The next step, apparently, was to get me an appointment for laser hair removal in about two weeks. If I didn't have enough hair growth at that point, then we'd have to push it back, but it was a good probability that I would. Hair apparently doesn't need to be that long for laser hair removal to be effective.
Since I'd signed over a check for the full amount in my account, and would be closing it as soon as Karl got funds confirmed, he would be paying for everything from here on out.
I felt so much like the eighteen year old I supposedly was.
So, since it was Thursday, and I had until Monday before I had to go in for my second audition, that and we really didn't begin prep for that 'til Sunday, I'll take a moment and tell you what seconds skin is.
I know. I'm so evil, making you wait in a story over which I have complete control over time.
I could simply say they lived happily ever after and end it here you know. . .
No?
Ok, second skin.
Strangely enough, it actually started life as a medical product. It was also a mistake.
I'm sure you've all heard of Liquid Bandage? It is a great product in most circumstances, but a couple of doctors wanted to create something that would act like real skin, even breath, that would be applied directly to the wound and would gradually flake off like natural skin, never needing to be checked or touched up.
What they created had all the properties they needed but one.
It would not adhere to skin.
It could however be molded much like silicone.
They initially tried to use it as a prosthetic for women after a mastectomy.
The problem was that it was designed to slowly degrade due to environmental interaction. Who wanted to pay $4000 for something that would last, on average, six months before it became too ragged to be of real use.
They tried to marked it to the special effects industry due to its life like properties, but again, a price tag problem appears. The cost is about 10,000 to 1.
But, Karl being Karl, he'd seen to potential for it. Real potential.
Foam Rubber doesn't look like skin no matter how well you paint it. It doesn't look bad, however in low like or at odd angles. It also has the advantage of being lightweight.
Silicone is translucent like real skin, can be easily pre-dyed to look the proper skin tone, and has the general resilience of fatty tissue making it great for consumer use in products like breast forms and implants. However, silicone used in special effects is heavier than an equal mass of skin, and it tends to pull apart under its own weight given enough time, especially with very large appliances. It also tends to shine in the wrong lighting conditions.
Enter second skin. Karl was pragmatic enough to realize that if it caught on, it would drop in price, especially when generics began to appear on the market.
It was lightweight, compared to silicone, looked like skin under all lighting conditions, was easily dyed to skin tones, and even felt like real skin to the touch.
The last was what really sold me on it.
Did I say that I wasn't doing any prep before Sunday?
I lied.
He pulled out the first second skin appliance from the mold that Thursday afternoon. It was emotionally painful to have my breasts removed.
I know they weren't really mine, and they were really looking ragged before they were removed, but they felt like mine.
All concern to be losing them disappeared when he applied the new ones to my chest.
I overlooked the problems with silicone while the other forms were on my chest.
No makeup was needed to blend these in. As soon as he lay down the edges only a slight bump showed the edge was there. It was a very slight bump and I kept loosing it as I moved in the mirror.
"Dawn, put your braw and shirt on please."
"What's wrong?"
"I know they're not real and I'm getting a hardon."
I blushed and covered up.
"I've never before been so convinced that what I'm seeing is real. I used my strongest adhesive, and I want to see how long it lasts under active use."
"Um, how active, Karl?" I asked, blushing furiously.
"Oh, hell no. Not that. I was thinking the treadmill."
I breathed a sigh of relief and walked over to the treadmill. They had me running on the treadmill for about half an hour. I did most of it alone as Karl and Ilene had to go deal with something in the other room.
I think it was because I was running in nothing but a bra on top. My chest was sore by the time I stopped, and I simply couldn't run anymore. I'd never really been that fit before, and I really wasn't used to all the bouncing around.
Karl checked the edges. He was getting really uncomfortable before he got dune.
"Karl! You've worked on naked women before. Don't think of me as a woman. Don't think of me as pretty or gorgeous. Just do whatever you do to get through working on one of them."
Karl took a deep breath and then smiled up at me.
"I think I needed that, Dawn. You're right. I do this for a living. I just expect to see less flesh as soon as I apply a prosthetic. That's how I usually get through it. I cover their nakedness. This time I created the nakedness and it was freaking me out."
"We'll get through this, Karl."
"Go hit the showers."
"What about the girls?"
"I want to test the water resistance in a shower, then we're going for complete submersion."
"What aren't you telling me?"
Karl smiled evilly at me, "I used Permanence on you."
"Shit, man, I told you to throw that out the LAST time you used it."
I was really freaking out now.
Ok, I realize now that I forgot a VERY important thing about Karl Romano. He is properly Dr. Karl Romano with a PhD of Analytical Chemistry. He finished his dissertation and decided that he didn't want to be a scientist any more.
He applied his knowledge of chemical processes to special effects, developing his own paints, tints and adhesives.
Especially adhesives.
Now, no useful adhesives that you can use on human skin can really be water proof. Something about the nature of the surface you are adhering it to makes it so that if it's not going to irritate the skin it's going to dissolve in water.
Either that or its actual length of hold is measured in minutes.
That is unless you use Permanence.
The first and only time he used it was "Catastrophic Failure."
My fourth dorsal tentacle tore off during one of the fight scenes, I don't remember which one. What I do remember is that we had to halt production for two days while I spent a lot of time in a hot tub trying to get the nub to come off.
As far as I could tell at the time it is only partially water soluble, and we had no idea how long it would hold.
I'd been the one who nicknamed it Permanence.
"I thought you threw it out."
"I did throw that batch out. Doesn't mean I couldn't remake it."
So, I went and took a shower, making sure to scrub my breasts. They would have been raw and red had they been real, and my chest underneath was even a little sore.
Damn, what was this stuff. Somehow the second skin was a little pinker from the scrubbing, but that quickly faded as they dried. Sure, it wasn't a normal capillary response like I got from my own skin, but it did react just a little.
I put on clean underwear and went out to find Karl so he could check out his handiwork.
He still couldn't lift up the edges.
"So, how are we planning on testing immersion?"
Ilene handed me the cutest bikini.
"Oh, no. Not a good idea."
"Why not. I take my creations to the pool all the time."
"I'm worried about the bottoms."
Ilene just gestured for me to put them on. I took off the panties, leaving the super gaffe in place and then slipped up the bikini bottoms.
They covered everything. Wow, that was so cool.
I slipped off the bra and put on the bikini top. Karl turned around while I was changing and I snickered.
"Dawn, you need to be nicer to my husband, girl. Even I'm not that casual about changing in front of him."
"You've also never run around completely naked except for stage blood in front of an entire production crew."
She looked at me shocked.
"You never saw 'Sorority House Murders III' did you?"
"Oh, wow. Yeah, I never really thought about what the set experience for that would be."
I tossed a tee shirt and shorts on top of my bikini and we headed out.
Well, we headed out to Karl's car, again with me in the backseat. I realized for the first time since I started wearing this outfit that I hadn't thought about my crushed jewels once. Sure, I knew they were there when I thought about it, but it wasn't as uncomfortable as I thought it'd be.
So, we went swimming. It took about four hours, but the edges began to pull away a little bit. Just the tiniest bit, but it was visible. By that point I was completely pruned out and wanting to go home.
Sunday. We went shopping in Aimee's closet, in the warehouse, everywhere till we found the perfect dress.
It even had a matching pair of velvet gloves. Did I mention that it was a crushed velvet dress?
It was a green so deep that it almost seemed black most of the time. It was another shoulder less number, but this time it had a plunging neckline and a full back. It had a full skirt that fell all the way to the floor even with me in three inch heels.
We decided to have me up by three am to begin my hair and makeup, so I got an early night of it while Karl and Ilene rallied the troups.
I'd been out of work for six months, and I wasn't really wearing anything you would call makeup in my line of work for 'Huguenot,' but three am still wasn't difficult for me. Most of my adult life had been spent on the sets of movies where I wore a lot of special effects makeup.
Three am wakeup calls are a normal part of that. They want a full day of shooting, which means the three to six hours of makeup has to start before a normal days work. Before anyone else arrive, Karl carefully removed my breasts. He'd hired a dermatologist for the next part, as he wanted a medical opinion of the effects of Permanence.
The dermatologist was a short swarthy man with a pronounced Spanish accent. Castilian due to the slight lisp. "Call me doctor Garza. Let us see. . .Dawn?"
"Yes, Dr. Garza"
"Well, let us have a look at your skin, yes?"
"Thank you, Dr. Garza."
He poked and prodded a bit. Then he took a scraping of my skin. He poked some more. Pinched me a little.
"I will do some tests upon this sample, okay? But seems good to me."
"Thank you for coming in, Dr. Garza," Karl said and Ilene showed him to the door.
"Well, I'm thinking that we might be able to get about five days before Permanence really starts breaking down. We need to touch up the edges after any serious time in the pool or a bath, but other than that. . ."
I began to smile a little smile, "second skin with new Permanence. The next best thing to reality."
"Yeah, now we just need to make commercials," Ilene said with a giggle as she returned.
Karl reapplied my breasts, and then we put the gaffe back on. Looking at me in my underwear Karl got a bit of a glazed over look.
"Ilene, honey, could you get me a dressing robe? I seem to have broken your husband. Sorry."
"No, it's not that. Um. I need another life cast of you, Dawn."
"Another? Don't we have enough as it is?"
"No, I have an idea for something that. . .I need to make some mockups, and then we need the life cast. No time right now, but I'll tell you when we do the life cast. If they give us time this evening, we'll get it them. Otherwise, you get to be patient. Don't really want to get your hopes up unless it really seems like it'll pan out."
I sighed, but I was truly happy. Well, not truly happy. It was a bitter sweet moment. I knew that my wife was dead. I mourned her loss. At the same time, I was able to move on with my life because I finally realized where my life should have been going all along.
I was sad that I couldn't share this with Aimee. Sad that we couldn't have worked something out. I was happy that I could show the world the woman I longed to be.
No, that's not quite right. Show them the woman I was.
The makeup and hair people descended upon me. Some of them I remembered from "Love's Sunset." Some of them were new to me. All of them loved what we were pulling over on the 'reality people.'
None of them knew I was physically male.
First it was my makeup and hair. They piled my hair up on top of my head, leaving a couple of locks to frame my face. They spent quite a while on my face.
"Dear, how did you get to this age without ever piercing your ears?"
I blushed, "I was in tomboy mode. Figured I'd get them caught on something."
"You could have always taken them out to play sports."
"Never thought to do that."
"Well, if they have us back in I'm bringing my gun."
"Okay. Sounds god to me."
After finishing with my face, they got my hands and feet. They did them both in ochre.
The sheathed me in my beautiful velvet dress, and slipped on the gloves. They helped me with the nylons and shoes. I could see my nails peeking out of the toe.
I caught view of myself in the full length mirror. I was a vision. I felt so sorry for everyone else in that moment. Not very sorry, but sorry none the less.
"Thank you all. We'll call you when we need you next." Karl said, and they filtered out.
That was at six am.
I spent the next hour trying to get used to walking in three inch heels. I was marginally successful. Which is to say I could walk about ten feet before I tripped over my own.
"Okay, dawn. You'll have to practice a bit later, cause for now, the two of us have to get to the studio."
"Thanks, Karl, for the vote of confidence, and while we're out, I'm Barbara."
He smiled at that. He helped me into the back seat again, and handed me the rest of my dress after I was seated. I felt so luxurious sitting there in that dress, and the feel of the fabric on my bare biceps was truly nice.
We pulled up at the studio and Karl helped me out of the car.
"Thank you, Karl."
"Welcome, Barbara. Knock 'em dead, dear. Break a leg."
"On these stilts? Very good possibility."
I was walking to the door and tripped over my own feet again. I felt an arm catch me before I could collide with the earth and break some of the work that we had gone through so much trouble to complete.
"You okay, miss?"
"Sorry, it's these stilts I'm in. I loved the dress, and just couldn't bring myself to take it in, so that meant I had to have these shoes."
I pulled up my dress a but so he could see my foot.
"Very pretty feet, miss."
"Barbara. And thank you so much for preventing me from making a bigger fool of myself than I already have."
"Sean. Can I offer you my arm, then? It will make it easier for me since I won't have to leap to your rescue again."
"Why thank you, kind sir. I much appreciate it. You have a slight accent. Where are you from?"
"Small country in Europe. We only regained out independence in the last twenty years, so you might not have heard of us."
"I hear a bit of. . .Polish, possibly another Slavic language."
"Serbian."
"Well, my Serbian friend, just get me in there in one piece and I shall be eternally grateful."
We were getting inside, and something occurred to me.
"Sean isn't a Serbian name."
He held the door for me, and I slipped inside, then he joined me and offered his arm to me again.
"No, my name is Sergei Anatoleyevich Mirov. Unfortunately my normal nickname is Sasha which is a girl's name in America. I decided that Sean was close enough."
"Sasha is a nickname for Sergei? That's. . ."
"Very Russian."
"That's an apt description for it."
He smiled at me and for a moment my heart stopped. He helped me into the studio and I took my place with the other girls. I showed them my engraved invitation, and the tech people smiled at me.
There were a number of men in the room with us as well.
"Okay, we're looking for beautiful people for this. First cuts are now, please smile if asked."
Two men and three women walked among us, examining our makeup and dresses. A number of girls and a few boys were asked to leave. The boys that were asked to leave were wearing two pant suits, or blazers. Basically they simply did not get the concept of dressing well.
Two of the girls have visible wrinkles through their makeup. Another had a skirt and blouse.
Then it was the hard decisions. Bad coordination of shoes and dress. Bad choice in makeup colors. Plastic nail extensions.
Then all five of them were hovering around me and I did the only thing I could do. I smiled.
They moved on after that, but one of the women hung back while the others walked on. "Get your ears pierced, dear. Your smile is the only thing that just saved you."
There were only thirty women and about a hundred men left after that.
"For this next part ladies, and gentlemen, we'd like you to mingle a bit."
So, we mingled. Sean latched onto me and lead me from group to group. He'd leave me there and go talk to other people, but he was my knight for the duration. Every time they called switch he was there with his arm.
I felt a couple of jealous stares from the other women, because Sean was quite handsome, but I ignored them.
I was getting much more adept at walking in the heels as the time wore on, even as my feet grew more sore.
Slowly they pared us down until there were only five women and five men left. The woman who'd worn the backless red dress on Wednesday was still with us. Sean had also made the cut.
"Thank you, ladies and gentleman. We'll have the ladies back here in four months time to make a final determination for our primary sixteen."
"Gentleman, we'll have you back a week after the ladies."
"We begin shooting in six months time. Ladies, Gentlemen, even if you aren't a primary, we'll need you to clear your schedules as you will be an alternate. Welcome to The Real Prince Charming."
I have to admit I squealed, but I wasn't the only one. there was general laughter and we broke up and went our separate ways. They gave us the date that we needed to be back for last looks as we say in the special effects business.
I was out to Karl's car before I knew it, and as soon a I was seated in back, I took off the torture devices that are jokingly called shoes.
"How'd it go?"
"Well, I need my ears pierced, and not having them so already almost cost me a spot."
"You're in?"
"We're in. Let's get back to Washed Out Bridge so we can plan."
"Well, I've done some of the sketches I needed while I waited, and I think I might actually be able to pull this off."
"Pull what off?"
He just smiled in his mirror at me while we drove back to the workshop.
When we got there, he started on a life cast, of my posterior of all things. It was cold, and really slimy. It was also one of the more uncomfortable experiences I'd been through. The claustrophobia of getting your face molded was the worst. This was just slightly less. And he wanted me to do two poses. One with my legs splayed, and one with my legs in a more classic mannequin position.
I was beginning to get an inkling of what he was planning, but like he said earlier, I really didn't want to get my hopes up.
It would probably beat a gaffe, anyway.
It took him two days to get the lifecast done. Then began the swearing as one after another appliances failed. Ilene and I spent a lot of time through this period bonding.
That means we were out of the workshop and shopping. More specifically she was shopping, and I was spending time with her. She had me try on lots of clothing, and we began to get a good idea of what looked good on me, and what didn't.
About a week after the lifecasts were made, we were just coming out of an American Eagle store when we ran into Julia.
"Ilene, I haven't seen you since the funeral. You've been busy I hear with a new production of some sort."
"Julia! You're looking good."
"Thank you, and you're avoiding the question."
"Well, that's because it's all very hush hush."
"Who is your new friend?"
"Hi, I'm Dawn."
"You look familiar to me."
"I was in a movie a couple of years ago. 'Love's Sunset?'"
"That was you? I wondered where you'd gotten off to. I thought that you were going places, and then you simply disappear for three years."
"I had someone near to me die and I wasn't ready to go back out into the world."
"Sorry to hear that, Dawn. Say, I'd love to introduce you around. . .what?"
"Dawn's part of that secret project we're working on. Don't want to let too much go, but she can't be seen by the normal crowd, if you know what I mean. Part of the whole nature of it requires that she be incognito."
"Not another one of those pseudo reality TV shows is it, where they get actors to pretend they're on a reality TV show?"
"None of those have been 100% confirmed. . ."
"Julia, I've heard some things about you, and one of them was that you keep a secret."
"How would you. . ."
"Well, not many people know this, but Donnie Leary is my brother. He sort of wanted to keep me out of the spotlight, but Aimee convinced me to try out for 'Love's Sunset.' It really pissed him off, and that's part of the reason I wasn't allowed to try out."
"I thought you said. . ."
"Ilene doesn't think I should mention Donnie. He's missing."
"Missing? Have you phoned the police?"
"Yes, but they told us that as he's an adult he probably just ran away from his life. It apparently happens."
And was one of the more popular bad script devices used in a lot of movies you've never heard of but I've read for. Adult male runs from his life only to be thrust into one of: A mystery, a horrible tragedy, an axe murderers path, and alternate dimension, some of the above or all of the above.
They invariably get relegated to episodes of mid-day soap operas.
"You don't think he might have. . ."
Crying on queue is an art form. I needed it as a child actor, and it didn't fail me now. Especially since while it was fake when I started, it wasn't by the time I was cried out. I finally mourned Aimee. I mourned Donnie as well.
Julia and Ilene helped me to a bench and I sat down as they surrounded me with love from both sides.
"Thank you both, but I really think I need to go fix my makeup now. I must look a complete mess."
We got into the bathroom, and my makeup was a complete write off. Luckily I'd been practicing regular makeup over the past week, so I was able to reapply my makeup without giving myself away to Julia.
Looking at me, Julia got a thoughtful expression. "I always thought that Donnie was an only child."
"Yeah, that's what his Bio said. He wanted to keep me out of the spotlight. Hogging it all to himself I think."
"Yeah, that sounds like Donnie to me."
"Also, you may have noticed I'm a better actor than he is."
"The term is actress, Dawn."
"The term actor is an accepted gender neutral term, with the term actress applied in situations where specific gender is required. In this case, as I was referring to people of mixed gender, using the more neutral of the two terms seemed more appropriate."
"Wow, there's something else you have that Donnie never did, Dawn."
"What's that, Julia?" I asked, genuinely curios how I was different from myself.
"Donnie wouldn't argue about anything. It used to really frustrate Aimee. She wanted him to take a stand and man up once in a while. You are more man than he was, it seems."
"Thanks, I think."
All three of us giggled at my response.
We finished up our war paint, and made our way back to the mall proper before Julia spoke again, beyond random banter.
"so, what was the big secret you want me to keep."
"Oh, I'm crashing the set of a reality TV show using a full makeup and wardrobe team. Consultants, the works."
"What?" her eyes shone, "Need any waxing for this? Other salon treatments?"
"We're actually opting for laser hair removal, or we would be happy to visit you."
"I swear I lose more business to that alone."
"Well, I'm sure that you're great at your job."
"Believe me, Dawn, she's one of the best."
'Well, if I have a relapse, hair wise, I know who to visit."
Julia smiled at this.
We visited the food court for some suitably fattening food after our workout in the cramped stalls of the changing rooms. I swear that you almost have to be a contortionist in some of these places to get changed.
We hugged after we ate.
"It's been nice meeting you, Dawn. We'll have to do this again sometime."
"I'd like that, Julia. Well, back to the grind stone."
"What are you working on?"
"Posture, diction, and makeup. A bit of self hair styling as well. I'm learning tips from some of the best."
"Well, if what you did today is any indication, then you're well on your way to being a pro. I've seen professionals do a worse job than this."
I blushed at her comment, "Thank you."
We did the air kisses and then Ilene and I were off to the workshop.
We came home to a triumphantly smiling Karl.
"I was over thinking it. I assumed that I'd have to keep the whole thing insanely thin to work, but when I did that, it became obvious that there was. . .something. . .behind it.
"The thing is, I didn't need to have it super thin, just blended."
"I have no idea what you're talking about, Karl."
"Then let me try it on you, and we'll go from there."
"Okay. . ."
"I need you to strip from the waist down."
I did so.
"Ok, I need you to squat a bit. I made two of them, and we're going to try some more regular adhesive with both of them. See which one has a more natural look. I've never needed to do this before."
I won't go into all of the technical details, but needless to say there was a Texas catheter involved.
He glued everything down, and had me walk over to the mirror. There was something a little off about the whole thing, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it.
Ilene came and stood next to me.
"I think you sculpted too much labia into this one, Karl."
"I was a bit afraid of that. It was the strange body position. I tried to compensate, but it looks like it was too much compensation."
He removed it. He had me lay down on the table to get the next one in place. It was much more snug. That's the only way I can describe it.
Individually punched hair. Perfect match to my flesh tone. It looked natural, and I could feel the pressure of my penis trying to push against the appliance. I didn't see any change outwardly to reflect this.
I had a vagina. A cosmetic one, sure, but a vagina none the less.
"Wow," was all Ilene could say.
"Ilene, could you see me in the office for a moment. Dawn, get dressed."
I giggled as the two of them walked off, but I got my clothing on anyway. I was able to forgo the gaffe.
I filled it out completely differently than I had even with the super gaffe that Ilene had used. It was. . .natural this look. I felt myself tearing up, so I quickly got my skirt back on and sat there waiting for the two lovebirds.
Of course now that I think on it, calling them love rabbits would be better if it didn't sound so corny.
While I was waiting, I began to realize that I had to use the restroom. Badly. From what he'd been telling me, this wasn't supposed to be a problem.
So, I went in and used the facilities. I don't know why I felt a sense of satisfaction that everything worked the way that Karl had planned, but wiping off the appliance gave me a sense of accomplishment for some reason.
When Karl came back, after a lot longer than I'd thought it would take him, I was less than patiently waiting to tell him the news.
"Well, it seems to be functional. Well, as functional as you wished to make it."
"Glad to hear. So, you ready to get it stuck into some Permanence?"
"Of course, and now comes the real test. Let's go with them until the bond fails so we have an actual time table. Just record, don't fix."
"Great idea, Dawn. About the same thing I was about to say. We have seven days 'til your next laser hair removal appointment, so we should just have enough time, provided that my calculations are anything resembling correct."
So, for the next five days, twelve hours, fifteen minutes and nine seconds I wore the pieces of my body that were second skin.
It was wonderful, for the first day and a half, when everything was perfectly in place. I was the woman I was beginning to see myself as. Beautiful, confident, poised.
Then I slowly began to fall apart.
The crotch section of my girdle, as Karl began to call it, came off first at 3 days and about eighteen hours. The rest of it went not much after that. Apparently the tube developed a pinhole puncture and the urine ate away at the glue.
Karl assured me it wouldn't happen again. It was VERY nasty.
The breasts hung on for a lot longer. I lost my left one only twenty minutes before the right one. The right was the one that lasted the full time quoted.
The next day was my LHR appointment, so we didn't reapply, and I really was feeling miserable. We had what little hair had grown back zapped, and I impatiently waited for us to get back to the workshop so I could get back to being me.
The next four months went like that in cycles. A week of fixing edges, and practice on speed for Karl, and then a week to allow the bond to fail on its own.
The longer I wore it, the better than Karl got at getting it applied. It is also possible that as my follicles began to seal up it provided a better surface for the appliance.
By the end, we had to stop fixing the edges nine days before my appointment, as it would take eight days before the bond failed.
Two days before the big event, I got a phone call from Joyce.
"Dawn, honey, there's been a slight change in plans. Nothing major. They'd just like everyone to come in a swim suit. There's been a rumor going around that. . .look I didn't tell anyone, but someone says that one of the contestants is a transvestite."
"Joyce, don't worry. I've got it covered. Literally."
"Well, wear a g string bikini then, as that was been requested of all the girls still interested in being in the contest."
"Well, Karl, looks like you are a genius."
"Why do you say that?"
"I have to wear a string bikini to this now. They heard a rumor that a transvestite will be trying to attend."
There was general laughter at this. Both of them knew that I wasn't, technically, a transvestite.
I just realized I forgot to tell you one of the more important parts of this story. I know, you're all thinking I'm ditzy at this point. Anyway. About two months before the phone call, I woke up happy and ready to go. I met a serious Ilene and Karl on the workshop floor.
"Dawn, honey, Karl and I have been talking."
"No, it's mostly me, so let me tell her. I did some reading on the internet, Dawn. Mostly on medical websites. Some not so clinical. Well, there are options for you to really have a body like I've given you, but not before the contest. However, that's not such a bad thing."
"You're botching it, Karl."
"Think you can do better?"
"Yes. Dawn, you really feel yourself to be a woman, right?"
I nodded.
"You want for society to see you as one as well, and potentially get Gender Reassignment Surgery, right?"
"Yes, I would like that."
"Ok, then to do that, you need to speak to a licensed therapist. We have an appointment for you for tomorrow morning."
"But, that's not enough time. . ."
"You can go how you feel comfortable."
A light was beginning to dawn on me. Get it? Dawn?
Anyway, I was going en femme.
I dressed casually, but feminine, and once again Karl drove me. I sat up front this time thought.
The office was small, but comfortable. I walked up calmly to the receptionists desk. "Donnie Leary. I have an appointment with the doctor."
"Miss Leary, I know it's how you feel. I know it's not really my place, but I've never seen a more feminine female patient come in here than you. You really don't strike me as the usual woman who feels she was born with the wrong body. I usually try to mention this to the ones who will have the hardest time. . .fitting in."
I blushed. "That's because I was born a man."
Her eyes grew wide, and she looked me up and down, looking for telltale signs. "I had no idea. . .wow. I just had a name here, and assumed when you walked in. I think that I've been doing people a disservice. If someone can be as pretty as you, and born a man, then maybe there's hope for each of those that I talked to. They all turned me down, of course which is part of the reason I likely still have a job. . .
"You've given me a lot to think about, Ms. Leary."
"And you finally realize why I do what I do, Grace."
"You've known, Doctor?"
"My patients talk to me, Grace. If you persisted after they told you 'no', then I'd have fired you fifteen years ago. As it is, I appreciate the effort. It saves me asking the same question."
"But I'm not qualified as. . ."
"No, but you are a qualified outside opinion. The road that is taken by these poor souls is not the easiest. This is not their choice, any more than it was yours to be a woman."
"But I love being a woman."
"So do I, Grace," I said joining the conversation, "Are you ready for me then?"
The doctor nodded and I followed him into the room.
"So, Dawn, that's what you're going by right now?"
"Yes, that or Barbara, but Barbara is a role I'm playing."
"Oh, yes, and actor. How do I know this isn't just an act."
"Do you watch horror films, doctor?"
"Some."
"How about 'Sorority House Murders III' or. . .no that's the one you can most readily tell it's me."
"That was a bad movie with really horrible. . ."' he looked at me appraisingly, "oh. You were a man in that movie I assume?"
"Yes. Did you by any chance see 'Huguenot?'"
"Oh, you're THAT Donnie Leary."
"I'm also THAT Dawn Leary."
"I don't follow."
"'Love's Sunset.'"
His mouth dropped open. He was flabbergasted. I never thought I'd actually see someone who was flabbergasted in person. It is so much greater than regular shock.
"You acted that beautifully. How did you. . ." He was becoming a bit red.
"A VERY tight pair of shorts."
"Ok, so apparently, you have a hard time acting as a man, but you believably act as a woman. That doesn't resolve the issue at hand."
"Doesn't it? A wise person once told me that when I get up on stage as Donnie, I first have to pretend to be a man, and then try to act out my role.
"As Dawn, I simply am myself, and then act a role."
"Is that the way it feels to you?"
"It was so much easier acting as Dawn. I just got up there and recited my lines how I felt them. I never once had the director trying to get me to be more gruff, or domineering, or any of a number of words that he was using to tell me to act like a man."
"So you've thought a lot about this?"
"Not really," I said with a smile, "I'm sort of making it up as I go along. Not the things they said, but my realizations of why they said them. That and the different experience I had on set for 'Love's Sunset'."
"So, would you take more roles as a woman if given the chance?"
"Oh, definitely. I would love to be on screen again. I'd love to. . .fit. . .into my role like that again. Well, I could live with another role like 'Transsexual Stalker' I suppose, but the more I realize who I am, the more that movie bothers me."
"Actually, I'd like to thank you for playing that role. I forgot that it had been you, and you did almost as well in it as for your romance."
"Thank me? Why?"
"That movie actually prompted a number of my clients to seek help. They were afraid of following the path of self loathing that your character in the film followed."
"But, it is so. . ."
"Harsh? Sometimes that is what it takes to convince us we need to change. Dawn, it was a movie. We all know it was a movie. What resonates is our fear of rejection. Your character was rejected not only by her peers, but by the medical community on whom she depended for support. True, they'd likely not deny her surgery for her specific psychopathy, but I wasn't her doctor."
I laughed at that. I couldn't help it.
"You have one of the most beautiful smiles I've ever seen Dawn. We need to get you smiling more."
"Thank you, doctor."
"Well, I have some specific questions to ask you. Try to be as truthful as possible. . ."
He went back and forth like that for about an hour, and then he came to the end of his questions.
"Well, I'd normally like to see you for a few more visits before I made a pronouncement like this, but I have more experience with you than a single visit, don't I."
I nodded demurely.
"I will not be prescribing hormones for you, as I was informed by Karl that for up to a year he'd like it if your figure didn't change too much."
"That would definitely help."
"Well, you have a nice enough figure as it is, even if parts of it are fake. Truth be told, I can't specifically tell which parts those are."
"Thank you." I blushed.
"So, if you agree, I'd like you to begin your real life experience as of today. That will mean that you would be presenting yourself as female full time. Can you handle that?"
"Yes, doctor, I can."
"Then I would like to see you once a week, at least until filming starts. Then, call me if possible during filming, or we'll just resume after filming if it's not possible."
And that was it. My RLE was confirmed as beginning.
Back to the pool party.
I wore a sea-foam bikini, and made sure it was the microest of micro g strings. It was barely decent, and just barely covered my female bits. Well, the appliance that simulated my female bits.
I wore a white skirt and blouse over my bikini for modesty sake.
Karl helped me out of the car, and I was really beginning to feel like Cinderella. No one knew who I was. I was whisked to and from the ball in a carriage of dubious origin, sorry Karl, but you know your car is dubious, and I lost my high heeled shoes at every opportunity I got.
I'd gotten my ears pierced so the dangles I had on tonight showed my femininity to the world.
Unlike some choices in accessory that one of the girls wore.
She'd tried a flesh toned gaffe, but it was painfully obvious to the rest of us and she was asked to leave.
That left nineteen of us to fill sixteen spots.
We stood in a long line in the studio, and they kept coming back to me.
I was beginning to get a bit worried.
No one had been tapped out yet, and I was worried I'd be the first.
"Beautiful choice of earrings." I think that was the woman who'd whispered to me last time.
"Daring choice in bikini."
I held my tongue. There'd been no direct question.
"Firm tits and buttocks." One of the male judges said.
"What's your name dear?"
The first thing that came to mind was Dawn Leary, but I altered my thinking even before I opened my mouth.
"Barbara Scott." I flashed my smile at them again. I was proud of my name and my body, and my smile said it all.
"Well, Barb, you don't mind Barb do you?"
I scrunched my nose and shook my head, "I don't mind it."
"Then Barb, welcome. You're the first contestant picked for The Real Prince Charming. Linda will have an information packet for you at the door. We need you here in two months. Good luck."
I'd made it. I was a contestant. I was accepted as a woman.
To be honest, I'm not even sure which of those thoughts made me happier even now.
"Ilene! I got the part! I'm in."
My joy translated itself into my every movement, into my voice, and for a moment I even forgot that I wasn't even half dressed. Ilene came out from the back room and gave me a hug.
When I say hug, I mean she ran up to me and enveloped me in her arms.
"Let's celebrate!"
Ilene and I looked at Karl and just smile. I think a little giggle might have escaped my lips, but the rest of that evening is a bit of a blur.
Oh, before I forget again, something happened almost three months before this point. I know, it all seems so convoluted here sometimes, but that is the nature of my brain. I will be running along at full tilt, and suddenly realize that I forgot to put on my shoes.
Well, the analogy worked properly for me.
About a month after Dr. Garza came to see me, and checked my skin, and took samples, he came back to do another test.
"So, Dearest Dawn. How has your skin been holding up under your mishandling, hmm?'
"It is fine. No irritation from either the Permanence or the LHR."
"Good. Now, Let's get a look at you."
He checked my chest out completely, and for a moment, I found myself wishing, for some reason, that I could show him my real self. It wasn't that I was attracted to Dr. Garza, but he was a man, and I loved the effect that my body seemed to be having on Karl and I wanted to share the wealth.
This was the week after Karl had perfected the girdle.
"Well, nothing seems to be…"
"Doctor…you're going to have to check…um…"
"Spit it out, girl, nothing I haven't dealt with in the past, I'm sure."
"My genitals."
"Oh, I see. And you're uncomfortable with me being forced to see you as a man, is that it Dawn?"
I nodded, with a tear in my eye.
"How about this? If you let me take a quick look at this costume of yours from top to bottom, I'll wait in the back room while Karl puts you back together and then you can show me the real you."
My mouth dropped open.
"Dawn, my daughter went through something very much like what you're going through. Not exactly, I'm sure, since she was a bit broader in the shoulder than you, and over six five. She towers over her husband when she insists on wearing heels."
He got a distracted smile on his face. After a moment or two he shook his head and look directly at me.
"So, let's get to that examination, shall we?"
It was over almost as quickly s he said it, and then he went into the back to talk to Ilene while Karl put me back together.
"Dawn, could you please stop squirming."
"I'm sorry, I just can't help it."
"You never get this way with the prospect of me seeing you."
"That's because you created me. Well, in a sense. You know what I mean. You're like my father. Or maybe just an attentive older brother. He is not related to me, in this scene, at all. It get to play the 'ne' role for a stranger for the first time."
"Well, he'll get bored and leave if I can't get this on properly. I've had kids who didn't squirm as much as you."
I had to laugh at that. Karl was the lead makeup artist on "Zombids" I know, it's a horrible name. The tagline will help you understand a little better: When your children are zombies, no one is safe.
I wasn't actually part of the production, but Karl called me in because I could keep kids distracted with some of my really bad acting impersonations. Well, some of them apparently weren't bad, but the disconnect between a man pretending to be Grace Kelly or Marilynn Monroe or Kathryn Zeta Jones seemed to be too much for most people.
I usually only did my impressions for my friends.
"Ms. Leary? Can you do one of Angelina Jolie?"
The question shocked me so completely that my brain shut down for a moment. Karl had to break me out of my revere. "Ms. Leary. You had a request."
The kids weren't laughing at me, and in fact they thought I was a girl. This was before I ever got my role in Transsexual.
Now that I think about it, Karl was the one who convinced me to try out for Transsexual. At some point I really have to repay him for all of the things he's done for me over the years.
Regardless, I spend three hours doing impersonations of actresses to the rapt attention of thirteen kids. They weren't laughing at me, but all just smiled as I did my shtick.
Karl had me back in every morning. I got used to being called Ms Leary, and even felt a twinge of sadness when the movie finished. I said goodbye to my young friends.
It also started one of the more epic arguments I'd ever had with Aimee. I suggested that we have a kid. She didn't want anything to do with children. They would ruin her figure. She loved appearing nude on the screen, and wanted to keep that going for as long as possible. A child would not only ruin that for 9 months, but likely cause her breasts to prematurely sag.
In her words.
Anyway, this tangent has gone on long enough. I settled down a little, enough that Karl got the appliances on, and I put on a silk dressing gown. It was a pale green in silk, and it pissed me off no end when one of the other girls stole it. Well, that came after the show started.
It was translucent and left very little to the imagination. It was modest in only the broadest sense of the word.
"So, what do you think, Dr. Garza?"
"If I hadn't just been in here and seen you, well, I'd think this was some sort of trick. That mole there isn't makeup, is it? You're not Dawn's sister or anything?"
I smiled at him, demurely, and shook my head. Hey, I'm an ACTOR remember. I don't have to be demure to play it.
"Then I need to get back to my wife. It would be a shame for me to ruin what obviously took some work to perfect."
For the first time my eyes drifted down and I realized that I'd had a profound effect upon him. I walked slowly over to him, letting my hips sway a bit, and gave him a kiss on the cheek.
"You're too kind, Dr. Garza," I said and fluttered my lashes a bit at him.
He cleared his throat and made a hasty retreat at that point.
Ilene let out a hearty laugh as soon as the outer door slammed shut, and Karl just looked at me.
"You can be very bad when you want to be, Dawn," he said.
"Oh hush, Karl. He enjoyed that as much as I did."
"He looked embarrassed."
"Honey, he was flushed, not embarrassed. He was showing visible wood to two ladies he could not touch. That man is a swinger, or didn't you remember."
It was Karl's turn to flush, and then he and Ilene disappeared for about an hour.
I was fine with that. I was more than fine. Happy for them is the best way to describe how I felt, and a little sad that I couldn't share this with Aimee. She would have loved my new breasts.
Back to the partying.
The next morning, Karl pushed me off the sofa. "You have a phone call."
How could he be so chipper. From what I remember of the evening he was drinking two shots for every one that Ilene or I drank. My head pounded and all I wanted to do was sleep until November.
"The studio is on the line for you."
Crap. We'd set up a private line for Barbara, and I was the only one who was supposed to answer it.
"You didn't…"
"I did, and said it was your phone. Told them I was your brother."
"You're the best."
He handed me the phone and I did my best to sound awake.
"Hello?"
"You didn't party too hard, did you?"
"Sasha?"
"Sean, please."
"Sorry, I am somewhat out of it. My brother said you were the studio."
"They pulled us all in here two days ago. This is the first phone call I've been allowed to make. Each of the other sixteen guys are each making a call as well. I just lucked out to get you, Dawn."
"That's so sweet, Sasha…I mean Sean."
"Well, you're not going to think me sweet in a moment. You have only thirty minutes to get ready and out to the car that's already waiting for you. This is the first contest of The Real Prince Charming."
"Then, I'd better get going."
I hung up and jumped into lurching action.
"Karl, we've got thirty minutes to get my clothing together and get me home."
"Huh?"
"They start filming today, and apparently the girls have to do contests as well."
"Then let's get to it. Ilene!"
We'd already considered what I would be taking when everything started up, and even had my two, modest, bags packed. Well, let me be honest. I had three bags. To easily carried ones with my everyday clothing, toiletries, and six swim suits. One not so easy, closet sized garment bag for my dresses. I have no idea how we got twelve dresses in there, flat, no wrinkles, but we did.
Karl grabbed a small bottle of what looked like nail polish and tossed it in with my makeup. "That is a bottle of Permanence. Says so right on it. Since no one will yet know what Permanence is, it should be fine."
I kissed him on the cheek, and then we were off to make the ride over to my house. We parked in the back lot, I hurried through my apartment to the front, and right out the door into the waiting lights of the camera.
I smiled the best smile I knew how, "Sorry. I just found out last night that I would be on the show, and so my brother and his wife came over to celebrate. I think we had a little too much celebrating last night."
"That's quite alright, Ms. Leary," Sean said.
"No heels today, Sean, so I guess I won't be needing your manly arm to get me down the stairs."
"Well, it's here for you if you want it."
I did, and I took it. I really liked this guy. I couldn't even begin to explain it, but he made me feel completely Feminine. Yes, with a capital F.
He took all of my bags as if they were nothing in his right arm, and I got the joy of his left. I leaned my head on his shoulder and we walked out to the car. I didn't know how it would work into the rest of the competition, but I wanted to spend as much time with Sean as I could.
He helped me into the car, and joined me after putting my bags into the trunk.
"So, Barb, are you ready for this little adventure?"
"Surprised they are starting it this soon, but more than ready."
I couldn't help it, I beamed a smile at him. He got a glazed look in his eye, and then went in for a kiss. I froze. No, this can't be happening. I like him, but…
"Sasha."
He jerked back. "I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have done that."
"No, I'm flattered. Really. I just don't know you."
"Well, I hope to change that, then."
I moderated my smile into a grin. Apparently, I’d have to learn how to control the strength of my smile if it did these sorts of things to the male mind.
And biting my lip would be an extreme no no.
We talked during the ride, which made it enjoyable even if my nerves were trying to get the better of me.
We pulled up at the mansion, and I was struck completely dumb. I'm still embarrassed by the footage of that shot. I look so simple minded.
"Whose house is this?"
"It's the house of the Real Prince Charming for the duration."
"You mean I get to live here?"
He nodded at me.
I squealed, gave him a hug, and ran up to the house…only to find eight of the sixteen already there.
"Welcome, Barbara. With a time of fifteen minutes and four seconds, you are in first place so far."
I looked a question at the man standing in the doorway.
"Most of these women are from Beverly Hills, and so much closer than you were. That is why we were only timing the amount of time it took to get out the door. You've beaten your closest competitor by ten minutes."
I smiled and said, "Thank you. I'm not sure if I deserve the honor, though. I've been so excited about being on the show that I have been packing, and repacking, my bags for the past four months. I was on autopilot this morning."
"Nothing to be ashamed of, Barb. If any of these ladies had taken your example, then they would have had the same opportunity."
Great, from the glares it would seem I'd already made some enemies. I went and stood next to the last girl in line, who had not glared at me.
"Don't let them get to you. My name's Sophie by the way."
"Well, I'm Barb, as you already know."
"Nice to meet you…Barb."
She was checking me out! I gave her a half smile. "So, do the producers know that you're on the other team?" I said quietly.
"What?"
"Honey, I'm bisexual. I caught how you were checking me out. I've seen a lover or two do the same thing."
She blushed bright red, and shook her head. "I've never even told my parents. My girlfriend is pissed at me…I should call her my ex-girlfriend. She left me."
I put my arm around her shoulders as she sobbed a bit.
"Is there something wrong, ladies?"
"Sophie is hormonal." I said bluntly. A couple of the other girls giggled, and Sophie elbowed me in the ribs, but smiled.
"That was a little blunt, Barb."
"I know this isn't going out live, since you can't afford to do that with a reality show. Either you'll edit it out, or you'll use it to create a character for me that the audience can accept. Either way, I'm not going to beat around the bush to convey knowledge that either you should already know, or will need to know."
The man was dumbfounded. I smiled at him. A really bright full smile. Then I licked my lip and said, "That's alright?"
He shook his head and laughed.
"I think it's going to be a joy to work with you, Ms. Scott. Or should I say Ms. Leary?"
My jaw dropped open.
"We only found out last night. Or I should say I only found out last night."
"You're the producer."
"Yes, I paid for the show and wanted to the be host. They let me. Last night, when you walked in, I was completely shocked. I knew I'd not seen your name on the list, and so I had to figure out what was going on. Joyce told me you were contemplating suicide when you called us?"
"My spouse had just died. I was a wreck and unable to go on alone. I saw the add and sort of thought of it as a last hurrah. I can leave."
I thought I would be able to do this, but I broke down and began to cry.
Sophie and a couple of the other girls gathered around me and held me.
"Actually, being an actress doesn't disqualify you, although if you'd told us you were Dawn Leary I would have snatched you up for a real role. We'll need you to resign your paperwork with your real information, though."
I giggled at this.
"Ok, now stand up so I can give your introduction for the camera."
I got out a small mirror and touched up my makeup quickly, and then stood up at the end of the line.
"Welcome, Dawn. Some people in the audience may recognize her from her starring role in 'Love's Sunset.' She's a Texas native who has lived much of her live in California."
The rest of the morning went like that. Girls arriving, some out of breath, and being given their time. Nothing like the drama that the final show gave you. It was edited to taters. Worked for me, though. They decided to completely cut out my breakdown.
Then, finally, the last girl arrived.
"I'm sorry, Melinda, but even your time of sixteen minutes even is not enough. Dawn, you have won this first challenge. Let me explain the rules for you. The Ladies challenges decide the order in which you will be selecting the men. You will be in a private booth, and will get a bank of televisions that will display the men as they compete against each other in tests designed to see who is the Real Prince Charming.
"Their scores will be tallied, but you won't be told was they are until after every girl has chosen one of the men. The man with the lowest score and the woman who picked him will go home. You may not pick a man who another woman has already picked, unless otherwise stated. In addition, you can't pick the same man two challenges in a row, so if you can't pick the best man, pick the second best."
There was general giggling and laughter at this.
"After the elimination, the remaining couples will go on romantic dates planned by the man. It will give you a personal view of his personality, and possibly help you judge him better during the next competition."
"Well, that's a nice turn about," said one of the other women. I think her name was Angela. "We get to pick the guys."
"If you'll come this way, we'll get you situated in the judges room."
They could have called it a theater. There were sixteen plush seats arranged around a room draped in velvet and satin. The televisions in the front were showing different scenes around the house, as well as each of the sixteen men.
All of you have likely seen what the men went through in that first challenge, so I'll give you a brief synopsis.
The competition was to choose the perfect bouquet of flowers for a girl who was a friend, with a hint of romance.
Most of the men went with white roses and one or two red. Somebody should have told them that Pink means friendship, not white. And red is love, not passion.
So, they were, in essence telling the girl that they thought her virginal, and were in love with her.
Yeah, I was as clueless as you before everything was explained.
They never showed the argument about Sean on the air.
"Excuse me, I want to make the perfect bouquet for a girl I know."
"Of course, sir. What did you have in mind."
"We've been friends for a while, and I want to let her know that there could be something more to my feelings."
"That you love her?'
"Well, I think she's smoking hot, but I don't know if my feelings go beyond wanting her and enjoying her friendship."
"Well, a truthful man. I like it. Let's go with pink carnations and roses with an amaryllis or two surrounding a single passion flower."
That is what was shown on TV. I thought it was the most beautiful arrangement I'd ever seen. And I said so.
"But he cheated by asking the florist what to get."
"Come on, Angela. You can't tell me that was cheating. They were never told they couldn't ask for help," Sophie replied.
"If you spent more time looking at the men, than at the women."
Sophie slapped her for this. I decided to join in. "so are any of you saying that you wouldn't have appreciated Sean's bouquet more than most of the other guy's"
"It looks like he put more thought into his," said Melinda
"And you're saying that the thought doesn't count?"
Angela was getting angry now, "but he didn't put any thought into it."
"He thought enough to ask how to put together the best bouquet. That's all that matters, Angela." I was getting angry.
"Come on, girls. If Dawn likes what she sees in Sean, then she picks him. You don't have to agree about his actions as were only judging who we think is the best."
Willow was a gem. She tended to act that way toward the rest of us. It's no wonder that we started calling her 'mom'.
Sure, it wasn't a long fight, but it would form the rest of the interaction between Angela and I. I think she resented the fact that I was an actor.
I resented the fact that she commented on every guys butt.
"I'd love to get my hands on that rump roast."
"His buns would look great in my bed."
"Have you ever seen someone who looked that good in a tight pair of jeans?"
"Angela, I know you’re playing to the cameras, which may or may not be here, but could you be a little more circumspect?"
"Sorry that we stepped on the toes of the famous Ms. Dawn Leary."
I copied her exact movements, and tone, "Sorry that we stepped on the toes of the famous Ms. Angela Darren."
"That's not funny!"
"That's so funny!"
Everyone was laughing at her, and I did my best not to even crack a smile, especially since I was trying to keep the same expression of anger on my face that was on hers.
"Oh, do me, next," Sophie said with a smile.
"You'd enjoy that, wouldn't you," I said with a smoldering look.
Everyone else laughed, even, Angela, but I could tell that this wasn’t over.
At the elimination ceremony later, I picked Sean and someone I never really got to know was eliminated. Her name was Deborah. We hugged and she left. So did the guy she picked. A hulking brute of a man who'd actually composed a bouquet of nothing but red roses.
"What do you have planned for us," I asked with a small smile for Sean.
"You'll just have to wait and see tomorrow," he said back.
We all went to our separate rooms. For the first time, today, I was afraid. I'd made it through the entire day without anyone twigging to the fact that I wasn't a genetic female, but here was the moment of truth. They would be seeing my entire body, well in underwear since I wasn't stripping completely for them, and I would be seeing them.
They were all chattering and getting undressed, a couple of them glancing in Sophie's direction, and I just sat there. I wanted to get changed, but it terrified me.
"Look, the little actress is afraid to get naked in front of us. What with the swim suit you were almost wearing and the way Mark was gushing all over you. You must have been a porn star," Angela said.
"Angela, you are a complete bitch," came a voice from behind me. I turned, and for the first time noticed the girl in the red dress who'd been at that first cattle call.
"Hi, I was there before you this morning, so you might not have caught my name. I'm Sarah. And you're Dawn Leary. I saw your film at Cannes. I thought you should have won the SAGs award as well. Frieda can only look pretty and be herself on screen. People keep writing movies for her, though, so what can you expect."
Frieda Cummings was a former porn star turned dramatic actress. Her past sort of kept her out of real movies, so she went from one indie production to the next. I had to disagree with Sarah about her talents, but I always thought everyone else was better than me.
"Angela, this woman has only ever been in one movie, and I'd know. She is probably embarrassed to show skin when not in a bathing suit. You saw how uncomfortable she was standing around in that piece of floss. If she wasn't the actress she is, I doubt she'd have made it in."
I was confused, and I'm sure that I looked it.
"I'm Sarah Parson. I'm a film critic."
The bottom dropped out of my stomach and I felt the blood drain from my face.
Sarah laughed, "Oh don't be like that. I didn't twig to you until Mark let us know earlier. I have to say that you look better as a redhead. Course, that might have just been the one scene talking."
I giggled at this, and beamed a smile at her.
"It's not that. It's just that this will be the first time I've ever really undressed in front of anyone. I mean in public. On set, when you get undressed or changed, or are getting body makeup, everyone is professional. You don't expect to be ogled and measured."
"Sophie, I think she wants you to leave the room."
"Shut up, Angela. Give Sophie a break. Just cause she likes your body more than you do." I slammed my mouth shut as soon as the words left my mouth. Angela's eyes grew wide, and two spots of color appeared on her cheeks.
"How dare you…"
"I may never have been in anything you've heard of, but I've been in the industry for long enough to see the signs. Bulimia leaves its mark on the body, and not necessarily in the good way."
Her mouth dropped open.
"See, right there, your teeth show signs of wear that even your bleach job didn't cover. There are tooth marks on your left middle finger, so I assume you're left handed. Your breath freshener is too sweet to cover up the smell of bile. Need I go on?"
"How dare you!"
"You need some help, honey, and I don't think anyone here would be doing you favors by telling you differently."
"You bitch." She stormed out of the room, and a couple of the other girls, including Sarah, followed her. The tears were already forming in her eyes before she left.
"That was cold, Dawn."
"Sorry, but not telling her the truth could easily lead her to a bad end."
After that, my fear was gone. I got undressed and put on my dressing gown. I got a few oohs and ahhs over it. It was the fancies that anyone had. I felt my underwear clashed with it, so I went naked underneath. They post processed a slight blurring when they showed it on TV. You could clearly see my nipples underneath it.
After I did that. A lot of the other girls relaxed a lot. It seems they were a bit worried about Sophie being there. When I was the last to get undressed, and I went that far, I think they decided that there wasn't much to worry about.
"Hey, Sophie. How do I look?"
Linda was in a very pretty lace bra and panty set, and a couple of the other girls gasped.
"Linda, I appreciate the offer, and like how they look on you, but I'm not looking for a relationship on the show."
Linda pouted prettily, and then smiled. "Thanks. I was so worried when I overheard you were a lesbian. I guess my preconceptions were wrong."
"What preconceptions?"
"Well, that you would try to force yourself on us and turn is lesbian."
"Would you expect a guy to try to rape you if he were here?"
Linda was dumbfounded. I spoke up, "Sophie, she didn't think about it that way. It never occurred to think of you like a guy."
Linda began to get a faraway look and then a small smile on her face.
"I think I need to go take a long bath," she said with a slightly breathy voice.
Sophie's legs went out from under her and she had the same faraway look. And then she refocused on Linda's behind with a smile.
"Sophie, I originally took the single room, but if you'd like to switch with me…?"
She just nodded.
"I'll move my stuff later and let you get acquainted with it now."
Sophie is a screamer. So is Linda for that matter. When they rejoined us awhile later, they both looked a bit sheepish and we got some good laughs at their expense.
And that was my first day in the mansion. I made sure to properly hydrate before going to bed, hoping that my headache would be completely gone before tomorrow.
I woke up with my hand in a bowl of water. I personally had never known anyone who that had worked on, and it didn't work on me. I put my hand to my crotch and looked horrified for a moment and Angela started laughing.
"Thanks for giving yourself away." I said with a smirk.
"What?"
"It's called acting." I said as I stood up, displaying a bed. I'd slept in the nude the night before, and so after standing up I put on my dressing gown.
Here is where I got the nickname "Ice Queen."
I literally forgot how sheer the material of my gown was. After putting the bowl of water under Angela's pillow while she was in the bathroom, I went downstairs to get something to eat. Carlos gave me a wolf whistle when he entered the room. I glared at him.
"Look, chika, if you're gonna show off that body, then you gotta expect some attention, am I right Henry?"
"You know it, my man."
They gave each other fist bumps and chuckled at their witty repartee.
I mollified my glare and just looked at them as if they weren't there. "Well, I suppose that you two won't be here long enough for me to worry about it."
"What are you talking about?"
"Yeah, what are you spouting, Chika?"
"Since we're here looking for a Prince Charming, you two are obviously out of the running. So, get your looks in while you can, since I am way out of your league."
"Barb, are these two hoodlums giving you any trouble?" Sean took that moment to walk in.
"Nothing I couldn't handle, Sasha."
Carlos spit out his drink and Henry began laughing.
"Barb!" Sean said shocked.
"Look, Sean, if you'd told them your name was Sergei, they'd have less trouble accepting your nickname as Sasha."
"Wait, your name is Sergei?"
"Dude, that's so cool. Can we call your surge? I've always wanted a friend with a nickname of Surge."
"Sure," he said a bit distractedly, as I'd stood up and the full impact of my almost nudity struck him.
I walked imperiously out of the room.
"Barb, wait!"
Ok, so it only looked imperious. It wasn't what I intended at the time. It's just that I only then realized that I was basically naked, looked completely female, and was alone in a room with three guys. In a word, I was scared and uncomfortable, and that translated my body language into haughty.
It apparently made for good TV.
I was hugging myself in the next room when Sean found me. That was one of the scenes they never showed, of course, why show one of their villains with an emotional side. They set me up to be hated. I didn't do enough at the points when they had to show me to disprove it. If I'd had any clue how they edited these shows I would have done a much better job during the one-takes.
No, that's not an industry term, that is a me term. There are scenes in any movie or TV show that you can't redo. The time it takes to set up is simply prohibitive, or you have a couple thousand, or even hundred thousand, dollars worth of pyrotechnics for the shot. Either way, the actors all have to get it in the first "take" or first time.
As a child, I smashed the words together when they would say, "Ok, people, we need to do this in one take."
I ended up with my own term that I would use in my head. It helped me focus.
It helped, too. Think about the Fourth of July scene in "Love's Sunset", or when they were blowing up the corridor around me in "Catastrophic Failure." Or maybe the death scene in "Huguenot." Sure, the director thought I looked too girly, but hey, it was only the truth.
Ok, the death scene was a bad example, since I missed my queue the first time, and they had to set up for a second shot and we lost two days of production. It was supposed to be a one-take.
"Barb, come on. What's wrong?"
"I'm naked."
"I noticed."
I hid my face in my knees and held them to me. "I've never been this naked before. I feel exposed."
"Then put some clothing on, you silly girl."
"No, I don't mean that. I mean…I've always deal with my kind of people. Professionals. People who could handle whatever you did, or were asked to do, and move on. It didn't even occur to me to be worried about coming down to breakfast nude. Everyone would just overlook my gaffe."
I turned my head to look at him from under a fall of hair.
"I don't belong here. I'm not real."
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"I'm and actor, Sean."
"You mean actress."
In that moment, I meant I was a man, and acting out a role, but Sean, sweet as ever, misunderstood my intent. He simply couldn't see it. I gave him a hug.
"Thanks for caring."
I got up and began to leave.
"Barb, where are you going?"
"To get some clothing on."
I turned in time to see Sean blushing bright red.
I blew him a kiss as I left the room.
When I got back to the room, there were a couple of guys there searching through my bags.
"What is going on here?"
"Sorry, Miss, but we were told that someone here was using a cell phone last night, so we're searching everyone's bags."
"What's this?" the other one asked.
He was holding up my bottle of Permanence.
"What does it look like?"
"Um…"
"It's nail polish, you moron," I said as I snatched it out of his hand. "I thought you were looking for cell phones, or do you think I magically made one small enough to fit inside this bottle of nail polish."
One of the guys glared at me, but the other one blushed. "Look, ma'am, this is our job."
"Then get to it, and I suggest you check the girl who is smirking behind you next."
They turned instantly on Angela, and she paled, "Wait…"
That was all the shark needed, a little blood in the water, and they descended. They were a lot less careful about Angela's stuff than they had been about mine. There was no cell phone of course, but they knew that they'd been had, and they let everyone know that not only were cell phones not allowed, like they'd told us last night, but that false reports would be dealt with severely.
After they left, Angela just let me have it.
"you bitch. How could you do that to me? They tore this top! They ruined half my makeup!"
"And the half they left is still more than most of the rest of us brought. You trying to hide your real age under a metric ton of concealer?"
I know, that line made it to the show, but I'm pretty proud of it.
She glared at me. "Not all of us have a body as fake as yours."
I couldn't help it. I laughed. Of all the insults she could come up with. "Is that all you have? Childish insults and pranks, and when they backfire you go running to daddy Shurtleff?"
"Dawn, a moment if I could?"
And there he was, standing in the doorway.
"Sure," I said blushing, and Angela began laughing at my expense.
"Angela, pull one more stunt like this and we'll kick you from the show."
"You can't…"
I have never seen a glare that literally dropped the temperature in a room before. I never want to again.
"Try me," he said to Angela, and then turning off his glare and turning back to me he said, "Dawn?"
"Yes, sir."
I followed him into the other room. "We have a couple of problems, Dawn, and we need to resolve them before we continue principle photography."
"Um."
"Very articulate. The first is that the network has already started promotion for the show. They started yesterday actually. Pretty much as soon as we finalized our picks. The entry scene was the last bit they wanted for it. They have your name there as Barbara."
I felt my heart sinking, "And the second problem?"
"Sean called you Barb in a spot we can't edit."
"Then it's simple, Mark, tell the network that my SAG card is under the name of Dawn Leary because I changed it when I joined the guild. I always thought that Dennis Leary was a great comedian, and I liked the idea of it being a new dawn to my career."
"That sounds…what's your real name?"
"A girl's gotta have some secrets."
I don't know why, but I kissed him on the cheek as I went out of the room.
"Wait, but what about Barbara?"
"I used my real name when I tried out for the show since I didn't think that Dawn Leary would be let through the door at the cattle call."
"You're prescient. I would have signed you right there for my next romantic movie."
"That's sweet, but after this I think I'll be out of the spotlight for a while. I have some issues I need to work through."
"The death of your husband?"
I smirked. Oh the little lies we tell.
"Mark, I've never slept with a man."
"But…oh…Oh!" His eyes got really wide at this, "You're Wife!?"
"Now he gets it. I changed it during the one-take yesterday since I didn't think national television was ready for a lesbian widow. And before you say what you are thinking of saying, there is a closet lesbian and an open one also in your group of sixteen, as well as the fact that I think I'm more bisexual that anything else."
"Huh?"
"I'm attracted to both guys and girls. You should understand that. After all, it's kind of obvious that I think you're sexy."
"Who?"
"The lesbians? I won't tell you, Mark, but if everything goes well then they might just let everyone know during the course of this."
"How will I be able…"
"Mark, this is reality TV. All you do is change the script that you keep behind the scenes. When you figure out who it is, quietly tell them that instead of picking one of the guys, they can pick each other. Sure, you have four people leave in one elimination, but it makes for great TV, if their up for it. Otherwise you let them know the guys who will be eliminated in two successive eliminations and they go out that way."
Mark was silent for a moment or two, and then he looked at me with a glint in his eye, "I have no idea what you mean, Ms. Leary."
He got up and left after that, but it was all the confirmation I'd needed. I knew there was a fix somewhere in this competition, and I thought I had some idea where it was.
It was little things that clued me in at that point, but little did I know the full extent of the lie.
Sophie was screaming when I got back to the room, and not in ecstasy.
"You little bitch!"
"Yes, Angela is that, but what did she do this time, Soph?"
"She put my hand in a dish of water and I peed the bed."
I blinked, "You mean that actually works with some people?"
She blushed and opened her mouth, but I continued.
"Angela tried the same thing with me. That is why her pillow is wet. I put her bowl of water under her pillow."
Before Angela could make one of her ill thought out come-backs, Melinda spoke up.
"Ladies, it's too early in the morning to be this angry. Angela, you are an adult, not some teenager. Start acting your age. Dawn, stop provoking Angela. Sure, she's pretty when she's angry, but from what I've seen Sean is more the one to get your motor running. Sophie, let's get you cleaned up."
And there was mom again, defusing another situation.
I relieved myself and then got dressed. Cotton top and pants that fit me like a glove. No underwear today. I loved the caress on my butt when I walked. I was thinking about the guys reactions to me and could feel myself straining against my Second Skin prison. I checked myself in the mirror to make sure that nothing was showing, which it wasn't, and heaved a slight sigh of relief.
I found myself beginning to think of Sean, and what he could do to ease my strain. That shifted suddenly to him penetrating me, and the pressure got worse. I wanted him like I'd never wanted another human being. Not even Aimee. I began to slightly rub my crotch and realized I could feel it. No, not like I was physically touching myself, but in a more distant, but pleasant, way.
Through a force of will, I ignored my feelings, that time, and stopped rubbing. I didn't want to take any chances of ruining the appliance with no possibility of fixing it.
It really hurt for about half an hour before the pain, and my genitals, subsided.
When I went downstairs there was much flirting going on, and even some heavy petting off in one corner. They kept those sorts of things off screen, but they happened. When you have thirty-six hours to play with and fit into the 42 minutes of an hour long television program, you get to paint any picture that you like.
It's how so many "perfect" couples end up breaking up after the show ends.
"Barb!"
I was Sean. My heart skipped a beat. His smile made me melt. If I could I would have jumped him right there and damn the consequences.
"Heya, Sasha."
"So, you ready for our date?"
I'd almost forgotten. We'd be going out for our dates with our chosen men today. Tomorrow would be more competitions. At this rate, we would be done with all of this in no more than a month. thirty days from today and I would know who the winner was. The desire to win the competition and prove myself as an actor and a woman was so strong.
"What do you have planned?"
"How about a picnic in a hot air balloon?"
Ok, I know what you're thinking. The images they showed on the program made it all look rather romantic. And in the abstract, at that moment, it was.
Then there's reality.
We had to drive for almost an hour to get to the place where the balloon was set up. I was distracted by the fact I was wearing no underwear, and by the closeness of Sean. Uncomfortable only begins to cover it. My pants were riding up my butt. The cotton seemed to slip right off the leather interior of the limo. And Sean kept trying to put his arm around me.
He'd gone to so much trouble I didn't want to shoot him down completely, but then again, I didn't want to lead him on. And I also wanted to lead him on at the same time. The things I imagined doing to him in that limo make me blush.
Ok, so a lot makes me blush, but I am embarrassed at the thoughts I had, so I'm not going to share them.
The thoughts increased pressure against…certain parts of me, and that increased my discomfort. I'm sad to say that I was fidgeting by the time we got done.
When we got there, I saw the movie crane, and I knew exactly what was in store. They'd get shots of us from "outside" the balloon, and edit it to look like it was hundreds of feet in the air.
Then there was the size of the basket, gondola, thing, under the balloon. We could stand comfortably in it, but that's about in. Add in the operator, and you are starting to get the picture.
I dropped the wine bottle three times before they stopped retrieving it for us. I think we got a couple of bites, what from the wind and all. I was frozen, and miserable by the time they finally called it a day.
I know, in the footage they have, I seem to be having a wonderful time. I was acting like it for the cameras, but when we were done, there's a reason there's no footage of the ride back to the masion.
"What kind of an imbecile decides to have a picnic in a hot-air balloon."
"I thought it would be romantic."
"In theory, sure, but there are a lot of things that are romantic on paper, and a stupid idea in the real world. Like kissing underwater. You're spending most of the time worrying about holding your breath, keeping water from going up your nose, keeping yourself underwater in the first place, and so on. The kissing part at that point is incidental."
Aimee and I had tried kissing underwater on three separate occasions. I was half drowned the first time when we decided to give up. Aimee really wanted to get it right, though, so we kept trying. Not worth it.
"Oh, sorry, Barb."
"It's ok, Sasha. Thank you for the thought, but I'm cold, and I'm hungry, and I really didn't enjoy myself."
"I was planning on heading for a burger afterwards, since that really wasn't my type of food."
"I'd love a burger, Sasha."
We ended up going for a burger and fries at MacDonald's. Through the drive through. In a limo. And for all the girls out there who say that is a cop-out of a date, all I have to say is don't knock it 'til you try it. I've done that again with my husband many times since then. You get some awesome stares from the people at the window.
Course, I'm a little more famous than I was at that point so they may just be staring at me.
No, I'm not conceited.
We laughed and talked for what turned out to be hours. While I was digging into my burger, he'd talked to the driver and told him to take the scenic route. That was both the best and worst date I'd ever been on.
"So, would you mind keeping the particulars of our second date to yourself?"
"Why, it was great. I loved it."
Sean got a pained look in his eye, so I just nodded, "ok, I'll keep it to myself."
"Thank you, Barb."
I was on cloud nine when we finally got back to the house. Today had been a rollercoaster of emotion for me, and I was ready to relax by the pool. I lay in the sun while the other couples trickled back in from their various dates. Many of them got into their swimsuits and joined me by the pool.
It was a pleasant afternoon, and I simply enjoyed the company, well most of it, anyway.
Sean was attentive and got me drinks as I lay there. It was…pleasant. That's all I can say about it. I was content.
Other people were less so.
"Carlos, I don't care if it has memories for you of childhood. I didn't like being taken to In-N-Out."
"But Willow…"
"Don't 'but' me. You had an unlimited budget and that's what you offer?"
"I thought that by sharing a bit of myself…"
"Then count me out of learning any more about you."
I know, I thought Carlos was a bit of a jerk this morning, but that was at least partially my fault. I was naked after all. And they are guys. I shouldn't blame them for thinking with their equipment.
Willow on the other hand was taking it way too seriously.
"Come on, Willow, give him a break." I had to chime in.
"It's not like Sean took you to a fast food place. I heard already. Hot air balloon picnic."
"So what if he did, Willow. Dates are about connecting to the other person, and not about so romantic getaway. I would have appreciated it so much better if it had just been a simple picnic in the park."
"Don't give me that, girl, I saw how your eyes lit up when you found out what your date would be," Amanda said.
I felt bad for that now, since it undermined my point. I wished that Sean hadn't made me promise not to tell, because I really wanted to. Our "real" date gave a bad impression about what was important. It made the surface seem to be more important than the substance.
"To tell you guys the truth, after having done the 'super romantic' date I'd much prefer a date at a fast food place."
"Put your money where your mouth is, then, chica."
"In other words, pick you tomorrow?"
"Exactly," he smiled at me.
"You just want to see if I'll let you touch my breasts."
He blushed bright red. I got up and sauntered over to him. "I haven't been to an In-N-Out in years. If I get the opportunity to pick you, then I will." I kissed him on the cheek and walked out.
As you all know Willow complained about being taken to a fast foot join for the rest of the competition. Every time she brought it up, Sean and I just looked at each other and laughed. Especially since she was so jealous of the balloon ride.
Now you know what the infamous "inside joke" was all about.
It wasn't until I was lying in the dark trying to fall asleep that I realized that I'd promised to pick Carlos the next day as long as no one else already had.
The next day I was already up and ready to go when Mark peaked his head into the girl's room. He gestured for me to follow him, and I got up to follow. He raised an eyebrow at my attire, or lack thereof, and led me into the same study from yesterday.
"How are things going, Dawn?"
"Pretty well, Mark."
"So you know, most of the time you are in here, you will be recorded. This room is soundproofed, so you can speak your mind. We use this to do the 'interviews' that are so common in reality TV."
"And then edit them down into soundbites."
He laughed, "Of course."
"So, what do you want me to say?"
"Anything. If you don't really have any opinions, then I can ask you some questions, but it's really up to you to decide what you're going to say."
"You going to be in here every time I do this?"
"If you'd like."
There was a look of admiration in his eye that I didn't really understand. I was just me. Just Dawn Leary. Crossdressing Transgendered Actor.
I began to giggle. I thought of myself doing the song from Rocky Horror. I'd never tried to sing before, so I didn't know if I had any aptitude for it, but it would be funny in my opinion.
"What's so funny, Dawn?"
"Nothing, really. Just thinking about what some of my friends would think of this situation."
"Friends?"
"Karl and Ilene."
"Washed Out Bridge? That Karl?"
"Yes. He did a lot of work with Donnie Leary, and so the two of us became friends."
"Donnie?"
"I thought Joyce told you. Oh, well, he's my brother."
I knew then that Mark knew nothing about who I really was, and a bit of my happiness went away. I still had a secret to keep from everyone here.
"Something wrong?"
"Donnie's been missing since I tried out for the Real Prince Charming. We tried to file a missing persons report, but we were told that he is an adult and that sometimes they just leave. Donnie isn't really like that, but I don't know what else to do. I move on, hoping he isn't gone forever. I miss him, especially at times like this. I know he wishes me the best, though, wherever he is."
"Would you like me to see if there's anything I can do?"
"No, thank you, Mark. I appreciate the gesture, but I don't want to make Donnie's disappearance into something big."
"It would be no trouble."
"I said no, Mark." I was getting agitated. I didn't want him to look into it, and yet, I think I was acting a bit suspiciously.
"Either he'll turn up, or he won't. He was close to my wife, and thought he had a real chance with her. He took her death even harder than I did. I am afraid that he might have committed suicide. I've already mourned him. If he comes back, then I'll rejoice. There's nothing I can do about it in the meantime."
"You are a complex woman, Dawn."
"That is the best compliment anyone's ever paid me, Mark."
I beamed my smile at him and he melted. I went to give him a peck on the cheek, he turned to face me, and we were kissing on the lips. I was shocked and froze, and he wrapped his arms around me. For a moment I melted into him, aware of nothing more than his lips and tongue. The smell of him filled my nostrils, and then I was pushing back from him and pulling away.
I ran out of the room crying. What was wrong with me? I wanted to stay there with Mark, and felt like I was cheating on Sean. I wasn't cheating on anyone. I wasn't promised to Sean. Fifteen of the girls would be leaving the show. The odds were against me winning, but I held out hope for some reason.
But, Mark…
I spent the next hour crying and being comforted by Willow, Sophie and Linda. In editing they made it look like I had fought with Sean, but you know it really wasn’t that now.
I wouldn't tell them what happened, and hoped Mark didn't tell anyone either. I didn't want anyone to know that I was confused. I was supposed to be all put together, and I couldn't decide on one man I wanted more than any other.
I started repeating the name Sean over and over, and so they began to assume that it was Sean who hurt me. I let them believe it, since Mark knew the truth.
"Ladies, you have an hour to get ready for the next challenge. Meet the crew downstairs." This was one of the women who would be leading us from place to place for the rest of the show. I never learned her name, I'm sorry to day.
I wiped away my tears with a hand and tried to put on a smile. It made the others smile and giggle a bit. We all broke up to get ready for the day them.
Well, let me address this 'issue.'
I cried on the third morning. Yes, that morning appeared on the second episode, minus me bawling my eyes out, but me bawling my eyes out was moved after events that happened later in the show.
Reality TV is less about reality and more about pseudo reality.
They edit the footage so that instead of a log it is a drama. Edited for dramatic emphasis. They create a story out of the lives of normal people. It is shown months after filming giving them the opportunity to make people seem like villains or heroes. They paint people in a better or worse light.
After having been in one, I can say that there is less reality in a 'reality TV' program than in your normal prime time drama.
At least the prime time drama makes no pretenses at showing real people in real situations.
I am telling my story. It has a beginning and an end, and usually proceeds from the first to the last. Usually. So, this happened on my third day at the mansion, and that's the story I'm sticking to. Don't believe me if you don't want to.
I spent longer than usual repairing damage in the bathroom that morning. By which I mean that I was gluing down the edges and trying not to make a complete mess of it. So far, as we figured would be the case, at least initially, there had been no opportunities for me to either get out to Karl or even contact him.
The small bottle had enough in it for at least a few more of these touchups, but it wouldn't last for a full month, and neither would the rest of the work on the appliance.
Composed, makeup on, dressed, I went down to get my breakfast. We were all more or less enjoying the company of everyone else, when Mark came in. I turned away from him. I simply couldn't bear to look him in the eye right now, and figured I could listen well enough with my back turned.
"Ladies, it's time for your next challenge. In today's age, it seems that most people have gotten away from the simple home tasks that in generations past everyone, especially women, were expected to be able to do on a daily basis.
"This next challenge will put that statement to the test. It doesn't need to be fancy, but we want you all to prepare a dinner. You have a budget of one hundred dollars, and have access to whatever you need for this competition. We'll be taking you to another location where we'll have a cooking station for each of you. You'll have six hours from when we arrive to accomplish this task, and the men will be tasting your offerings."
Aimee and I had shared cooking duty, so I knew how to make at least a few things, and even better, I knew how to follow a recipe. It might not be four star dining at its best, but at least it would be edible. That's all I could hope for here. That and not placing in the bottom.
There is a secret to making really good spaghetti, and it's not the sauce.
The primary thing that alters the experience is the noodles. They have a very subtle flavor, but it's there and it will color the impression that you get of the rest of the dish. Making your spaghetti go from just blah to something edible requires cooking the spaghetti noodles to the right consistency in water that has been seasoned to the right amount.
I like to use ginger, oregano, some chili powder, diced onions, and my secret ingredient: a pinch of nutmeg.
The sauce is garlic, more oregano, parsley diced and dried, basil, and cumin. I like Chicken as the meat. Less greasy. Also, green olives. I prefer the ones with pimento, but any will really work here. Sliced. They are both for contrast, and a bitter tang. It complements the nutmeg mentioned earlier.
Since the entrée was going to cost me very little, I went with breadsticks. I thought that I might be trying for too much by getting premade dough and then cooking that in the oven, but I had to do something a little special. I brushed them with butter. No garlic. Yes there is such a thing as too much garlic.
I spent most of my money on a bottle of red wine that I can't remember the name of. You can watch the episode if it really matters to you. I followed the suggested of the boy in the store.
I've never really had much money for wine or things like that, so I hoped everything he'd told me was correct. The bottles of scotch mentioned in the beginning were an aberration.
It seems that I was among the first qualified contestants to finish.
Angela and two of the others had ordered out. Angela had actually been thinking at least logically and ordered a catered meal. It looked right, but of course the cameras were everywhere.
The other two simply didn't think ahead. They were tied for last. Angela got second to last.
Apparently one of the other girls, Helena, was a professional chef, but you all saw that on the show. Sorry. Sometimes I forget I am just retelling my portion of a story everyone's already seen.
She came in first, but that isn't a shock to anyone. She also took the most time.
Sophie finished her meal before I did. Sarah finished just after I did.
Now, if you'll recall, they had a tally sheet that they graded us on. I was completely smashed in the presentation category. Apparently it isn't kosher to put everything on the same plate, which is the most simple and easy way to access your food.
I got high marks for the wine, for which I was silently thanking the shopkeeper, and apparently they thought my sauce was top notch. I smiled to myself. No one blames the spaghetti when the sauce tastes bland, but they give the sauce all the credit when the spaghetti makes it taste that much better.
More than one of the guys stopped back at my table after all of the judging was done for a full portion of my spaghetti.
Seems my meal was a true success in the only way that really matters: people wanted to eat it.
I didn't get to even taste the wine I'd purchased, so I can't tell you a thing about it.
When the tally was complete, and everyone was ranked, I came in third. Not too bad for a meal that took me little time and less money.
We were driven back to the mansion and we filed into the theater for the second competition of the day. The guys would be showing off their parenting skills. Well, parenting light I guess would be the best way to term it.
Wow, it was a disaster. Unmitigated.
Well, only for me.
I'd made a promise to Carlos that I would pick him if he was available, and he would be for my lofty pick position. He borrowed one of the kids portable game systems, and spent the entire time playing and almost completely ignoring the kids. They wrecked the room he was in, and he barely batted an eye when the woman who ran the center the kids were in asked who would be cleaning it up.
"I assumed that you would be cleaning it up."
And here is where they pulled a trick on us, and something that I would come to suspect they did throughout the entire competition. They ended his footage there. Basically, there were sixteen screens, each with a name underneath. And when their portion was done, or they were out of the competition, their screen was turned off.
Yes, they moved the names around to keep the screens together that were active as the competition progressed.
They didn't show what happened next with Carlos because, as you know, WE were the ones really being tested. You in the audience saw what happened, of course, because you were told all of this ahead of time.
The woman glared at Carlos.
"Look, I'm sorry. This was my fault, and I should have watched the kids better. Hey, kids! Why don't we help clean this up. I let you run loose earlier, so now we all get to pay for it."
"No!"
One of the little boys was glaring at him.
"No? Really? Weren't you the one who tore the poster off the wall and shredded it? I really think that means you are responsible for picking up the pieces," Carlos turned toward the woman and pulled out his wallet, "how much do I owe you for the poster and the other items they wrecked?"
The woman looked a bit flustered. "The studio already said they would pay for it."
"Ok, then. Kids? Let's get to work!" He had a huge smile on his face as he pitched in. After a couple of seconds the rest of the kids joined him.
Yeah, I consider Carlos to be a big kid. He's really a good guy.
So, I was agonizing over whether or not to pick Carlos. In the end, it was Mark's kiss that decided me. I wanted out of the competition so that I could get away from Mark.
I know, they built it up as this noble thing, but it wasn't. I just wanted to go home.
The other girls were teasing me over my promise, and so I had to say something.
"Look, I made a promise. If I don't keep it, then I'm not worth anyone's time, let alone my own. If that means I'm going home, then I'm going home with my head held high.
No one saw Aaron almost let the kid die. I know I didn't. One minute we're talking, and the next there is Aaron, white as a sheet walking away from the kids and waving to the woman in the middle of them.
I have no clear recollection of his video. He was sort of a non-entity as far as the rest of us were concerned, too.
"What just happened?"
"I don't know," Willow replied to the unknown voice, "Can we get them to play it back?"
A voice came over the speakers, "Sorry, Ladies, these are live, we can't bring them back for you."
That struck me as really false at the time, but I didn't speak up. Of course they were recording them. How else would they show what the guys did on the TV program.
So, we were left not knowing what happened to Aaron, but everything really seemed ok. I was one of the few who saw him white as a sheet, and most attributed it to low blood sugar.
Sean played touch football with his kids and ended up in a dog pile with them. It was a nice moment. Not perfect, but definitely nice.
He had an infectious grin and I couldn't help but smile at him, even though he couldn't see me.
Then it was time to go get ready for the elimination ceremony. Tonight I would be wearing a pale blue dress. I was thoroughly entertained by the other girls trying to get creases out of their clothing choices. I was the only one who'd chosen to bring a flat, hard sided, garment bag to this place. The others had either folded their clothing or used the folding garment suitcases.
A light steaming and my dress was perfect. I wore a robin's egg blue satin corset and matching panty, bikini cut. I styled my hair loosely, only putting a simple brown clip in it to keep it out of my eyes. The color of the clip matched my hair.
I added a pair of diamond studs and matching necklace and called myself done. I went downstairs to wait.
It gave me a wonderful opportunity to mingle with the guys.
"Wow, you are gorgeous," Carlos said. I think he was trying to remind me that he was there.
"Evening, Carlos." I smiled at him.
"Barb, if you hadn't picked me last time, I'd almost have to demand that you pick me tonight."
"Sean, I need to spread myself around a little bit. Wouldn't want all the others getting jealous of our passion." I said it with a wink. There was general chuckling from the other guys. I was the center of attention. A light blue rose amidst the thorny ground.
"So, Barb, you gonna stick to your promise?"
"You'll have to wait and see, Carlos."
I preened and flirted and simply smiled. I smiled. This was where I belonged. My pick of the best guys in the world. I wanted to be wanted by them. By one of them. They made me feel so secure, even as I was feeling more in control of my surroundings than I ever had before in my life.
Woman, thy name is contradiction.
One by one the other girls came down, more or less put together, and I walked over to take my place third in line.
Helena picked Henry, and then Sophie, after a longing look at Linda picked another of the guys. I think his name was Walter or William or something else W.
"It's your turn to pick, Dawn."
"I made a promise I would pick Carlos, and even with his poor showing today, I must keep my promise. I pick Carlos."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Carlos said in my ear after I walked over to him.
"You spent the day playing video games."
"Yeah, with the kids."
"Well…" That was something the video didn't show. It had seemed he was off in his own little world.
"Sure, some of them didn't have systems, but I traded off a couple of times with them. The poster things was a…I mean I didn't…"
Carlos paled visibly. He swallowed a couple of times and tried to put on a smile, but it was forced.
"What are you talking about, Carlos?"
"Nothing. Don't worry about it, Chika. Nothing to worry about."
More and more about this contest was seeming strange. Sure, it was just little things, but there was definitely something that they weren't telling us.
I thought over the wording of my contract. It had talked about our agreement to go through a wedding should we pick the winning individual and last through the elimination process. I had no fear of that, since legally I couldn't marry any of these guys. That would come out at the end, though, and who knew what would happen between now and then.
Additionally, after all of the indemnity this and clause that there had been something that I couldn't quite put my finger on.
Something about this whole thing just wasn't quite adding up.
We got to the end of our picks and then Mark turned to us.
"Ok, are all of your happy with your picks for the evening?"
We looked at each other a bit confused.
"Tonight, we are diverging from the normal procedure a bit. We will be eliminating a woman from the competition. Someone here has violated the terms of the competition."
What could he be talking about? Could it be that he was planning on removing me from the competition because I'd rejected him? It couldn't be something as simple as that, could it? Or could it?
"We explain the terms of each contest before that contest begins. This morning, three of the women violated the terms of the contest by ordering out instead of preparing a meal. Angela, consider this a warning. There are no shortcuts in this contest. You came in close to the bottom because of your choices, even below people who burned their meal. At least you chose a meal and had it catered. Creativity can't be punished. You are safe, but do not specifically violate a term of a competition again.
"Two other ladies ordered take out. Katie and Ophelia, you are eliminated. Collect your belongings and vacate the mansion."
"The gentleman you chose are safe, however, as they are among the better scoring competitors for this competition. Aaron you will be leaving the competition. Collect your belongings and leave the mansion please. Linda, you may pick one of the remaining two gentlemen."
"I pick, Lewis."
"Henry, you will have been eliminated. Collect your belong…"
"This is bullshit, man. I was promised…"
Henry was shouting and looked like he was going to punch Mark. Before anyone else reacted, I put myself between the two men.
"Henry, what do you think you are doing?" I glared at him, and heard a couple of gasps.
"I was…"
"Just proving why you were eliminated? You are acting less mature than the kids you were playing with earlier. And finger painting? Those were twelve year olds. I don't know about you, but when I was twelve I was more interested in the opposite sex than arts and crafts. Movies, high school. Any of this ring a bell? Sure, video games were popular, but not my thing. But finger painting? Didn't you see how those kids were laughing at you?"
He went bright red.
"Now, see if you can act a little more like the man you claim to be."
I went back to stand next to Carlos who whispered, "Good job, Chika," in my ear.
I caught Mark glaring at me for a moment before he put his smile back on.
"Tomorrow, you'll all be going to the grand opening of Firebird, a much anticipated new restaurant. This will be your date for next episode."
I was shocked, and not in a good way. I'd hoped to get some real quality time with Carlos, hoping to see who he really was, and instead we would be going to a fine dining restaurant to be shown off to the glitterati and paparazzi.
I went upstairs, heading toward my room, when one of the assistants got my attention.
"Dawn, you're wanted in the interview room."
I entered to find it empty except for the camera.
"Hello Camera, my old friend," I said after noticing the red light. "Looks like mark is avoiding us. I can understand why he would avoid me, since I was a bitch to him earlier, but no clue why he is avoiding you.
"No, I wasn't a bitch. It isn't bitchy to stand up for yourself. I don't need to make out with every Tom, Dick, and Sally who thinks themselves a producer. I'm not that kind of girl, and I never will be.
"My wife, Aimee, told me about a couple of parts she lost out on because she wouldn't service the producer. I actually considered decking a few, especially the guy who came to the reading nude. He asked for Aimee and the actress she was reading across from to disrobe. He wanted to make sure that they were suitable for the role.
"Not being shy, Aimee disrobed without a seconds thought and read her lines. The scumbag took her aside afterward and told her she was captivating. She just needed to do one more thing and she was into the movie.
"Him I didn't need to worry about. She kneed him."
I smiled to myself over the thought, but then the smile faded.
"She found out later that her agent had sent her to a porno shoot without telling her. He had to pay a fine to the Actor which she'd kneed. Still, it is an interesting story.
"And it's keeping me from thinking about that kiss this morning. Mark, you confuse the hell out of me. First you tell me that you'd like me to be an actress in your movies, and then you are kissing me like I'm air and you are suffocating. I am not that kind of girl, Mark. I do not sell myself for a role.
"But damn it, I'm attracted to you. I want to be with you. I tried to get myself eliminated this evening by sticking with Carlos. I really thought he had performed poorly."
I began to cry.
"I want Sean. This is supposed to be a contest for the best man here, but I already find myself lost in his eyes, and wanting his arms around me. At least I did want Sean, before that kiss. Now? I think I just need to be needed for once in my life. My wife needed me to need her. She wanted me to be the man of the relationship. Funny, right? Me, a man. Well, she didn't see it that way.
"Oh, god. I'm rambling. I don't know what I want, or need, any more."
"I think I heard a couple of things in there that worked for me."
"Mark?" My face burned.
"Hey, Dawn."
"You heard that?"
"Everything that mattered."
"I have to go."
"Dawn, let me explain. I'm sorry. I didn't want to take advantage of you."
"Then why did you?"
"Look, I'm sorry. If you want to press charges, I have a policewoman down stairs ready to take your statement."
"What?"
"I wanted you to sit her for a minute while I called the police."
"But, it wasn't…you just kissed me."
"And essentially you're my employee. Some people would consider that sexual harassment."
My jaw dropped open and I just looked at him. He was serious.
"Mark, I enjoyed kissing you. A lot."
He got a goofy grin at this.
"But you're right. It's not appropriate."
I got up and walked through the door and downstairs. The officer had a severe face, but a nice body. I smiled at her as I approached.
"Hi, I'm Dawn Leary."
"Hello, Ms. Leary. It seems that a Mark Shurtleff called us to report himself for harassment? He does know that this is a civil issue and not a legal one?"
"I have no idea what Mr. Shurleff knows or does not know. Regardless I have no charges to press. He kissed me. That is it."
"Really?"
"I was upset by it yesterday for a number of reasons. Not least of which is that my wife died recently."
"Your…wife?"
"Yes."
"Then I understand why you would be upset. I have a couple of lesbian friends. Not that I am myself. I mean."
"I'm not a demon, officer. You don't have to worry about me taking offense. Anything else I can help you with?"
"Let Mr. Shurtleff know he'll be fined for a false 911call."
"I will."
I went upstairs to the gossiping and backbiting and got ready for one more night in the mansion.
I was being propositioned by both Sean and Mark. Both wanted me desperately, and both were touching me, and stroking my skin. I woke up crying. Sobbing. It should have been at least erotic, but the terror of what they would find if they got too close was simply too much for my waking mind to take and it had ended the dream.
I cried for a couple of hours, there in the darkness. I did the best that I could to keep it quiet, but my best apparently wasn't good enough, because I heard someone stirring in the room.
"Dawn, what is it honey?"
I pulled away from Willow. She wasn't supposed to comfort me right now. I was so ready in that moment to throw in the towel and just quit the competition. I couldn't handle it. My nerves couldn't handle it. I was leading two wonderful men on, and the worst part was that I wanted to.
I sobbed even harder. I heard some other sleepy noises of confusion from the room, so I got up and fled.
The house was huge, and I found myself in an unused guest room. The queen sized bed made a perfect target for my body, which I flung down upon it. I felt very melodramatic in that moment and wished that the bed was a cliff that I could throw myself from.
I don't know how long I lay there, crying uncontrollably, but eventually I felt the soft arms of Willow wrap themselves around me.
"Shh. It's ok. Shh."
"It's not ok, Willow. I shouldn't be here."
"Why not? You seem as qualified to be here as any of the rest of us."
I sat there in relative silence, the sobs threatening to suffocate me.
"Dawn, honey. It can't be that bad. Sure, Mark likes you, but I doubt that is the reason you're on the show."
"It has to be. Anyone should be able to see I'm not real."
"You certainly feel real enough to me."
I stopped there, teetering on the brink. I could tell her my secret, and then I would be out of the competition. She would tell everyone else what I was. I was a freak and I didn't deserve anything else. They would throw me out and I could get back to figuring out how to pull the trigger on a shotgun while keeping it in my mouth.
"Dawn?"
I shut my mouth tight. Apparently, I spoken at least part of the last paragraph aloud. I still don't know how much I said at that point. I was distraught, tired, and working myself up to a frenzy. So I did the only thing left to me.
"I'm not really a girl, Willow."
"Could have fooled me. I've seen you naked."
"No you haven't, not really."
"This is some sort of illusion?"
"Something like that. I'm wearing really elaborate…um…prosthetics."
"I could see the breasts being fake, but a prosthetic adds to, it doesn't subtract."
"It does when it is smashing that part of me. Well, mostly smashing anyway."
"There's no way that your vagina is fake. They can't make latex that looks like that. I was your pubic hair."
"My makeup artist is a wizard."
"Take it off, prove it to me."
My breath caught in my chest. She wanted such a simple thing, and yet it was so difficult.
"I can't…but if you could stand touching it…"
"This isn't some strange attempt to get me to finger you up is it?"
"I would never do that to you Willow."
I felt the pressure of her fingers even before I stopped talking. I knew that the labia and clitoris were there, even if I had no sensation in the appliance, and the thought of someone touching me in so intimate a spot aroused me a little. She jerked her hand back.
"I felt something move under your skin…well I guess your prosthetic. But it is so…real."
"That's what I've been trying to tell you."
"Sound like a man, then."
"What? But…"
For the past few months, I'd been working on my "female" voice. Not that I spoke higher, or anything. I have a pretty high pitched voice for a guy. It was the way I spoke. There are mannerisms of speech that men use, that women don't, and vice versa.
And for the first time I realized that my speech pattern wasn't forced. I tried, cleared my throat, tried again.
"Shit." And it was the most ladylike swearword you had ever heard.
Willow started giggling at me.
"Stop it, that's not funny."
She laughed harder, and eventually I joined in. When we were both almost calmed down, Willow mimicked me saying the word and we busted out laughing again.
"Dawn, were you really the actress in Love's Sunset?"
"I really was."
"I have that movie on BluRay. I watch it every couple of weeks with my girlfriends. When your character finds out that she has only weeks to live, it tears my heart out."
"Then blame me. They approached me toward the end of filming and asked me if I would agree to make a second movie. I was still pretending to be a guy at the time, so I declined, vehemently."
"Listen to yourself, Dawn. Do your really think you are a guy?"
"No, but I am male."
"Physically, maybe. I felt you flinch when I touched you."
"What?"
"You are wierded out being in a lesbian relationship right now."
"I was married."
"And you took your vows seriously?"
"Of course I did."
"What were they, your vows I mean?"
"That I would never love another woman for as long as I lived."
"Well, you're still alive, aren't you?"
I was dumbfounded. I'd said the words, before, and logically I realized that I was aroused by women, still, but the thought of touching one, or being touched in return, no matter what my physical body looked like, turned my stomach.
I even dry heaved.
"You need a trashcan or something?"
"I'm good."
"I can get one if you need it."
I punched her in the shoulder.
"Subject A hits like a girl. Further testing required."
"Willow, what are you out in the real world?"
"A marketing executive, if you believe me."
"I can't see it. You're too nice."
"And Marketing people are supposed to be mean?"
"I think I mean that they're supposed to be slimy."
"How rude."
We both giggled at this.
"So, are you going to drop this nonsense about being a man?"
"But…"
"No buts, Dawn. We had sixteen different types of guys in this house. Each one was a little different, but each one was distinctly male. We had sixteen…"
I tried to protest, but she ran over the top of my objections.
"…sixteen women in this house. Each one a little different, but even you are distinctly female."
I blushed so hard that I thought I would have to be glowing in the darkness. Willow just kept her arm around me.
"So, what was this about a shotgun?"
"I tried to commit suicide with my wife's gun."
"Your 'wife's' gun?"
"She was more into that than I was. She thought every home should have protection of some sort."
"But a shotgun?"
"Something about the pellets not penetrating drywall from very far away. I don't get it, but she was sure."
"Dawn, why did you try to kill yourself with a shotgun?"
"I was afraid of the pain of a knife. I lay in the tub for an hour trying to get up the courage to try the first cut."
"Have you talked to anyone about this?"
I shook my head and just sobbed harder. I was so broken that even Willow didn't want to help me. She was nice to everyone, and she wanted nothing to do with me.
"I'm sorry I took so much of your time. You need your sleep. Please, just leave me here."
"No, hush now. I'm not leaving you right now. I just wanted to know if you'd sought out professional help. You've made two attempts at suicide, and told no one about them. I'm really worried about you, Dawn."
"Four."
"What?!"
"It wasn't two."
"You're really bad at it, then, or you aren't trying hard enough. All since your wife died?"
"No."
"Dawn, you need some help, and I'm not sure that being in this competition is the best place for you. Of course being out of the competition on your own wouldn't be a good idea either."
"You can't Willow. I'll just tell some of my friends."
"Like you told them already? Dawn, you need help."
"I don't deserve help!"
The moment the words were out of my mouth, it was much too late to take them back. I wanted to, badly, but it wasn't in my power. I wanted so badly for someone to love me again like Aimee had. She'd been my rock and the center of my universe. She'd had the strength of character to keep us going forward. Sure, she was more masculine that I was, emotionally not physically, but that worked for us.
Or did it just allow my femininity a way out?
I thought through a lot of this during the next few minutes. Ideas and thoughts that had been disconnected finally gelled. This is called an epiphany.
"Thank you, Willow."
"For what?"
"I wasn't in a lesbian relationship, and never have been."
"I knew that."
"Never been with a female, either."
"What are you talking about?"
"If I'm female, I think my wife was male. She was the one who asked me out the first time, and she was even the one who proposed."
"That doesn't mean…"
"That was just the obvious stuff. She acted as protector. I felt safe with her there. She loved to hold me while we sat on the couch. I once tried to hold her, and it just felt wrong to both of us. Sure, there were moments when we took our traditional roles, but usually, I was the one who stayed home, while she worked. She was much more popular as an actor than I was."
"It sounds like you're sure, but keep in mind that you aren't a therapist. There may be some things about her personality that…"
"It is possible, yes, that I'm wrong, and thank you for pointing that out, Willow, but I know I'm right."
"Ok."
"No, it's a good thing, Willow. It really is. I've been discovering myself over the past year, and realizing that I'm more normal than I thought. Well, more average at least. I don't really know that I can be called normal.
"Willow, I know that you are worried for me. I think that for the first time I'm not worried about myself. I feel…hope. More than that I feel hopeful. I feel as though the worst, for me, is over."
"Well, if you're sure…"
"I'm not sure about anything, Willow, but this I can say: For the first time, I don't need to be."
I kissed her on the cheek and helped her to her feet. Then, giggling, we ran back to the room.
I'd only barely closed my eyes, it seemed, when everyone was up and moving around. I threw on my dressing gown, and went downstairs. Willow raised her eyebrow at me and gave me a meaningful glance. I just had to laugh at her.
There was the morning rant about going to a fast food place on her first date, and the obligatory laughter from Sean and myself.
I was content.
It almost seemed as though I were in a family. A horribly dysfunctional family, but a family none the less.
Not even Mark could ruin my good mood.
I smiled at all of the guys, and flirted a little with each of them. We were then asked to head upstairs to get ready.
The Firebird opening was considered black tie, so I went with the most severe black dress I had. I'd figured that there would at least be one formal dinner during the competition, so I'd gone with a black silk evening gown with a complete front, and uncovered shoulders. I even had matching black elbow length gloves. I'd considered going with a wrap, but decided against it.
I wore heels as well, but they were almost invisible beneath the flowing skirts of the dress.
"How in the hell do you keep your dresses looking so perfect?"
"I'd say practice, but I'd be lying. Mostly, it's a matter of watching what the wardrobe people do with the costumes, and mimicking them."
"You figured this out by watching other people do it right?"
"Well, that and I asked questions. I swear one or two of them thought that I might be trying to take their jobs away from them."
"But you were an Actress."
"There is more steady work for a great costumier than a middling ok actress."
I got a laugh at this, but Willow had a shrewd look in her eye. It would seem the two of us would be having another private conversation.
I walked to the head of the stairs, and Carlos was there in a tux to escort me down to the foyer. He'd worn baggy styles every time I'd seen him in the past, so I hadn't realized the type of body he had. The fitted tux showcased his built body, and I could feel the strength of his arm as he helped me down to the ground floor.
I had to keep telling myself to relax. For some reason, my libido was up, and I just wanted to jump him right there. It wasn't easy, but I managed to simply keep one foot in front of another. I expected to stop in the foyer, but he lead me right out of the building, and into the first of many waiting limos.
"Aren't we gathering in the foyer?"
"No, this is another timed event for the ladies."
"What? But our competition isn't supposed to be until tomorrow."
"They accelerated the schedule for today. Timed event to get to the restaurant, and then graded competition for the remainder of the evening."
"Are you supposed to be telling me this?"
"Probably not, but you already killed her in the appropriate dress and accessories department, and from what I've seen of you in the past, you likely have etiquette down."
"Appearances and be deceiving, Carlos."
"I doubt it. I'm sure you are the beautiful woman I see before me."
I laughed at him, but gave him a quick peck on the cheek to show him there were no hard feelings.
"I like you, Carlos."
"What's so funny?"
"I doubt you'd understand it if I explained it to you. Sort of a had to be there, sort of thing."
"You are one strange Chika, you know that."
"You have no idea."
"There's something I've been wanting to do since I first saw you at your second…the second audition."
"What is it?"
"You won't be mad?"
I had no idea at the time what he was talking about. "I make no promises, Carlos. Tell me."
"How about if I show you."
He kissed me. On the lips. I stopped him from letting his tongue join in, but it was pleasant other than that. It was more than pleasant.
Kissing Mark was like a nuclear bomb. Like eating or breathing. It was coming home after a long day on set.
Kissing Carlos was like high school. Like Prom. Like a first date. Like snow falling.
The first was pleasurable and completely took my breath away. The second would be pleasant, under the right circumstances. This really wasn't the right circumstance.
"Carlos…"
"I know. Everything I could have hoped for, but it didn't do anything for you."
"I'm so sorry."
"Story of my life."
"I really would have enjoyed fast food with you. That's actually where Sean and I went."
"What!?"
"After the balloon ride for show, we got MacDonald's"
"You are alright, Dawn. Don't let anyone tell you differently."
I blushed and smiled, and he put his hand over his heart as if mortally wounded. I laughed some more.
Why couldn't they have put some of that footage on the show? I would have loved to see that.
We got to the red carpet outside the building, and Carlos got out so he could help me up onto the curb. He then escorted me toward the entrance.
"Dawn Leary?"
I turned toward the reporter. I saw the E! on her microphone and my heart sank. I waved and tried to get by, but she waved me down.
"Folks, we have one of the most elusive, if not the most elusive, actresses ever to have graced the screen. Dawn Leary. Your first movie was a success at both Cannes and Sundance, and you were nominated for Best Actress in an Independent Film. So, are you planning anything else, Dawn?"
I smiled at the camera. "At present I'm actually a part of a reality television show."
"Really?"
"Yes, not sure if I can tell you the title…"
Carlos came to my aid here. Not sure if he was supposed to, either, but at least it let me off the hook.
"It's called the Real Prince Charming. Check your local listings for show times. It will be airing next spring."
"And are you one of the contestants as well?"
"Who me? Not really. They just wanted someone who wouldn't disappear beside the glory that is Dawn."
I blushed, and opened my mouth, "Carlos! He is being strangely modest. Yes he is part of the show, and my date for the evening. I am not currently working on any movies, but I've had some offers that I might take up after the show. If you'll excuse us, please?"
I smiled again for the cameras, and moved up the carpet. That one moment seemed to spark interest in who we were, and we were mauled by everyone from there to the end of the carpet. I smiled, I kept my answers short, and I laughed at Carlos' jokes.
All in all it was one of the best dates I'd ever been on.
Of course they skipped that in the actual episode as well. They had a specific character they wanted us to be, and they edited the footage to make us look that way.
Some people just plain look bad no matter what you do.
"You call this Coq au Vin? Take this back and do it right this time."
I shook my head at Angela's antics. I couldn't believe at the time that she actually believed that she could win acting that way. Knowing what I do now, I can't believe that she made it as far in the competition as she did.
I guess that as long as one of their actual choices didn't get eliminated, then they were fine leaving the people that Mark wanted there for drama.
Kevin looked mortified. He was trying to sink as low in his seat as he could, and doing everything in his power to not be noticed by anyone.
"Carlos, you feel like bailing Kevin out?"
He looked in the same direction I was, and got an evil glint in his eye. "Of course, Madam."
We got to the front of the short line waiting in front of the Maitre D'. "Your names?"
"Carlos Perez and Dawn Leary," said Carlos before I'd even opened my mouth.
"Of course, sir. I have your names here. If you'll…"
"Actually, would you mind too terribly seating us next to our friend over there, it seems that he is having problems with his date."
"But…"
"Please?" An entrée of pout with a side of puppy dog eyes was all that he could take. And that was Carlos. I was doing my best to keep from laughing at the whole thing.
They pulled up a couple of chairs for us, and Carlos sat me before going around the table to seat himself. Carlos will make some lucky girl happy someday. Just not me ever. I liked him, but I wasn't really attracted to him.
"Hello, Kevin, how are you doing today?" I asked with a bright smile. I showed a little too much tooth, though, and it makes me look really predatory in the clip.
He swallowed nervously, so I just purred at him, "Don't worry about Angela, she's more interested in sticking it to the Chef than in actually spending the evening with you."
Carlos chuckled at this, "She's right, man. Angela is a bit of a Bitch, capital intended, don't you agree?"
Kevin smiled at me, and then at Carlos.
"Yeah. She told me that if I embarrassed her, she'd castrate me, and then she proceeds to try to chat up every reporter on the carpet. I don't think it's possible to embarrass her."
"To be fair, Kevin, she is sensitive," I said, "At least you certainly look shocked to see me saying this sort of thing right to your face. Or was it acting as if you weren't even here that has your goat?"
She glared at me as I continued to smile at her. I hoped that the mics where good, since the three of us were talking softly, and our body language gave nothing away.
"You…CUNT!"
She didn't speak quietly. She stood as she was speaking and reached for me. Carlos, laughing so hard he was crying, grabbed her by the arm in an iron grip and wouldn't let go.
"I suggest you don't try it, Angela."
He gave her a meaningful look and then glanced in my direction. Angela paled, and began doing an impression of a fish drowning on dry land.
After a moment or two, a security individual came and escorted Angela out.
"Well, that was fun. How are you, Kevin?"
"Great, Carlos, thanks for saving me."
"No problem. You'd do the same for me."
"I doubt that Dawn would ever pick me."
"Why do you think that, Kevin," I asked him in a sort of sultry voice. Well, I thought it was sultry at the time.
He swallowed, took a drink, swallowed again, "Because you are likely the most beautiful girl in this competition."
"And…"
"And I'm not the most handsome guy."
"Really, Kev? I think your better looking than Carlos here, no offense, Carlos."
"None taken. I agree he is better looking than I am."
They both laughed.
"Tell you what. I'll pick you next, how about that, Kevin?"
He was speachless.
"What about Sean?"
"Yes, Sean is probably the best looking guy in the competition, and I have a huge lust on for him, but you are a nice guy. Well, you could grow a little backbone, but you are definitely nice. I'd be honored to go on a date with you."
He melted. We talked a little more, nothing important, before someone from the show came over and escorted Kevin out.
"You know, if you really want to win this competition, you couldn't go any safer than Sean."
"That's just it, Carlos. I don't need to win anymore. I've proven all I wanted to. I'm going to have a little fun from here on out. And Kevin needed a little morale boost. You saw what Angela did to him."
"You're crazy, you know that?"
"I've been told so in the past. If you'll excuse me, I need to freshen up."
Carlos stood before I could even begin rising, and I gave him a little curtsy in thanks. He was so special. Maybe…Julia? Yes, I needed to set him up with Julia. She needed a good man who didn't let the world get too serious.
I slipped into the ladies room, only to find Ilene washing her hands.
"Ilene?"
"Good, you finally came. This way, quickly."
She led me into the large handicapped stall, where I found Karl set up with his equipment.
"When I saw how locked down the mansion was, I started to worry a bit, guys."
"It's fine. That's part of the reason I gave you the bottle of glue. Here's another, by the way."
"The first was almost out. Thank you so much."
"No problem. Let me see?"
Ilene helped me out of my dress so that Karl could get a better look. I wasn't wearing a bra with the dress, but I did need to slip out of the lacy thong I was wearing on the bottom.
I felt like I was in some sort of fetish porn wearing nothing but my 4" stiletto heels and black gloves. I could tell that it was turning Karl on, anyway.
He poked and prodded, and I found myself squirming a bit. I'd needed to use the facilities before I entered, and it was getting to be more than I could bear.
"Karl, if you don't mind?"
I sat down quickly and did my business. When I was done I dried myself and stood up. He blinked at me a couple of times, then got back to work.
"You've done a great job with the edges. I can tell that some of the internal glue is giving way, but with the job you've been doing, there's nothing I can do about that. We'll need to get you taken care of fully in the next couple of days. Let me see what I can manage on my end."
"How about the north wall of the property. It is only three feet tall on the inside, and you can lean a ladder on the outside. I'll come out there tomorrow night."
Karl thought about it for a moment, and then nodded, "Ok, great. We'll have the full crew there to give your hair a trim and get you a full mani/pedi."
"Thanks." I said with a smirk.
"No worries. Now, get out of here so I can make use of this semi-private stall."
Ilene gave him a knowing look, so I exited quickly. I had no intention of joining in a ménage a trois with them. I washed my hands and left the bathroom. Yes, I remembered to get dressed…well almost. I left my panties with Karl and Ilene.
I was feeling a bit naughty, and figured that no one else would know.
Yes, I was horny, damn it. Very horny. I really wanted sex for the first time in my life.
Look, I'm not saying I never enjoyed sex, and I masturbated occasionally, but this was the first time I wanted to be taken and owned by another individual.
If I could be sure that Carlos wouldn't find out who I was, I would have ridden him as soon as we got back in the limo. As it was, I was just getting more and more frustrated.
I needed release, and I wasn't going to get it.
I didn't pay much attention to the rest of the night, hanging on Carlos' every word, and imagining what his dick would look like in my gloved hand. By the end of the evening, my own penis was sore from being bound in its little prison, and I just needed anything to give me some release.
Carlos escorted me to our Limo. As soon as he closed the door behind himself, I began inching my way toward him, and was about to put my hand his pants zipper when the door opened.
"Carlos, mind if I ride back with Dawn?"
"Not at all, Sean." His body language said something else entirely. I think that somehow he know that I was about to give him everything I wanted.
"Dawn, we need to talk," Sean said as soon as he got into the car and shut the door.
And then we were kissing, and it was more than I could ever have hoped for. My entire body was tingling and I just wanted to keep doing this. I threw all of my caution to the wind, and slowly began to grind against him.
His hands slipped up my dress and began to caress my behind, and slowly he began to work his hands forward. Warning bells were sounding in my head, but for some reason nothing but his touch mattered to me. I felt a rush of cold air, and he removed his hands and covered up my butt.
"What the hell, Carlos!?"
I kept grinding against him, and began to nibble on his ear. I wasn't listening to Carlos' reply, but Sean stiffened beneath me and then pushed me away.
"He did what?!"
"That's what I've been trying to tell you, Surge. Kevin spiked her drink with something. She's out of it. Lowered inhibitions and a spiked libido. She'd do anything at this point."
"No, just the two of you. Get in here. It's cold out there and I'm not wearing any underwear."
They shut the door on me. I tried to get over to the door to open it, but they were blocking it from the outside. I moved to the other one, and the same thing.
I have never been that frustrated in my life.
And there was absolutely nothing I could do about it. I couldn't get enough friction through the girdle to get off, and I couldn't remove the girdle. Oh, I tried, and I screamed and cursed, but nothing was happening that night.
After what seemed like an eternity I began to relax, and finally came more to my senses. I tried to assess the damage, and it was severe. There were tears in both my dress and girdle. It was obviously fake.
My world fell apart on me. Rubbing against Sean's pants had abraded the surface and ruined some of the coloration. Then I'd tried to rip it off, doing even more damage. My dress barely covered down there. I got into my clutch looking feverishly for something to pin my dress, and I found by black thong.
I slipped it on, and thankfully it covered the worst of the damage.
What was I going to do?
I was so embarrassed at my behavior. How could Kevin have done this to me? How could he do this to any girl. I knew I liked Sean, but I didn't want to have sex with him. Beyond him learning my secret, I wasn't the sort to have sex with people casually.
And I'd only known him really for about four days.
I rolled down the window to find Sean and Carlos still standing there.
"Would you boys mind letting me out?"
"We were waiting for your climax."
"I was frustrated in my endeavors. It pisses me off."
"I could help you there," Carlos volunteered.
"Not the time, Carlos," I replied.
"She's done. Let her out, Surge."
"Yes, let me out please, Sasha."
He opened the door and I climbed out.
"Oh man," Carlos said after I got out of the car, "you put your panties back on."
I slugged him in the arm a moment before Sean did the same.
"I'm joking."
"So, how long was I out of it?"
"About an hour. Surge, mind if I run?"
"You need to get back there for the ceremony."
"Got it."
"Ceremony?"
"Yeah, they are having an elimination ceremony today," Sean replied.
"Then that means…"
"No, you're safe. Kevin is guaranteed eliminated today. That means that the girl who placed last in the competition tonight will be joining him."
"Angela?"
"No, not Angela. Patricia drank too much and vomited all over herself and her date."
"Ouch."
"Or gross. That was my personal response."
I giggled at this.
"Wait," I said, "What about me and you?"
"We've been given a pass in this ceremony due to the 'traumatic' experience. I'm supposed to give you a ride back to the mansion and then see you into bed."
"Don't get any ideas, buster."
"I'd never dream of it, although if you'd kiss me a little…"
"Shut up, Sasha. I'm really not in the mood after getting brain f'ed by Kevin, I just need some time to myself."
"Ok…"
I didn't know exactly where he was coming from, but I could imagine getting rejected after a girl got me going. For a moment I considered finishing him off, just to give him the release that I myself couldn't get, but that would move our relationship in a direction I wasn't yet ready for.
I did give him a deep and lingering kiss on the lips before he pushed me back to come up for air.
When he went back in for a second go I laughed and pushed him back. "Now now, lover boy. I was just giving you a kiss. I am not ready for anything more, ok?"
"Ok," this time he was a lot less sullen in his delivery, and I just smiled at him. I knew I was giving him mixed signals, but I was a bit mixed up myself tonight.
The limo dropped us at the back entrance to the mansion, near the garage, and he lead me in through there. He turned his back while I changed. I wore the pajamas that I hadn't even unpacked until that moment. Partially because they hid the damage, which being naked wouldn't, and partially because I just wanted to hide my body away from everyone. He tucked me into bed, and then slipped out of the room after turning out the lights.
I lay in bed huddled over the sheets. I thought over everything that could have happened to me tonight. If Carlos had been a minute later…if Sean had been faster to seek out my sex…so many ifs and possibilities and I shook and cried.
All of the hope I felt after talking to Willow this morning evaporated into so much mist.
I cried until there were no more tears left in my and then I just sobbed to myself.
It took all of my acting ability to hold myself still as the other girls came in and began to get ready for bed. They saw me there, and their conversations trailed off. They left the overhead light off, and just moved around me.
The third episode look so different on TV. They built up the red carpet, and showed all of the clips from the speeches, that happened in a different place on a different night. They played with the lighting to make it seem as though all of the dates happened in the same place, at the same time.
That episode was pure Hollywood, as I like to say.
They glossed over Kevin getting kicked off the show, as criminal proceedings were still pending. Linda, his first date, pressed charges. So did fourteen other women, including a fifteen year old he still swears looks eighteen.
I've seen her in person. She doesn't even look twelve in my opinion.
Course that might simply be my anger over what he almost did to me.
When the rest of the house quieted down, I slipped down to the guest room that Willow and I had found the day before, and I slept alone in that bed. I awoke to the sounds of the rest of the house calling my name.
Apparently someone had thought that I might do something to myself.
"Guys, I just wanted to be alone. Is that too much to ask?"
Mark rushed over to me and threw his arms around me.
"We were worried about you, Dawn."
"Willow and I found that room yesterday when I woke up with a nightmare. We didn't want to wake the others while I was calming down. I figured that it was a fine place for me to get some time alone."
"I have a lousy sense of direction, Dawn. I couldn't find it again."
We had a laugh at her expense, and I gave her a friendly hug.
"It's alright, Willow. you did nothing wrong."
"Well, it's dates again today, and nothing sneaky like last night. Just dates," Mark said to general heckling.
"Is it alright if I don't go this time?"
Sean looked crestfallen at the suggestion that I wouldn't go on a date with him.
"Dawn, we're not asking you to have sex with the boy, but we need to move on as quickly as possible. Are you sure?"
"I am a bit raw, okay? I had no underwear on, and…" I blushed, only half of which was acting.
"Oh, shit. I was enjoying that so much it didn't even occur to me what my zipper was doing to you."
Then I was really blushing, and turning to run, but Mark grabbed my arm.
"Dawn, we know that you wouldn't have done that under normal conditions. Kevin's been arrested, and the police are linking him to a number of rape incidents in their books. If we would have known…"
"Dawn, believe me, if you'd feel more comfortable…"
"Guys, I know the show must go on, just no horseback riding to mountaintop picnics, Ok?"
Sean looked uncomfortable.
"Carlos, you and Sophie get the horseback riding."
Another piece fell into place. For some reason, Sean's dates were being chosen by the show.
Even as Carlos was giving some of the other guys fist-bumps, I watched Sean.
What was going on here?
Not in my wildest dreams did I ever come to the truth…well, not until much later.
I took Sean aside after the others had left, and I talked to him.
"Sasha, I like you, but these dates planned by other people really don't fit me, and I doubt they fit you."
"Dawn…"
"Don't give me that, Sean. You are a fast food guy."
"No, I just like burgers. Prefer to make my own…"
He shut his mouth, and I smiled. I'd gotten something the show didn't want me to know.
"Cook me a meal, Sasha. Any meal you want. That is the date I want you to give to me today."
"but it would take so long."
"Then I can go lay down again, by myself, and get some more sleep, okay?"
I gave him a peck on the cheek and went back to the room.
I'd actually dosed off by the time he brought some burgers to me in the room. Was sat there on the bed and chatted. I was a mess, no makeup, scary bed head, and wearing those comfortable pink fleece pajamas.
He was wearing a t-shirt and jeans.
We talked about nothing in particular, and simply got to know one another better.
Also, he was right, those were the best burgers I'd ever had.
The rest of the day was torture as I waited for everyone to get back, gather to talk about their dates, and generally gossip about the boys.
"How was your mountaintop, Sophie?" asked one of the other girls.
"I would have much preferred to be there with someone else."
Linda ducked her head and blushed, but I don't think anyone else noticed. Well, Willow might have, but that girl kept things close to her chest.
And more of the same.
"Sean made me burgers."
"He ordered out burgers?"
"No, he made them, unless someone else you know makes all of their patties by hand."
"Wow, girl. Getting a guy to cook for you. On a competition like this? Props."
When everyone else started getting ready for bed, I was still in my PJs, I slipped down to the room I'd stayed in. Someone had put my name on the door while I was gone.
And by someone, I mean Mark. He was waiting in the room when I got there.
"I thought you would feel more comfortable here for a couple of days."
"Thank you mark."
"This is the only keep for this room."
"Mark…"
"Yes, I know. I installed the lock myself today. I felt like I had to. I'm sorry. If I'd known."
"Don't, Mark. Linda was raped by him with that potion of his. You knew that happened."
"I thought…"
"You thought it was ratings gold when one of the girls had sex on camera? You make me sick, Mark."
"No, I wasn't in the booth at the time. When I found out I told them to turn off the cameras."
"Doesn't matter, Mark."
"I didn't know, Dawn. I really didn't know. I'm not the director, I just fund this thing."
"Then you are responsible for what happens here. Get out of my room."
"Dawn."
"Get out!"
I was seething by the time he finally left my room. This was so much more than I wanted to deal with. Before this I thought I might actually be falling for Mark. Sure, he was rich, but none of that mattered to me. Overall I thought he was a good guy.
Now I just wasn't so sure.
I cried for over an hour before the sounds of a waking hose fading into those of a sleeping one. Then I waited longer just sobbing to myself with my door locked.
I got up and went to the bathroom. I washed my face and then slipped out the back door. The ladder was already waiting for me when I got to the back wall.
"What did you do to my beautiful creation?"
"Date rape drug and a zipper. Any more questions?" I glared at Karl and he gulped.
He couldn't repair the damage so he carefully removed the remnants of my pseudo-gina and cleaned up the site around it.
It actually felt good to be myself again down there. That thought worried me, so I called my doctor.
"Hello, Dawn. How are you?"
"The contest started early. I've been here for a week, been slipped a date rape drug and tore my appliance all to shit. How do you think I am?"
"Do you need to leave early?"
"No."
"Tell me about it then."
"I like Mark, the producer, and Sean, one of the contestants. No, I'm pissed at Mark. I hate him actually, right now. I want to kill him for what he is putting me, I mean us, through."
"What is he putting you through?"
"He must have know that Kevin was slipping girls the drugs. Linda was acting out of character for her."
"How would he have known that?"
"She's a closet lesbian."
"He knows that?"
"Well, no. I didn't tell him, but someone else might have."
"Really?"
"Ok, probably not. Right now getting rid of one girl really doesn't improve our odds."
"So, they would save that til later, like you are?"
"Nah, I want to see if anything develops between her and Sophie."
"Sophie?"
"A not-so-closet lesbian."
"Really?"
"Yes, really. They make a cute couple."
He laughed on the other end of the line.
"So, how would Mark have known that Linda wasn't a hot-blooded heterosexual female unless someone told him?"
I opened my mouth to speak, and then shut it again, blushing.
"I take it by the sound of teeth snapping shut that you have no answer to that."
"No, I don't"
"Then give the guy a break. None of us are perfect. What did he do after he found out?"
"Well…"
He gave you a room, with a key lock, called the police on Kevin, let you sleep all day. Hugged you in front of everyone. You know, nothing much you cold-hearted bitch.
Sometimes I inner-monologue and I do really cuss myself out.
"He was a perfect gentleman to me and I threw it in his face."
"Then you better apologize to him, don't you think?"
"I guess."
"It's up to you, Dawn, but if you want him to take you seriously, then it's the thing you need to do."
We chatted for a few minutes more, and then I slipped back into the house.
I lay awake the rest of the night, wondering what I would do. Before dawn, and before everyone else got up, I slipped back upstairs, got undressed, and slipped under the covers. There was something sensual about sleeping in the, almost, nude. I appreciated getting back to this small part of my routine, and it helped me rejoin life in the mansion.
I walked into the interview room as soon as people started waking up, with my robe over my arm and nothing else on me.
Mark's jaw hit the floor, and his eyes kept trying to drift down my body, mentally I applauded the effort. I don't think he ever let himself go below my chin.
"Mark, I have to speak to you for a moment."
"Ok, Dawn," he said in a weak voice.
"I appreciate what you were trying to do, giving me my own room and all. But I have to decline. I'm here to win this contest, Mr. Shurtleff. I can't do that if you are treating me differently than the rest of the girls. I realize that Kevin's actions were beyond your control."
"What changed your mind?"
"I spent a lot of time last night thinking about it. I just thought I'd let you know. Also, I wanted to tell you one more thing."
"Really, what was that?"
I sauntered over to him, got up on tiptoes, and whispered breathily in his ear, "You're a damn good kisser."
I giggled and turned and left the room. He didn’t make a single sound as I left. When I got to the hall I put on my dressing gown, hiding behind the illusion of being clothed, and walked downstairs to breakfast.
A routine seemed to start at this point. There were so many of us there, and every two days two of us would leave. Through the entire thing, Angela, Willow, Sophie, Linda and I seemed to skip through every elimination as if it were meant to be. And maybe it actually was.
Before I knew it, the house suddenly felt empty, and it took me a couple of hours to realize why.
It was our 11th day in the mansion, and last night, the 8th woman had been eliminated. We had hit the halfway mark of the competition. There were only 8 women left upstairs, and things were about to really change.
"Soph, would you mind if I moved into your room?"
I squealed like a little girl. Angela was dumbstruck. Willow smiled. Sarah and Jane were outside the room and so didn't hear the interchange.
Oh, in skipping here, I forgot to mention something that happened on day seven.
Let's go back, well just to explain it really quickly.
Jane was pretty much a non-entity up until this point of the competition. Somehow she kept picking the winners among the guys. She kept her head low in the theater room, and I really thought someone was feeding her the information on how to pick the right guy, or at least the one who wasn't being eliminated.
We'd all finished our dates, whom with doesn't matter as he was eliminated on the eighth, and I saw Jane slipping away from the others. I followed her.
She slipped into the film booth and I watched from the door as she told the director something that one of the other girls had been doing the night before in the theater room.
I was confused by the interchange, until the elimination ceremony on the eighth. That was the woman who went home.
Something clicked for me in that moment. I had no idea of the criteria that they were using, but Jane was a plant to help them get the information they were looking for. Either that or she was simply looking out for her own hide. Either way, this wasn't the contest I thought it was. So far, blundering through, I'd been able to avoid any pitfalls, but I would not be stumbling along blind anymore.
Not that I would be taking Jane's out. No. I would just put my acting skills to the test. I went back through my mind, examining who had been eliminated, and who had not.
I would make this work for me.
I would win this damn contest and throw it in their faces.
No one makes a fool of Dawn Leary on national television. Apparently I do a good enough job of that on my own. Watch the gag reel sometime. They packaged it with both the BluRay and DVD releases of the show.
And yes, I get royalties from every purchase of the show, so buy it.
Now that my self-marketing bit is over.
I didn't tell any of the other women what was up, but my behavior changed, and I never told any of the others anything I didn't want the director to know in front of Jane.
Everyone except for Angela caught on. That woman was bullet-proof, I swear.
So, Linda moved in with Sophie. They celebrated immediately their joy in finding someone.
Remember how I mentioned that they are screamers?
I think Willow climaxed just listening to them. I had to leave after that as I was getting really cramped.
I kept Jane, and the guys, downstairs by relating a story about "Love's Sunset" that was absolutely true, and I can't tell you all on pain of death.
Let's just say it involves peanut butter and one of the actors.
I really liked his dog. He was such a sweet mutt.
That is more than enough. I was threatened with a libel suit if I printed anything about the story. Mark's lawyer looked over this and told me it was fine, since I never mentioned specifics. Or linked everything.
You read between the lines.
Yeah, I have a lot of stories like that. Sure, I would win the libel suit, but I don't want to spend time in court over something I'm doing for free. Now, if I ever write my actual memoirs, it will be a tell-all, and some of the things I could tell…
Getting back to the story, the other one, not the fetish one, a flushed Sophie finally came down to breakfast just before noon. Linda was a couple of minutes behind her, and a lot more composed.
I smiled at the two of them until Willow joined us. She was so disheveled that I was glad I left when I did, and all I could do was laugh. It wasn't long until Willow joined in and was laughing right along with us.
By the end of the day, Jane was getting desperate. She was lurking in corners and trying to listen in on us at the pool.
"Skulking is unbecoming, Jane."
"You, Bitch!"
She charged me and we both fell into the pool. I was drenched from head to foot, and I was almost undone.
Luckily, I wasn't in my bikini, or this story would end in a much different manner. My left breast came completely detached. I was wearing a slightly small bra, as all of my clothing had disappeared while I was in the shower after my date, and Willow was loaning me one of her Bra's while they looked for the culprit.
I felt it slip when we hit the water, and all I could do was think about getting out of there.
I was getting so close, and this could ruin it all.
I needed to speak to Karl, but he wasn't due until tomorrow night. There was no way that I could spend the next day covered up completely. Not without a good reason, and my mind couldn't come up with one.
I slipped out of the water, and wrapped in a towel. I was crying before I got to the house. I ran up to the bathroom, and tried to find my makeup in Jane's things. It had to be her, but it wasn't there. I had no bottle of Permanence to try to self repair.
I had nothing, and when I took of Willow's bra, my breast went with it. Somehow, the other seams were fine, but that one breast was completely off.
I locked myself in the shower, and cried.
"Dawn, honey, we're worried. Were you hurt?"
Willow was at the door, and I let her in.
"Dawn…"
I showed her my second skin breast, and she almost vomited. She controlled herself, and looked at my chest. "I really thought you were lying to me before. You weren't, were you."
I was choked up, and couldn't do more than shake my head.
"Don't you have any glue?"
"It was stolen with my makeup."
"What are you going to do?"
"I have no idea…"
"Hmmm. How about…put the bra and shirt back on. I'm going to talk to Mark."
She left the room and shut the door behind her.
I sat there, shivering, for an eternity of five minutes length.
Willow returned with dry clothing, and Mark in tow.
"Menstrual? You're kidding, right?"
I just shook my head at him.
"But, the director loves….your moves."
"He loves to have me naked on tape, you mean?" I put as much vitriol as I could muster.
"You're right, she's on," Mark said to Willow.
"I'm right here, you bastard," I said, only half acting.
"Ok, how long usually."
"A day but it's pretty heavy. I usually like to take two."
"Well, stay dressed if you want to, but I need you to join in with the rest of the girls."
I grumbled at him, but I was smiling and silently cheering as soon as he left the room.
I got dressed, in Willow's clothing, and left the bathroom. I really felt bloated wearing clothing that was one size too small, but it was either that or Jane's clothing which was a size too big.
The rest of the day was uneventful.
More than just the woman who married Karl.
And every piece of clothing, and each cosmetic, was a memento of that bond.
Someone in this house had stolen it away from me, and in so doing had violated one of my most precious memories as a girl.
It took me almost twenty minutes to relax enough so that I didn't start in on everyone, accusing and ranting until someone found my clothing for me.
I was almost exactly in the middle of heights and weights of the remaining eight women. I alluded to the fact last night, and I just wanted to relate it again in more detail.
I was bigger in the bust and smaller in the behind than willow, but not by enough that it really mattered. Jane was a little bigger in the bust and considerably bigger in the caboose than I was. Before our little tussle in the pool I just didn't like how loose her bra's felt.
After? I wouldn't have taken her charity for anything.
The other women were significantly taller, or broader, or skinnier, or whatever, than I was. So, I figured if it was one of the women, it was likely Willow or Jane who took my clothing. It could be one of the others, I suppose, but I assumed someone stole it because they could use it.
I went downstairs to get some breakfast, and Felice was flirting with a couple of the remaining guys. I noted that she was wearing a pretty pale green ribbed tee shirt a lot like one that I'd lost, and then went on to thinking about other things, and trying to act just this side of surly, leavened with apparent attempt to be cheerful.
Then it struck me. The shirt wasn't just like my shirt, it was my shirt.
I'd gotten a bit too exuberant in removing the tag that first day, and the shirt had torn a bit at the back of the collar. I'd ignored it since I usually wore my hair in one version or another of 'down' so it would be covered up. Felice had an A-line and the back of her neck was completely visible.
That was my shirt, or a reasonable facsimile of it.
I excused myself and slipped back upstairs to the common room, and opened Felice's bags. there was my clothing. All of it. My dresses were still locked in the closet in the locked room. I'd moved them there as soon as I realized that the rest of my clothing was stolen.
I was ready to take all of my clothing back, when I realized something very sad. I had about ten times the clothing that Felice did. She had huge suitcases, but they were mostly empty. She'd been somehow giving the impression of having more than she did through the entire rest of the competition.
I left the dressing gown, and a good percentage of the rest of my clothing, and a small note. Then I moved all of the clothing I was going to keep to the locked room. I wouldn't be taken advantage of in the future.
I hid out and waited for Felice to come back upstairs. She opened her bag looking for something, and I could see her expression fall. She picked up the note and read it and then collapsed there beside her bags.
"Hi, Felice."
"Dawn!" She was startled and scared.
"So, you read my note, it seems."
"This was your note?"
"Yes, it's mine."
"But…"
"I took enough to get me by, Felice. Ask me next time, ok?"
She broke down and began to cry, so I put my arms around her and comforted her. We sat there like that for a while. Willow came in and began to move toward us. I just shook my head and she backed off. She took position by the door, guarding the moment.
"Thank you, Dawn. You had so many nice things."
"I know. I have some really nice friends."
"Huh?"
"I didn't buy a single item that you stole. Every piece of clothing was a gift. I currently have no money to my name."
"What?"
"Dead broke."
"But, you're famous."
"You can't spend fame, Felice."
She laughed at that, and she hugged me back.
"Thank you for that, Dawn."
"No, everyone needs to feel special. That's why I left you the robe."
"I could never wear that!"
"Maybe not here, but try it. You don't feel as naked as you are. You may want to wear some nice underwear, though."
She blushed and nodded her head.
I was still uncomfortable, and wanted to just crawl back into bed and hide until tonight, but that wasn't an option.
The contest for the day was hostess. We had to host a mock party, one at a time, and deal with the actors who had been brought in to give us problems. All of us did pretty well, we got to watch the others through a two way mirror. The scenarios stayed pretty much the same, but the people initiating and the timing changed. It was hectic while you were in the room, but funny when out of it.
It was pretty obvious to me by this point that the girls were the ones really being judged, and not the guys, so I'd stopped really paying attention to what they did. I watched who I wanted to. Mostly Sean. He was really cute that day, as he was helping elder couples at a retirement community. Keeping them entertained and so forth.
I hadn't been able to get together with him for a couple of days, since I kept placing low in the rankings. I was wondering what was going on, as I thought I did well, but it was likely a ratings thing.
I was second in the rankings that day, so I picked Sean, finally. He kissed me when he came over to stand next to me. That was the first time that he'd done that for any girl in the elimination ceremony, and I blushed to the roots of my hair. That didn't stop me from enjoying the kiss.
I had a goofy smile on my face, as the footage clearly showed, and I had to hold onto him to keep from collapsing into a pile of goo on the floor.
Jane was eliminated along with the guy she picked.
I wasn't shocked by that. It seems that she ran out of gossip to spill about the other contestants, and so her usefulness expired. I wondered when Angela would outlive her usefulness, but that was something for another day.
The fourteen people remaining in the house sat around the lounge that evening.
"So, Surge, that was some kiss," Carlos said
"Yeah, man, almost seemed as though you were marking your territory," continued one of the other guys
"Nah, just letting her know I missed her."
"You live in the same house."
"On opposite sides, and I missed you too, Sasha."
He kissed me again to wolf whistles and laughter.
We chatted about inconsequential things after that, just relaxing in each other's company. Things wound down around eleven, and I climbed into bed and waited for everyone to get to sleep. As soon as they were gone, I slipped quietly out of bed and went over the back wall.
"Hello, Beautiful."
"Hey, Karl. We have a problem today."
"What problem?"
I took off my top and bra, showing him that one of the breasts, my breasts, had come unattached.
"What happened?"
"Another girl tackled me and we wrestled in the pool."
He got a glazed look in his eye and absently said, "be more careful."
Ilene came in the back of the truck where we were sitting, and I felt my heart drop. I'd given away the clothing she gave me, and didn't even think to talk to her about it.
"What's wrong, Dawn?"
"Well, um, one of the other contestants stole my clothing. When I found out she only have five outfits total, I gave her a lot of the clothing she stole, and told her that she could keep it."
"Ok."
"But, you gave that to me…"
"Dawn, it's just clothing. The time spent was more important to me."
I shook my head and smiled.
"Thank you, Ilene. I never knew I could possibly have a friend like you."
"You're welcome, Dawn."
We hugged until Karl interrupted us.
"Hey, I need to fix Dawn up so she can get back to the competition."
"Yes, Master."
They laughed at this, and I just smiled. Karl took more care getting my breasts in place this time. I hardly moved at all, even though I was so ready to feel like myself again. I began to imagine what it would be like to simply be me, whole, without the need for this makeup to complete me.
I began to cry as I sat there, silently.
"What's wrong, honey?"
"I want to be Dawn."
"But you are Dawn," Ilene replied.
"Only when your husband performs magic. I'm not really Dawn."
"Dawn is who you are inside. It isn't these appliances I made, or the clothing you wear."
"Or don't wear," I told him.
"What?"
"I've kinda been running around the house basically naked."
Both of their jaws dropped.
"I know, I never told you what was going on. You know that dressing gown I have?"
"Yeah, the one designed to be used over sexy lingerie," Ilene said.
"Well, I've been wearing that."
"Ok," Karl said.
"Just that."
His eyes unfocused and his breathing became a bit shorter. Ilene slugged him.
"You sure aren't shy are you."
"That's the thing. I've never been that shy of my body. I never saw the reason. As Donnie, it never mattered much as women are usually too polite to say anything. As Dawn, on the other hand, I love the attention. It makes me feel wanted. I know every eye is on me, and that they are either jealous or lustful or both."
"Dawn!?"
"What? It's true. I like to be lusted after. I want to satisfy that lust, especially if it's with some guy I like…"
Their jaws dropped open again, and I realized what I'd said.
"I'm not gay, so what do you want me to do? Pretend I am? I just can't see getting with another woman."
"What about Aimee?"
I was silent for a bit, and then finally found the words to explain my reasoning.
"Aimee was always more of a guy than I was. She asked me out on our first date, initiated all of our intimate activities, and even was the one who asked me to marry her."
"Wait, all?"
I smiled at the two of them, "well, I did dress sexy for her sometimes, you know, things that would get her to notice, but I never touched her first. I needed that from her. It made me feel wanted and secure. She was my man, more than I was hers."
"But you didn't look like a woman…"
"Because I think she was trying to keep up appearances for her parents. Did I ever tell you about the times that I wore the breasts home from the set of 'Transsexual'?"
"No, you didn't"
"She attacked me as soon as I came through the door the first time. It was another time that I ended up reading for 'Love's Sunset'. I know I tell everyone I just forgot they were there, but I was aware of them every minute. I kept thinking of Aimee's eyes when she saw them straining to get out of my button shirt. She tore the first shirt I wore.
I think it's part of the reason I gave such a good performance on screen. I kept imagining what Aimee would do to me when I got home."
"Call the doctor, Dawn."
Karl and Ilene went to a different part of the truck to take care of business and I called the doctor.
"You call at the strangest hours, Dawn."
"You know why, doctor."
"Call me, Tom."
"Doctor, what are the chances that I would be able to have breasts of my own?"
"Well, now there's a weighted question. Chances are you would never have more than a b cup through hormone therapy alone."
"That big?"
"Most consider that to be small."
"Doctor, I use a 26b bra. I find it ample."
"Ok, well, then, you might get the size that you want. Might. We'll have to see when you start hormone therapy."
"How much short term change would there be? Can I start now?"
"No, since I'd have to refer you to an endocrinologist."
"But…"
"No buts, Dawn. This situation is already irregular enough. Let's get you through this competition and then we can talk about where we're going from here. Hormone therapy is not necessarily the solution you are looking for?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Look, you are suicidal, or at least was. There are indications that estrogen therapy can lead to depression. Why would I want to prescribe depressants to someone in your condition."
"But that wasn't, I mean it was just…"
"A phase, a moment, a onetime thing? We both know that isn't true. You tried to kill yourself more than once, and we both know you suffer from depression."
"But, I feel so much better now that…"
"That could be true, and it could be simply a self-delusion. We won't know without further observation, both yours and mine."
"But, I'm safe here."
"Dawn, I will want you under observation when I begin prescribing you HRT. And by observation I mean someone who actually knows what's happening. You willing to leave the competition, or tell someone there what is going on? That even assumes you could get out long enough to actually see a specialist."
"But…"
"No more on this subject, Dawn. Get used to who you are now, and then we can talk about changing things up. Give it some time. Impatience is the best way to tell me that this is more a fad than something that is really in you."
I was pissed off and really wanted to…do something permanent to the good doctor. It wasn't fair, but there was little in this life that I could really say was fair.
Aimee dying wasn't fair. Neither was the fact that I was in this competition. I'm not saying that the one balanced out the other, but I had to be realistic here. There was both good and bad in life. There were subjective and objective versions of both as well.
I simply needed to, well, woman up and get through it.
I climbed back over the wall and made my way into the house.
The sound of voices carried in the quiet house, and so I crept closer to the source of the noise. Someone was in the interview room, even though I thought that it would be empty at this time of night.
"I did everything that was asked of me, didn't I? I did it for you," Angela said.
There was a muffled male voice. I couldn't hear what he was saying, and couldn't even tell who he was. He could have been any of the guys in the competition, well almost. He could have been Mark at least. Or Sean. Carlos was a possibility as well.
"But, we made a deal, baby. You said I would be there with you at the end."
A short response.
"Well, let me show you what I can do for you."
I'm sure you have a good idea of the sorts of sounds that emanated from the room. And for a lot longer than I would have expected from any of the guys in this competition. Course it could just be that I was the only one here who wasn't getting any, but hey, a girl can hope, right?
"See? I can make the ending something special for you. It's your money after all, and you should get to choose the winner, not some high and mighty…"
Angry response.
"I didn't mean it that way, baby. Really."
A cold ball formed in my stomach. Mark? I'd thought of that just to toss it out, but Mark? How could he?
The thought of our kiss was still fresh in my mind. It had only been about a week since it had happened, sure, but I thought it meant something to him. And here he was screwing Angela in the dark when no one could see him.
I wasn't going to be devastated over that man. I wasn't going to let him ruin the rest of this competition for me. So what if Angela was trying to subvert this competition?
I hid out of sight and waited for Angela to slip out of the room. I slipped in behind her, hoping to catch him red…handed as it were. I wanted to confront him with my knowledge, but the far door was closing as I entered and I didn't see anyone there.
I looked around the room, at the camera, at the couches, looking for any evidence of the tryst that had happened right here in this room.
The camera was pointed at the couches like normal, it's red light shining into the darkness. The couches seemed in order, if just so. One of the pillows was on the ground where it had been knocked by the gymnastics that had gone on here shortly before. No clothing or anything else was left behind…
The red light was on.
The camera had been recording.
I Walked behind the camera, and began to really look at it for the first time. It was digital, like most cameras it seemed these days, and in addition to a data cable leading off into the bowels of the house, there was a memory card as well. I stopped the recording, and began the playback.
Angela was sitting there on the couch, waiting, and then her eyes lit up. The conversation began, and she was talking to someone off Camera. I fast forwarded through the conversation until the guy came into the frame. I couldn't see any of him, really. Or that is to say I couldn't see his face. I got to see a lot of him.
And I have to say that they were both very flexible.
It really seemed like he was aware of the camera, even if Angela wasn't. She looked so smug and satisfied when she was done and almost whispered something.
I replayed that moment over and over before it finally came through to me.
"Dawn, eat your heart out." She dressed and left.
There was a sinking sensation in the pit of my stomach. I sat down, barely able to see the screen. It couldn't possibly be…no. I wouldn't accept that it could be…
The man sat down and looked directly into the camera. "Well, there's another for the scrap book," he said with a smirk and that slight accent of his. He dialed a number on his phone, waiting for a moment or two for someone to pick up.
"Hey, Mark, yeah. Remember what we discussed the other day? Yeah. I have no problems with you removing Angela from the competition at this point." He waited as if listening, and then there was a sound from the direction of the door. He looked up startled and ran out of the frame.
Sean looked up startled.
I'd really thought that Sean was a good guy, but I'd been taken in by an actor of more skill than any I'd ever met before. He made my simple skills look amateur.
And I let him fool me. I let him make a fool of me. While I'd been trying to get further in this competition, he's simply been notching his shaft with the competitors that he could get with.
I had to know something.
I slipped into the guys room, and looked around for Carlos. He was right next to the door, and no one was near him. I put my hand over his mouth and nose. He woke up quickly, and so I moved my hand down a bit so he could breathe.
He focused his eyes on me, and I put a finger over my lips and then motioned for him to follow me.
I led him up to the sex room, I mean interview room.
"Carlos, did you know that Sean was banging the contestants?"
"Um..what?"
"Did you know that Sean was recording himself having sex with the other contestants?"
He blushed and refused to look at me.
"You knew and you didn't tell me?"
"I couldn't tell you. I signed an agreement."
"If I'd had sex with him in the limo, would I still be in this competition?"
"He doesn't make the call. His pare…I mean."
"What's going on here?"
"I can't tell you, Dawn. Really. I've said too much as it is. Look, Sean's a real scumbag. Don't give anything up to him."
"Not after I saw that tape. I'm sure that Angela has no idea how…" I shuddered.
She was degraded, in my eyes. He used her for his personal gratification, and she asked him to do it.
"Are you ok, Dawn?"
"No, I'm not."
"Would you be offended if I offered to hold you?"
I slipped into his arms and cried. I stayed there for a long time, and then I dried my tears on his shirt.
"Ewe, snot stains."
I laughed at that, and he chuckled with me.
"So, what are you going to do?"
"Win this competition."
"You know that includes a proposal from Sean, right?"
"Well, I have that covered."
"How?"
"Can you keep my secret? If it means getting back at Sean?"
I looked at me warily, and then slowly nodded.
"I'm physically male, Carlos."
"What!?"
He started to pull away, but then stopped. "This is a joke, right?"
"Next generation of movie makeup actually. I have a penis, Carlos."
"Ok, I'll just take your word on that. Are you gay, then?"
"Not any more than most of the other girls here."
"But you said."
"I said physically. I never said anything about mentally."
"Well, then, let me test something."
"What…"
I never finished the question. Carlos kissed me. I stiffened up until his arms went around me, and then for the briefest of moments I relaxed in his strong arms. Then I remembered where I was and what was happening. I turned my head away and tried to push back from him.
"Well, that answers the question for me. So, male, huh. Never would have guessed."
I took his hand and put it under my pajama top. I could feel his hand around the edges of my fake breast, but nothing on main bulk of it.
"You don't know how many fantasies you just ruined. I have wanted to caress those since that first day you came down nude to breakfast. And now that I have all the magic is gone."
"Well, I plan on getting real ones, so come back to me in a year or two and we can revisit this."
"You are such a tease, Dawn."
"I could…"
"No, thank you. I don't do the casual sex thing. Even if I would really like to right now."
"Neither have I. Only ever had sex with one person, and she is dead."
Carlos shifted uncomfortably.
"Sorry about my casual reference to death."
"Not that, dawn. It is the thought of you with another woman. A lot of guys have lesbian fantasies."
I blushed.
"Look, I found out after that Sean did put Kevin up to it. He was the one supplying Kevin with the stuff. Don't trust him, ok?"
"Thank you, Carlos."
"I hope I'm still in the house so that I can watch what you tell him live."
"I'll pick you as much as I can, ok? If I make it that far, then I can protect you at least half the time, right?"
I kissed him lightly on the lips and then got up to go to bed. There was a visible spot of wetness on his pants. I just smiled to myself as I left the room. I swayed my hips. I liked to give a good show.
Tomorrow, the war would begin.
"Mark?"
"Can I talk to you in private?"
It had been more than twenty four hours since I'd found out what Sean was, and what this competition seemed to be. I'd thoroughly enjoyed making a complete mess of his date with me, on accident of course. I can be awfully clumsy when I put my mind to it.
And a picnic in a rowboat on a wading pond doesn't need that much clumsiness to completely ruin.
"Of course…"
"You complete bitch," Sean stormed into the room. The veneer of his civility was beginning to crack and the ogre began to peak out from underneath. His right arm was raised, and he was twisting his body away from me.
Mark stepped between us, and put his hand on Sean's chest.
"What do you think you are doing, Sean?"
"That cunt completely humiliated me yesterday. I just saw…I mean I can't believe what she did."
"Sasha, I was just clumsy. I didn't mean to tip us over into that algae."
"And didn't get any on you?"
"I fell on you, Sasha. I felt so relieved that you were there to break my fall. I would have hated to fall into that slime."
Sean, thankfully, wasn't as fluent in English as he liked to pretend. I don't think sarcasm translates well.
Mark gave me a look that said 'that's enough,' and then turned to Sean, "You need to back off, Sean. And change your attitude. As things currently stand..."
Sean paled, looked at me, looked at Mark, and then turned and walked away. He was becoming a bit green around the gills as he did so.
Mark and I walked toward the Interview room.
Ok, I know: That scene was so much more tame than the one that appeared on the show. Artistic license. Also, if I really used some of the words they bleeped out, or just did something like:
"Dawn, you <bleep> <bleep>, you ruined my <bleep> shoes. They were Italian leather. Italian. Do you know what they cost you <bleep> whore!"
then the actual message would be lost in the, well, <bleep>!
And it is on the DVD anyway. Yes, the scene is accurate. I have no idea how they succeeded in keeping Mark out of the scene completely, but he was there, between us, the entire time.
"Dawn, I'd just like to say that it's been a pleasure to work with you."
"Mark?"
"It has. You are a consummate actress, and I love…" He blushed, and searched for the words for the moment. "I love your skill."
I was still uncomfortable around him. He always looked at me so intensely. It was as if his eyes would eat me whole, and I didn't want to be eaten.
"Dawn, please, I want you to know that I fought for you. I didn't want this for you. Really."
I began to feel the earth falling out from under me.
"I'm the next one to be eliminated, aren't I?"
"No, Angela is being eliminated."
"But…"
"Sean isn't the catch he seems to be, Ok. Just keep that in mind."
"What are you talking about? I really don't understand."
"You're smarter than that, Dawn. You know how Hollywood works."
It couldn't be that he was telling me…
"I wanted to let you know that you'll always have a home here, Dawn. No matter what happens. I know that I was too forward. I thought…it doesn't matter what I thought. Look, I want you to have this."
He handed me a box, with silver wrapping paper on it. He touched my hand and then left the room.
My heart was pounding, and I couldn't bear to open the box. I couldn't handle knowing what was in there. I felt so confused. I was sure that Mark was a part of this entire charade, but his behavior to me told a different story. He wasn't the man I'd thought him to be.
And then, how could he be.
"Hi, Dawn."
"Joyce?"
"In the flesh. How are you holding up?"
"As well as can be expected."
"Well, Mark told you I take it?"
"Told me what? As far as I can tell he just suggested that I was going to win this competiton. There are at least 4 more eliminations to go before that, aren't there?"
"Well, Linda and Sophie are an item, although I wouldn't have minded a try at either of them myself. Angela is out tonight. That leaves Willow, Sarah, and yourself."
"Right, and Willow…"
"Is dying."
"What?!"
"She was given six months to live almost a year ago. Day to day. Cancer."
"But Sarah…"
"You really think she will win this?"
I couldn't believe what they were telling me. All of this seemed to good to be true. The curtain was lifting, and there wasn't even a small man behind it. There was nothing behind the curtain.
No glitz, no glamour.
I was hollow inside once again.
I'd focused my life on winning this competition and here it was being handed to me on a platter and I no longer cared. Well, that's not entirely true. I did care. I cared a lot.
"What are you planning, Girl?"
"You'll find out in the end."
Angela was eliminated that night. Sophie and Linda came out two nights later.
Sean couldn't believe that I kept picking other people.
I made sure that the elimination after Sophie and Linda left, that I picked Carlos. Willow was eliminated then, as Sarah had picked Sean.
The house was so empty. None of my friends from the rest of the competition were left. Sarah and I were cordial, but that was the extent of it. I mean, she was a critic, and I was an Actor. And I happen to know that she'd reamed Donnie in the press on more than one occasion.
Carlos finally took me to In-n-out. Sarah got a 'Sean' date, that I never really cared to remember.
And then we were at the final ceremony.
"Ladies, as was stated at the beginning of this competition, you were here to pick the Real Prince Charming, but in actuality, he was here to pick you. Behind the scenes, the King and Queen of a small country in Europe have been judging you on your deportment, your character, and above all your appeal with the American people."
Mark stood there between the two remaining men. Sean, who was the obvious prince, in all of the finery of his station, and Carlos in a simple, in comparison, tuxedo.
"Today, we will be running the ceremony a bit differently. Sean, as the Prince of this story, it is up to you to do the final selection."
They'd dressed us in the most beautiful wedding dresses for this ceremony, and inside, I simply smiled at the pageantry of it all. This wasn't the dress I would have chosen for myself, but it was gorgeous. I'm sure you saw it, but let me tell you about it anyway.
The bodice was covered in pearls. The dress covered me from neck to floor, and included fitted sleeves that even covered the backs of my hands. The train really was as long as it seemed. And underneath, I was all me.
I knew after my news that they'd want to verify, and the easiest way was to show them my real body.
I couldn't help but smile as Sean walked stifly over to me.
"Dawn, you are a gorgeous creature, and I have come to feel deeply for you. You would make me the happiest man in this world if you would agree to be my wife."
"Sean, I appreciate the sentiment, but I can't marry you."
"You have to, you signed the document. You are under contract to wed me if you win."
"Well, seeing as I'm a man, I don't know how that's possible."
Carlos busted out laughing. Sarah fainted before Sean could turn her direction. Sean, well, he was completely shocked, and then something occurred to him, and he turned a shade of green.
"Mark, we have to stop this. You can't let this show broadcast on television."
"Too late for that, Sean. They aired the first episode last week."
Mark was smiling. I'd assumed that he would be as shocked as Sean, but no. He was prepared for this.
"Sarah…"
She was coming around.
"Oh, hell no. There's no way I'm being your runner up. Dawn won this contest, and it serves you all right. He belongs to this mad house."
"Sarah?"
I stood above her, and she glared up at me. I offered her a hand and helped her to her feet.
Then I slapped her so hard she fell back to the ground.
"I may have been born male, and may physically still be so, but I know who I am, and that isn't a man. I said it earlier for shock value. I am an ACTRESS after all you filthy bitch."
I was so pissed off at her. Sean helped her to her feet, and they slipped off into another room. For another of his private interviews I assumed.
The director came out of the other room, fuming, "Dawn, there's no way you're male. We checked you out. Every contestant. You wore a thong!"
I lifted up my dress for him to show him my much abused, but still intact, penis.
"Don't believe everything you see, Lyle," I said as I twitched my skirts back into place, "one of my best friends owns 'Washed Out Bridge.'"
"There is no way."
"Get her off the set, Lyle. You've had your proof, and I think she needs to get changed," Mark said,
Right. Fairytale over. Time for Cinderella to wake up.
I thought he might think that, after what he was sure was me leading him on...
I made my way to my room, and began to pack. The silver box peaked out from amongst my clothing, still unopened.
I picked it up, and heard the familiar clicking sound inside. All my dreams were shattered. My life was over. I brought my arm back to throw the box against the wall.
How could he not stick up for me? I was Dawn. I really was Dawn.
I'd prepared that speech to Sarah, meaning to give it to Mark. Everything had been so mixed up. Nothing went the way it was supposed to.
I carefully opened the box. I was ready for the further disillusionment that it meant now. Nothing was important if I wasn't going to make it into next week.
There was an ornate key on a golden chain inside the box. I pulled out the key and broke down and cried. I'd lost everything that really mattered to me. And Mark, before he knew, offered me his heart.
I'd never meant to hurt Mark in all of this. Through the tears, I noticed a card at the bottom of the box.
Donnie,
I wanted to thank you for everything. You are the most wonderful actress I have ever seen, and Joyce should already have told you this. I know that you probably don't care for me the way that I care about you. I can take that. I don't want to put any pressure on you either. I would still love to cast you in one of my movies. Let me tell you that I won't ever be there on set. I respect you too much for that, and if you want nothing to do with me, I understand. I would love to get to know you better, in a less pressurized environment.
If you can forgive me, let me know at the ceremony on the final day. If you can't I'll understand…
I couldn't finish the note. I was crying and I knew that my heart was broken. My pride had not allowed me to open that box, and now the best man I had ever known thought that I hated him. I tried to stop, but all of the women I'd relied on were gone. No more Willow or Sophie or Linda.
I sobbed until I had no more tears, and the pain in my chest just didn't subside.
"Mark really wants you to feel at home here, so he has gone to his beach house until you're ready to face the world."
"What have I done, Joyce?"
"Won a national competition and admitted that you're transsexual."
"No, to Mark. I love him, and just didn't want to really admit it to myself until today."
"So, why didn't you let him know…"
"I just barely opened the box. When did you tell him?"
"What? I promised you. I would never have told him…"
"Dawn, you ready to get put back together?"
"Why does it matter now?"
"I thought that you and Mark…"
"Karl?"
"Well, um, he sort of followed you one night and accosted us in the van afterwards."
"You told him!?"
"He figured it out. Apparently he knows who I am. It wasn't that far for him after that to figure out who you were."
"Not are?"
"You actually want to go back to being Donnie?"
"Of course not."
"Then let's get you put back together. I set up an appointment with the endocrinologist and then the good doctor wants to visit with you in person, and you know."
"Let's do this."
I still wanted to be a woman, and I would be. Even if I could never apologize properly to Mark, I could at least go through the changes I needed to become the woman I was inside.
I got my first shot of estrogen, and went to speak to my doctor.
I don't need to tell you everything we spoke about that day, since I've already shared most of it here with all of you.
It was late when Mark's personal limo dropped me off at his front door.
I walked through the empty house and just felt more and more lost. I had pissed away every wonderful thing in my life, and Mark was just the next in a long line of my failures.
I went to my room, my single room on the first floor and slipped into bed. I felt arms come around me and just cuddled into them and cried. I wanted this and it wasn't…
"Shh, it's ok, Dawn. I'm here."
"Mark!?"
I kissed him for the first time since we'd met in the Interview room what felt like an eternity ago.
His hand slipped under the covers and touched my relatively naked body. He avoided everywhere with an appliance He caressed my body and I thrilled at his touch. When he touched my behind I tensed up.
"Dawn…"
"No, Mark. I can't I'm not really a girl. I just look…"
"Dawn Leary. I love you whatever body nature or science gives you. I want to make love to you. If you don't want me to tonight, or ever, then I can live with that. However…"
I stopped him talking with the only things I had available: My lips and tongue.
You don't need to know the rest of the details of that night, but I gave pleasure and received it.
For those that follow the trade journals, yes the two of us recently got married. And yes, I am physically and legally a female now. Mark is not gay, and that is something I am very pleased with. He is one of the most inventive…
Like I said, you don't need to know this.
I'm acting again, and I have two movies coming out this fall. I am listed as Dawn Leary in both of them. It's of course my legal name as well as my SAG name.
I wish this were always the case, and often it isn't, but sometimes, the best things happen to the people who deserve it. Willow is still alive at T+three years. The doctors have no idea what keeps her going. I like to believe that it is positive mental attitude.
She was my matron of honor. If not for a pesky thing like needing to legally be recognized as female, I would have been married before her. Well, she and Carlos make a beautiful couple.
I was her maid of honor, though, so it wasn't all wasted. I threw her a bachelorette party to be remembered.
The one she threw for me was even more epic.
Now, if only I can convince Mark to cast me in the leading role for "Sorority House Murders VI."
As with most of my story ideas, I discussed this with my wife before-hand, and while she thinks that the high-school angle is a bit over used, well, this is me we’re talking about. I like writing about high-school kids :)
Without further ado, I bring you the story.
Not at his head, exactly, but they were traveling at over eighty miles an hour, and required a bit of concentration.
WHACK!
He sent another ball flying into the net at the far side of the batting cage. He loved the feeling of the bat connecting to the ball. He could tell, just by the way that the bat vibrated, whether it was a nice solid hit like that one, or a pop fly like the one after that.
WHACK!
Another homerun, or so he imagined. He had no idea how fast the ball was traveling when it left contact with the bat, but occasionally he could get the net to hit the chain link fence almost two feet behind it. He was the only one he knew that could do that.
WHACK…ting!
There it was. A ball hit the fence, letting him know with the rattling ‘ting’ that resulted. He smiled, but there was no time to exult as another ball was already coming his way. He was so lost in the physical movement of the bat that the twenty minutes he’d paid for were over before he was ready. He stood there for almost a minute a before someone clearing her throat behind him brought him to himself.
“You going to stand there all day, Babe?”
“Um…what?” Jay flushed bright red at the assumed intimacy of the greeting.
“You know, as in Bambino…the original home run king?”
“He was also the strike-out king, you know,” Jay responded, regaining some of his composure.
The blonde girl chuckled at him as she tucked her long hair up under a baseball cap. Jay just stood there watching.
“You mind moving out?” she said when she was finally done.
“Oh, sorry,” Jay said, moving out of the way for her. He was about to move off when he noticed her ramping up the speed of the balls to ninety-five miles an hour. Jay stopped, shock suffusing his features for a moment. He’s tried to hit balls going that fast in the past, and while he was occasionally successful, he didn’t do it for fun. The problem was that his reaction time just wasn’t good enough for it.
If there had been a real pitcher out there throwing the baseballs, then it wouldn’t have been as much of an issue. The brief wind-up would have telegraphed the ball a fraction of a second before it actually released, allowing him to prep his swing for the release.
With the auto-pitcher, the only alert you had was the whump when the ball was launched in your direction.
CRACK!!
The sound of the bat hitting the balls was almost like a gunshot, and Jay heard the tink from the fence almost immediately after. He hadn’t even recovered from the first hit when the crack of a second went off. This one caromed off the net roof.
Three more went into the roof and then there was another solid hit, and the ball went into the far fence. Jay started watching how she moved, examining her form like he would one of the other players during batting practice at the school.
He kept it up for a little while, before his thoughts began to drift into other avenues that her curves seemed to trap him in.
“You know, I can feel your eyes on my butt,” she said to him, breaking him out of his reverie. Blushing furiously, he refocused on how she was moving when she was hitting the ball.
Through the rest of her twenty minutes, she hit an average of one in five of the balls right down the center, with another two in five being fouls of one sort or another.
“You know, you might do a little better if you placed your feet a little further apart and swung the bat with your entire body.”
“It feels too weird when I do that.”
“That’s because you’re too used to doing it your way.”
“Whatever…”
“What did I say?”
“It’s more the fact that you’re obviously trying to pick me up or something because you liked the look of my ass in these jeans.”
“I won’t deny that I liked the view, but there are two reasons that you should listen to me on this.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yes, really. The first is that I’ve got a girlfriend and she is the jealous type.”
The girl smirked at this, “What’s the second?”
“I’m the captain of the baseball team,” I said, gesturing toward her baseball cap where a chipmunk was displayed prominently. There are a lot of people who think that we have a really stupid mascot, my best friend among them, but me, I like being a chipmunk. Besides, the school actually got permission from Disney years ago to use the likeness of Chip.
“Oh…you’re Jay Sims aren’t you?”
“Yep.”
“Katie is your girlfriend.”
“Yep.”
“I’m Katie’s cousin, Melanie.”
“The one from out of state? So, you’re going to be coming to school with us? Hope to see you there.”
“Not likely. Katie never really liked me.”
“It doesn’t seem that way. She did tell me you were coming here after all.”
“She thinks I stole a previous boyfriend. Look, you seem like a good guy, Jay, but I have more time here, and I want to get back to my practice.”
Jay stepped into the cage with her and dialed down the speed to seventy.
“What are you doing?” she said with a shout.
“Giving you the time to try it my way. Use your whole body in the swing.”
Melanie trie the first couple of times, but completely missed the ball. She was awkward and couldn’t quite get into it.
“Look, anyone who can hit a ninety-five mile an hour fast ball should be able to kill a seventy.”
Melanie grumbled at him but tried again. She missed the next three but then she caught a piece of the fourth one, and she was off to the races after that. Hit after hit went into the net. She began to smile and then giggled a bit.
The next set Jay dialed up to eighty. She had to work at it a little harder, but she again hit ball after ball into the far net. He punched it up to nintey halfway through, and she missed a couple, but still hit most of them into the net.
“You know, you might actually be better at bat than I am.”
“Not that it matters. Apparently your district doesn’t allow girls on the boy’s team.”
“Huh, but isn’t there a girls…”
“Softball? No thanks. I like baseball.”
“Sorry,” Jay began, but Melanie interrupted him.
“Not your fault, Jay. Look, maybe I will see you at school, but would you mind leaving me in peace? I kind of like to take out my frustration on the balls.”
Knowing exactly where she was coming from, Jay walked away, but not before he saw her dialing the speed back up to the max of nintey-five.
He could hear the crack of the bat as she hit the balls while he walked out to his car. It happened more often than the last time she’d run it up that high, but nowhere near every hit.
He smiled and shook his head before getting in his car to drive home.
He drove home slowly not wanting to lose the feeling of peace that he’d gained by hitting balls. His parent’s marriage had always been a bit tumultuous, but recently the screaming matches never ended. Burying his head in his school work, or in practice, was the only way that he could really cope.
With the baseball season not yet started in earnest, Jay had to find other pursuits. Katie was one of those interests, but she was at one or another of her ‘activities’ as she called them, and so had left him to fend for himself for the day.
He slipped inside and rushed upstairs, hoping that he wasn’t seen. There was a lull in the shouting, but it quickly started up again before he got to his room. His parents talked a good game about love and marriage to everyone else, but they choked when the pressures of life piled on.
With his headphones on, and some rock music blasting away, Jay settled down to work. He was going over the math problems for his calculus class for the third time when his door opened.
“Jason Harold Sims, didn’t you hear me calling you down to dinner?”
Jay quickly took of the headphones so he could hear what his mother had to say.
“What, Mom?”
She smiled at him halfheartedly. “Time for dinner, Jay.”
“Ok, I’ll be down in a minute.”
His mom winced when the front door was slammed and the sound of a car starting told me that dad would be missing another meal with them tonight.
Jay was relieved.
It’s not that he hated his father, or was even afraid of him, more that he was tired of all the bickering. They ate a lackluster dinner and Jay went up to his room to go to bed. He was lying in the darkness, waiting, hoping, when his phone began to vibrate.
“Hello?”
“Jay!!! You’re still up!”
“Hey, Baby.”
They talked for a few minutes, talking about their days, leaving out all of the difficult things. Katie didn’t like to deal with the difficult things.
“I’ve got to get some sleep, Katie. I’ve got to be to the school early tomorrow.”
“Why?”
“Coach wants to talk to me about something. Some issue that the district is telling him.”
“Anything I should know?”
“Not really…oh, while I’m thinking about it, I met Melanie today.”
There was silence on the other end of the. Jay sat there waiting for a response for a while before finally he’d had enough and just needed a response. “Katie?”
“What did you think of her?”
“She’s a great hitter.”
“Huh?”
“She was at the batting cages. Doing a little batting practice I think.”
Katie began to laugh.
“What’s so funny?”
“She’s always had a really butch idea of femininity.”
“Why do you dislike her so much. She said something about stealing your boyfriend?”
Katie began laughing. “She said that? No, I hate her because she thinks she’s better than everyone else. She has to be better at sports, better at dancing, better at music, you know, just better.”
“Where is this venom coming from?”
“She beat me at a beauty contest.”
“What?” Jay couldn’t help it. He laughed at her.
“It’s not funny. I had been in a number of other pageants. I was working on my skills and trying to work my way into the top position. The next one was mine. That summer, Melanie was stuck with us, and my mother thought it would be a good idea if the two of us did a beauty pageant together. It would be a good experience for the little tom-boy.”
“She won?”
“Don’t get ahead of the story, Jay.”
“Look, I don’t have time. I get it. She never did any of that stuff, won her first pageant, and you feel slighted. Don’t you think it is more your mom’s fault than Melanie’s that she was in the pageant?”
“Bu…”
“Look, be nice to your cousin. She’s not a bad person.”
“I’ll think about it. Night, Sweetie.”
“Night, Jay.”
He was even more confused to see Melanie in the coach’s office when he arrived.
“Hey, Melanie. What’s up, coach?”
"Hey, Babe."
Jay laughed, "So, should I call you Dot or something?"
"Dot?"
"My mom loves A League of Their Own. That was the only female player I could think of off the top of my head."
The coach chuckled at that, realizing that she'd been calling him Babe Ruth, not an endearment of some sort. “Well, I see introductions are going to be unnecessary. Where do you know Melanie from, if I might ask?”
“I’m Katie’s cousin?”
“Cheerleader Katie?”
“Or dancer Katie, or flautist Katie, that Katie.”
The coach chuckled before continuing.
“I’d like you to dress out, Jay. We’re going to give a private tryout for Melanie here. Her dad used to be on the team and he thinks she’s good enough. The district, in it’s wisdom, is trying to tell me that I can’t allow a girl on the team, since they just won’t be able to compete on the same level as one of the guys.”
“Coach Peters,” Melanie started only to be interrupted by him raising a hand.
“They, not me. I figure that anyone who can hit a nintey-five mile an hour baseball like you did last night deserves a shot.”
Jay laughed and Melanie just blushed.
“Something you want to share, Mr. Sims?”
“I kind of gave her a couple of pointers on form last night before you arrived.”
“I did point out she was a bit awkward in her swing but all the basics were there. That was you?”
“Yeah. She was swinging with her arms, so most of the time the bat was out of position when the ball crossed the plate.”
“Most of the time?” the coach asked, looking at Jay pointedly.
“She only got a solid hit on about one in five.”
“Maybe I should fire my batting coach then.”
“Why?” Jay was curious at the comment, as their batting coach had played in the major leagues and was giving something back to his original mentor.
“Because she was hitting one in two by the time I got there.”
Jay was shocked to say the least. He’d heard of improvement, but never that quickly. Especially never because of a few pointers he’d given.
“See, and here if I hadn't called you on staring at my butt you might never have helped me improve my swing.”
Jay flushed with embarrassment but wasn’t about to let her get the upper hand this time, “Nah, making you swing your body just helped me to get a better view.”
Melanie went bright red and tried to hide her face in her hair. The coach and Jay laughed good naturedly at her.
“Go get dressed you two and we will start to run Melanie ragged.”
“You’re a sprinter, Jay. You and I both know that. As pitcher, you don’t even need to run much during the game. Melanie is long distance. I’m sure the cross-country team would love her, but she wants to join us, god knows why.”
“Coach, you’re not telling me you don’t want her, are you. I can push her harder…”
“Never, ever, suggest such a thing, Jay. I may think that this is the wrong thing for her to do, being the only girl on a team full of hormone-flooded teenage boys, but I would never suggest hazing. You should know that. I don't allow it on my team, and I have kicked people off it jus tthat reason. You know that even better than I do.”
Jay hung his head in shame. He knew the coach wasn’t that way, and more he’d been shocked at the hint of impropriety that seemed to hang on his coaches words.
“Look, Jay, I’m sorry. This is stressful for me. She’s good. Really good. Half the team is in worse condition than she is, and here I’m probably going to have to tell her that it’s not good enough.”
“I’ll do it, coach.”
“It’s my responsibility, Jay.”
“No, it’s not. I’m the one who has to cut a member of the team.”
“She wasn’t ever a member…”
“If this were a fair tryout, she would be. You just said she’s better than half of the other members of the varsity team. I’ll tell her on the way back to the showers.”
At the coaches wide eyes, Jay chuckled. “Coach Peters, I never took you for a dirty old man. No, separate showers, in separate locker-rooms.”
“Ok, Jay. Melanie, bring it in!”
Melanie finished the next circuit of the track and jogged to a stop.
“Thanks, Melanie, I’ve seen enough. Jay will escort you back to the school.” After finishing speaking the coach walked off back to the school shaking his head. He'd known this would worked out, but if Jay had just fought for her instead of going with the party line...
Jay watched the coach leave. He seemed to be burdened by an added weight. Jay was brought out of his thoughts by Melanie speaking to him, “So, you’re my chaperone now?”
“Hardly, I’m the team captain.”
“So, I’m in?”
Jay saw all of the hope and joy that belonging to a team could bring to a person. He’d had to tell players in the past that they’d been cut for this or the other thing. He’d never had to tell a player who was obviously fit to be on the team that they were being cut because of something out of their control.
“In a fair world, you’d be on the team in a second. You’re a better hitter than I am, you’ve got a faster sprint than most of the team, you’re got the capabilities to play basically any position other than pitcher, for which you just seem to be lacking in the arm strength.”
“What are you telling me?”
“Melanie, I’m telling you that the coach wants you on the team, but I have to cut you because the district won’t allow it.”
“You don’t want me hogging the spotlight away from you. You and Katie are perfect for each other.”
Melanie stormed off without allowing Jay to explain.
“But I want you on my team.” He was conflicted. Melanie was so real to him, more real than his girlfriend. Jay watched her back as she stormed toward the school angrily.
Jay took a long shower to try and clear his head. It didn’t help. The beginning of his day went by in a daze, as he tried to figure out exactly why he was so conflicted.
Katie and Jay had no common interests. It was almost as if she’d settled for the second jock down on the totem pole. You can’t be the girlfriend of the Football Captain? Be the Baseball Captain’s girlfriend. That is where the simplicity ended. She dragged him wherever she wanted to go, and when she was done with him, he was left to his own devices.
He liked her, and he loved kissing her. The things she could do with her tongue…but he didn’t love her.
He thought about it for a while and realized that he couldn’t actually pinpoint anything about her that he liked, even. It was almost as if this relationship was like his parents and traveling more on momentum and what they’d once thought they meant to each other more than what they now meant to each other.
Was that what it boiled down to? Did Jay only want to stay with Katie because that would somehow keep his parents together? If he worked things out with his girlfriend, then anyone could?
Melanie on the other hand...as he'd thought before, there was no one as real to him as Melanie was. They had at least one interest in common, and it was something that he devoted his life to. Before he'd begun playing, he never watched a game. Now, it was all he could think about. Well, that and Katie. And Melanie if he were being honest. Both of the cousins were now invading his thoughts, and they seemed incompatible there. Sure, they both had blond hair, and were both smokin' hot, but there the similarities seemed to end. No, that's not true. Both of them took his words to mean something other than he meant them to. At least Katie cast him in a better light, while Melanie had just taken them to mean he was a misogynistic jerk.
Jay heard the bell ringing and realized that he’d missed the first two periods of the day in his reverie and next he’d see one of the objects of his inner monologue in their first class together of the day: AP Biology.
“Jay, my man!”
“Doooogie!!!” Jay chanted at him.
The two friends sat next to each other and were lab partners ever since the teacher had caught Katie and Jay kissing during a movie about mitosis.
They chatted quietly until the bell rang and Mr. Henry called the class to order.
“As you all know you’re getting your DNA profiles back today. Most of you have absolutely normal profiles. Some of you, however, have profiles that are a little out of the ordinary. We’ll be using some of those profiles, with your permissions, in class to better understand the DNA profile. When I call your name, come to the front of the class and get your profiles.”
Doogie watched as they called each one of the students up one at a time, while Jay and he joked about what might be in those tests.
“Jay Sims?”
Jay was still smiling until he noticed how somber Mr. Henry was. Doogie watched the smile fade until it was completely gone when he got to the front of the class. Mr. Henry spoke quietly to him, and jay was shaking his head. Jay’d gone white as a ghost, and turned toward his seat. Mr. Henry called out after him, “I’m sorry.”
“Jay, my man, what’s up?”
“Nothing, Doogie.”
“Seriously, you’re scaring me, dude.”
Jay winced at Doogie’s words.
“What is it?”
“Just drop it, Doogie.”
Doogie stopped talking about it, but didn’t stop worrying about it. His dad had recently been diagnosed with Huntington’s, and that was one of the reasons that Doogie already had a DNA profile before the class had started. He was negative for the marker, thank god, but that doesn’t change that there are some scary things that can come up in a DNA test.
When Mr. Henry let them separate to talk about their results, Doogie waited until Katie came over and was showing Jay her profile. Doogie snagged the folder…the only folder that Mr. Henry had handed out, and looked inside. The first thing he noted was the Karyotype 46,XX. Confused, he looked at the name line and saw Jay Sims there. There was a second sheet. It said Jay Sims as well, and had the same profile. Mr. Henry had run the test twice…and both times it had come up XX.
“What are you doing?” Jay shouted at him.
“Nothing. I wasn’t doing anything.”
Nothing made sense, was what he was really thinking. Jay was a guy. Doogie should know. He was on the baseball team, and he knew that Jay showered with the rest of them. He knew Jay was a guy…but his test…
Doogie stewed about it for the rest of the class. It got out and he made his decision of what to do about it when they were passing one of the bathrooms.
He shoved Jay into it.
“What are you doing, Man?”
“I could ask you the same thing? Jay. What’s going on?”
“You pushed me in here.”
“That’s not what I’m asking. I mean come on, dude. You’re a girl? Seriously?”
“There’s got to be some mistake, Doogie.”
“They ran the test twice. Unless you’re saying it was a contaminated sample.”
“Mr. Henry watched me give the second sample. There’s still got to be some mistake. Do I look like a girl to you.”
“Truthfully?”
Jay slugged him in the arm.
“Exactly like one. The six o’clock shadow at ten in the morning sells it completely.”
“Crap, I forgot to shave this morning. I was in such a rush to meet with coach this morning…”
“You met with coach? What about?”
“Nothing import…oh, shit. Oh crap, No, this can’t be happening. No, no no no no.”
“What’s up, Jay? Tell me.”
“I’ve got to talk to coach. He’s got to figure something out before this get’s out of hand.”
“Before what gets out of hand. Talk to me, man?”
The sound of voices faded from the bathroom. The person in the stall waited for another thirty seconds after they’d faded before peaking his head out. He’d come in here to shoot up, so he’d kept his feet out of view. This was the only place he felt safe, really, or as safe as he could feel while still at school. He didn't have to worry about the football team finding him and shoving him in a locker, or trowing him in the cafeteria dumpster.
And his sanctuary had just become his power. This was a better high than he’d ever experienced from a drug. One of the gods on Olympus had a flaw, just like that Achilles dude. And he alone had the arrow that would take the smug bastard out.
The person snickered at the thought.
No, not bastard. He had the arrow that would take the bitch out. He was laughing to himself as he left the bathroom and entered the rest of the student population.
“Coach, we have a problem.”
“It’s not because of Melanie is it. I told you…”
“No, it’s a bigger problem than that, but related.”
Doogie laughed darkly. He didn’t know what was going on with Melanie, but he got the reference when Jay put it that way.
“Maybe you’d better start at the beginning, then.”
“Ok, well, you knew I was in AP Bio, right? Well recently we submitted DNA samples to get a DNA profile…”
You have much the same problem if you tell the people who are friends with your target. They know the person well enough that they can confirm or deny or evade.
No, you want to either tell someone antagonistic to the subject, or indifferent to the subject.
The problem with telling someone who is antagonistic is that they are considered a questionable source of gossip when the information is passed on to the next person.
The bigger problem is with telling someone who is indifferent. They need proof before they begin spreading rumors. And something this big would usually require absolute proof. Normally. Right now, however, with everyone aware that the DNA profiles were just passed out, that proof could be less than concrete. People just had to believe it existed. And the glorious thing was that the proof actually existed.
There were a number of girls who owed him favors for one thing or another, and so he let them be the ones to begin telling people the ugly truth.
It was a simple matter of ending a single text out to them: Jay Sims is really a girl. Her DNA profile proves it. Be creative.
After that he just needed to wander around and examine his handiwork.
“You know Jay Sims? Well apparently we should start calling her Jamie.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I hear that she got her profile back today and it says what we’ve always suspected. She’s a girl.”
“But he’s the captain of the baseball team.”
“Not for much longer, from what I hear. The coach is furious.”
The boy smiled in ill-concealed glee as he heard the first of his planted rumor starters. He walked from one point to the other, listening to what people were saying. On his way to the 4th location, he heard someone he didn’t know was talking about it. After that it was across the school like wild fire.
He hadn’t been watching where he was going and ran into one of his tormentors.
“Look, it’s Pasty. Hey Pasty.”
“Come on, Brad, we have bigger fish to fry today. We’re hunting Faggots.”
It took his heart a long time to return to normal, and longer for him to realize what was going on. When it did he began to laugh. They were not going to be tormenting him because they were going after that little whore Jamie. Everything was working out better than he could have ever hoped.
His laugh cut off short when one of his rumor starters came up to him, “So, are we square now?”
“Not by a long shot, Amy, we’re only just beginning.”
“For right now, don’t say anything about it, okay?” Coach Peters said.
“But…”
“We’re not really lying to anyone, Jay. You are male as far as anyone, before today, has known.”
Jay didn’t seem convinced, but he let it drop.
“This might actually be good for the team,” the coach said, “Melanie is a great player, and would be a great addition. If we can convince the school board that we’ve had a girl playing varsity for two years, and there haven’t been any ill effects, then we might be able to slip Melanie in without a fuss.”
“It’s not the same thing, Coach,” Doogie replied. “Jay isn’t a girl…I mean physically. Who cares what his DNA says.”
“For a lot of people, DNA is all that they care about. Of course…”
The look in the coach’s eyes scared Jay a bit. “What are you thinking, Coach?”
“There’s a possibility that this could be more than just DNA.”
“What are you talking about?”
“There are a number of reasons, medically speaking, why you’d look male, but be genetically female.”
In any given school there are a limited number of Gym teachers required, and an almost unlimited number of coaching positions. Coach Peters taught Biology in addition to being the baseball coach. It was only his personal policy that he not teach any of his players that kept Jay and Doogie in the class they were currently in.
Most people, however, felt a little weird calling a coach Doctor Peters, so a lot of people simply forgot that he had been an MD and a surgeon before deciding that he preferred to teach.
“Doogie, go to class. I don’t want you talking about this to anyone else.”
“Okay, coach.”
“Jay, I’d like to send you out to get some tests. I still have a couple of contacts in the medical community and I think that they’d be willing to help me out with this.”
Jay looked a little worried at the idea of becoming some sort of a human guinea pig, but nodded and said “Okay” as well.
Jay called his mom, knowing that his dad never answered the phone during the day.
“Jay, what’s wrong?”
“Something weird showed up on my DNA profile.”
“You’re not sick, are you honey?”
“No, Mom. I’m not sick. I don’t think so, anyway. Coach Peters thinks that they should run a couple of tests to make sure.”
“Do I need to say anything to him? Give any authorization for the tests?”
“Coach, my mom is asking if she needs to give any authorization for the tests.”
“Yes…probably. If she could meet us at King Memorial Hospital that would be great.”
“You hear that, Mom?”
“Yes, Jay, I did.”
“See you soon.”
“I love you, Jay. You’ll be fine, I promise.”
Jay signed off the phone after mumbling something to his Mom that she could take however she liked. It was embarrassing having your mom gush all over you like that.
“You still have the DNA profile?”
“Yes, I do. It’s in my bag.”
Doogie rushed back into the room just after the tardy bell rang.
“Is there a back way out of here?”
“What’s up?”
“I have no idea how it happened, but the whole school seems to know about the test.”
“What?” Jay exclaimed, hyperventilating a little.
“It’s worse than that. Some of the football players are looking for you. They want to show you ‘what happens to faggots at our school.’”
“That doesn’t even make sense.” Jay said. “How would being a girl in disguise as a guy make me a faggot?”
“Doogie, Jay, I’d appreciate you not using that word in my presence.”
Coach Peters had a strict policy on name calling and swearing. It was not allowed.
“This is my prep period, so I can be away from the school for the next hour. I’ll let the school know I am taking you to meet your mother. Doogie, get to class.”
Doogie snickered and headed off to his next period of the day while the coach called the office to get Jay excused.
“No, sir, it’s actually true. That’s part of the reason I’m taking him out of class today.” There was a pause as he listened to someone on the other end of the phone. “No sir, I can’t do that. I can’t afford…of, when you put it that way…yes, I understand…right away.”
The coach hung up the phone and looked thoughtful for a moment before talking to Jay, “well, it looks like we both have the rest of the day off, Jay. The principal would like me to stick with you to make sure that no one tries anything. He’s heard about the DNA test, so it’s definitely all over the school at this point.”
“What does this mean?”
“It means that I’m supposed to act as your bodyguard, at least for today.”
“What? But I’ve always been able to take care of myself.”
“That may be true, but the principal doesn’t want to take any chances.”
“Fine,” Jay said. He wasn’t happy about being treated like, well, a girl, but it was something he’d put up with at least for the time being.
They left by the outer door to the coach’s classroom and quickly climbed into his car.
As they drove, Jay stewed for a bit thinking about what all of this would mean. It had all happened so quickly that even now he was unsure how this would affect the rest of his life. This morning he was helping to give a private tryout to a girl he found very attractive.
This evening, would he be the girl everyone thought was attractive?
He pushed that thought away. It’s not that he had anything but respect for girls…other girls? He just didn’t want to be a girl.
He aspired to be in the Major leagues. It is all he wanted to do. He wanted to play the sport that he devoted his entire waking life to. Most people just weren’t good enough to get there. Being some sort of freak could ruin that whole plane before it ever happened.
It could ruin his entire life.
His phone rang as they continued to drive. It was Katie.
“Hello, Katie.”
“Thank goodness you’re okay. I’ve been hearing some nasty rumors about you today. I wanted to make sure that they weren’t true. They’re not true, are they?”
“What rumors have you heard?”
“The craziest is that you’re a girl dressing up like a boy.”
“I’m not dressing up as anything.”
“That doesn’t put me at ease. You’re saying you really are a girl then?”
“I don’t know, Katie. Can we talk about this later?”
“You don’t know? What do you mean you don’t know. You either are, or you aren’t. It’s that simple.”
“My birth certificate says I’m male, Katie.”
“Wait…why would you…no. This can’t be happening to me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Is that why you won’t have sex with me? Because you can’t?”
“You’ve completely lost me,” Jay said as he was thinking something else entirely. He hadn’t ever had sex with her because he thought she was a little too aggressive for him. He wanted to let things happen naturally, and above all he wanted to be in control of what happened when. Whenever he was with Katie, and alone, she just sort of forced herself on him, which really turned him off.
“You don’t have a d…I mean the equipment to play ball.”
“I have the equipment, Katie. Look I’m not having this conversation with you right now.”
“All you have to do is prove it to me. Meet me somewhere and prove you are a guy and we’ll figure out some way to get through this.”
My phone beeped telling me that I had a call on the other line. It was from a number I’d never seen before.
“Katie, I have another call coming through. It could be important.”
“Don’t you hang up on me. If you can’t do this one thing for me, we’re through. I can’t have people thinking I’m some sort of lesbian.”
Jay did the only thing he could at that moment, he laughed at her.
“Fine, Katie. Look I’m on the way to the hospital. Maybe we can resolve this later.”
The call beeped in again. The same number was calling him back after going to voicemail.
“Come back here and we can resolve it now. You can go to the hospital afterwards.”
“Look, Katie. This makes it simple. Not everything is about you. If you want it to be, let me oblige you. Assume this was an elaborate way for me to break up with you.”
“You can’t do that!”
I hung up on her and went to the other line.
“You total bitch!”
“Excuse me?”
“That line you fed me about not allowing girls on the team, and here you are a girl yourself.”
“Melanie?”
“Of course it’s Melanie. How could you do this to me? Were you afraid that I would have told someone your secret? Well, it’s all over the school now. Nothing to hide anymore, huh?”
“This has nothing to do…I didn’t mean…I never knew…Melanie, look. I’m on my way to the hospital right now. Can we talk about this later?”
He got no response, and when he checked the face of his phone, all it said was call ended. Coach Peters was laughing quietly at him.
“It’s not funny, Coach.”
“Actually, it kind of is. Look at it from my point of view. You are a guy, I meant you are really a guy.. There isn’t anything about you that suggests feminine to me. And here we all come to find out that you’ve always been a girl inside.”
“We’ll maybe someday I’ll think it’s funny, but right now I face getting kicked off the team, my girlfriend just forced me to dump her, and the hottest, coolest, most perfect girl I’ve ever met doesn’t ever want to speak to me again.”
“Oh to be young and sure of life. Jay, nothing is ever what you expect it to be.”
“You can say that again. I mean look at me. Apparently girls can look like this now.”
“We’re going to figure this out.”
“I hope so.”
Jay spent the rest of the trip staring out the window, glaring at everyone who made eye contact. It’s not that they were to blame, but at least then he didn’t have to blame his parents, or god, or whatever else came to mind at the moment.
He was happy that Coach Peters just let him have some time to himself.
They pulled into the parking lot at the hospital and got out. The building had been a hospital longer than it had the name it currently did, but it had worn time lightly. Or it had been renovated in the past. Neither of those Jay knew for sure, but there was definitely a presence about the building that said ‘the sick come here.’
The problem was that it also seemed to have a patina of death about it.
Jay hated hospitals. From years of broken bones, stiches, shots, and all the myriad of other reasons that an active young boy gets himself into one, Jay hated then, and distrusted doctors.
“Come on, Jay. They’re expecting us.”
Jay shook his head and smiled ruefully at himself. Coach was a doctor. If anything it wasn’t doctors he hated. It was being sick. Like him blaming the random strangers on the street, blaming doctors for the consequences of his own actions seemed silly to him in that moment. Even this, today, was a consequence of one of his actions. He was the one who decided to take AP Bio.
He preceded Coach Peters into the open lobby and looked around. The entryway could have been located in any upscale corporate building, and that made sense in a way. A hospital was a business of a sort.
They went to the bank of elevators and rode one up to the third floor. Jay was amazed at the décor. He’d never thought of the inside of a hospital being so calming. The lighting and paint scheme was…nice. He’d gone from business upscale to high-end hotel. It was as if the interior of the hospital was doing it’s best to not be a hospital. It was masquerading as other things to put people at their ease.
The time that Jay spent wondering about the interior of the building did the same. He was almost confident when he walked into the room that the coach directed him to.
“Hello, Pol.” Coach said as they entered the room.
“Hello, Andrew, and this is Jay?” the man said. He had an accent unlike any that Jay had ever heard. It almost seemed like he was talking with a mouthful of mush, but was understandable at the same time.
“Yeah, I’m Jay.”
“Well, Jay, welcome. We already have a DNA test, but I’d like to take some blood, if you don’t mind, so that we can test hormone levels, and other things. I want to get a good picture of the chemical nature of your body. After that I’d like to perform an ultrasound.”
“Pol, his mother is coming in, since he is still a minor. She said that she wanted to be here to consent to any testing and so on.”
“No problem. How are you taking all of this, Jay?”
The mushy accent put Jay at-ease. He just couldn’t see the man being any sort of evil. It really didn’t fit. He seemed more like someone’s favorite uncle than anything else.
“Horribly, how would you take it to learn that the most fundamental thing about yourself was false?”
“Not too well. Who am I kidding? I'd probably be screaming and yelling about how the world can’t do this to me.”
Jay chuckled at this.
“Don’t think I didn’t consider doing just that. It’s just that yelling at the world, or god, or whatever never solved anything. You can only be pissed for so long before you realize that you have to make the world change or nothing is going to change.”
“That is a very enlightened viewpoint to have, Jay.”
Coach Peters snorted, “More of your new-age personal enlightenment, Pol?”
“Nah, I just feel that the word is good. This month I’m trying out being a Buddhist.”
“This month?” Jay said his eyes wide.
“Pol feels that there are too many religions and phylosophies in the world to limit himself to just one. He decided a couple of years ago to try each one out, that he can, for a month and see what is worthwhile in it. Then he takes those little things with him into the next month and whatever philosophy he’s moved on to.”
“Doesn’t that get confusing?
“No, it doesn’t…usually. Some of them are very similar though.”
“Jay?” Jay’s mom walked into the room.
“Hello, Fae.”
“Andrew, so what’s wrong with Jay. He was so cryptic on the phone.”
Jay reached into the pack he’d carried in with ham and grabbed the folder. He handed it to his Mom. She looked confused for a moment as she looked through it, and then she really noticed where it said female.
“What does this mean? Jay isn’t a girl.”
“That’s what were here to figure out. I’d like to take some blood and get an ultrasound.”
“Of course. Go ahead.”
“I’ll have a nurse in to take your blood then. Fae, Andrew, if you could come with me?”
They left Jay to it and went down the hall a little to Dr. Pol’s office.
“Fae, I’d like to talk to you about what this could say for Jay.”
“What do you mean?”
“The least this could mean is that he’s sterile. Or at least he’ll never be a father. At the worst, he could…she could be only male on the surface, and female on the inside.”
“How is that the worst? There’s nothing wrong with being female.”
“I personally don’t think that is what is going on here. He is too masculine looking. And that is why it’s the worst. He is very masculine in his mannerisms.”
“Oh.”
“Mom, I’d like to mention to you that you are really going to need to hold back. I can tell you’d like to have a girl. Jay is your child and he needs to be able to express himself as whomever he feels he is.”
They talked for a few moments more before Dr. Pol left the two of them in his office and went back to Jay.
“A little blood? I feel half drained.”
Pol laughed a bit at this.
“So, you ready for that ultra-sound?”
“I guess. What are you looking for?”
“A uterus, actually.”
“What?”
“Yeah, I doubt you have one, as I think I know that exactly is going on, but we need to make sure here.”
The gel was cold, but it didn’t really phase him. You lived with what you couldn’t change. Isn’t that what he’d always felt? But how did that relate to this ‘problem’ he was now dealing with? Jay lay there, worrying about what this would mean if he did have a uterus, or all of the other things that would make him truly female. Could he take that?
He found himself praying to a god he wasn’t even sure he believed in that it would come back negative. He needed it to come back negative.
“Well, I can tell you for a certainty that you are one hundred percent male, physically at least.”
Jay smiled, but then looked up at the doctor with a look of worry on his face. “What does this mean?”
“What it means is just exactly what I assumed when I first saw you. You have something that the medical community calls XX male syndrome.”
“If they include male in that…”
“Yes, at least the medical community considers you to be male,” Dr. Pol said with a slight smile, “Unless you think that you would prefer…”
“No thank you. I like being a guy.” The relief was evident in Jay’s voice.
Dr. Pol chuckled at this. “We’ll check your hormone levels to see if you need to take any pills or shots to keep your testosterone up, but from your hair growth I’d say that won’t be necessary.”
“Thank you.”
“Now for the bad news, I’d like for your mother to be there when we discuss it.”
The two of them walked back to Dr. Pol’s office, and Jay was beginning to be worried. The look on the doctor’s face was one that bothered him. It was almost as if he was about to issue a death sentence.
His mother became worried when she saw both of their faces.
Pol held up his hand before Fae could speak.
“First, I’d like to say that your son is physically male. There are none of the female internal organs visible. That leads us to the other problem. It is very likely that Jay is never going to be able to father children.”
“I can’t ever have sex?”
Dr. Pol smiled at this, “That’s not what I said. In every case I am aware of, XX males are sterile. They just don’t produce sperm.”
“Oh,” Jay said and sat down hard in the chair. It was almost as if someone had given him the best present in the world, and then told him that the batteries were missing. It looked good sitting there on the shelf, but he’d never be able to actually use it for anything other that looking at.
“Honey, I’m so sorry.”
Jay sniffled a bit, but wouldn’t let himself cry. It’s not like it had ever really meant much to him, but what teenager doesn’t tell him, or her, self that when they’re a parent they’ll do something different than their own parents.
Now, he’d never be a parent. He’d just be some in-between freak. And the rest of the school already knew.
“Honey, how about we go home. We can keep you there for a couple of days…”
“I want to go to the batting cages, mom. I need time to think.”
Fae was about to speak, but Coach Peters just shook his head.
“Come on, Jay, I’ll give you a ride.”
Fae began to cry as soon as they left the room.
“Oh my boy, my darling boy. What can I do for you now?”
His life hadn’t significantly changed, really, but now he knew, at the ripe old age of eighteen that he was completely sterile, and it was something he would have to live with for the rest of his life.
Somehow, being a guy, his virility was tied up into everything that was…him. If he couldn’t perform that most basic of human abilities, propagation of his genes, then what good was he?
A stray thought entered his head that he didn’t need to live with this for very long, and he began to consider how he could act upon that thought.
It disgusted him that he would even go to that place shortly afterward, but he did go there, and it was more than just idle fascination. It would be better to be dead than half a man.
He could make it look like an accident…his thoughts continued.
“If you’re here, then I’ll go someplace else.”
“Melanie?”
Her expression showed fury. He knew that she was angry at him, and he probably should have let Coach handle the entire thing this morning, but He'd thought it was important. Jay thought it would be easier coming from another student. Jay told her that.
“Melanie, wait. The only reason I told you is because I thought you should be on the team. Coach tells people when they are cut from tryouts. It’s my job to inform them that they aren’t on the team anymore.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“I’m saying that I wanted you on the team. Coach wants you on the team. The district has declared no.”
“Then how are you on the team?”
For a moment, in trying to explain everything to Melanie so she’d understand the weight of his situation had lifted. Now it hit him again like a ton of bricks and he sat down there in the batter’s cage. He still didn’t cry, but he felt like it even more. Jay just leaned against the fence and looked up at the sky.
“I don’t know how long that will last after the district hears.”
“Well, that’s what you get for lying about it.”
“I never lied about anything,” He said, getting angry. “I never knew, okay? I am male. I don’t care what my DNA says. I have a penis and testicles and that’s all that matters to me.”
Melanie turned bright red and was trying not to laugh. He’d embarrassed and amused her at the same time.
“How does that work exactly?” She asked curiously. She came into the cage and sank down next to me. For a moment he just relaxed in the mere presence of her before he decided to answer her question.
“I don’t know. According to the doctor it’s something called XX male syndrome.”
“There is a whole syndrome devoted to it?”
He chuckled at her tone. “Apparently,” I reply, smiling at her.”
“If only you weren’t my cousin’s boyfriend,” Melanie muttered under her breath.
Jay heard, “I’m not. We broke up this afternoon. Something about her not being a lesbian.” Jay was frowning when Melanie sat up a little straighter, pulling away from him.
“You know, my doctor says I’m a guy.”
“You’re doctor says you’re male.”
“Isn’t that the same thing?”
“I think being a guy is more a case of your state of mind. Being male is physical.”
“Then I just have to find a doctor who can attest to my being a guy.”
They’d been getting closer to each other the longer that they talked. Melanie sat up straight suddenly.
“Jay, I can’t do this. If there’s even a hint of a possibility of me getting on the team…I can’t do this.”
Jay watched her as she got up and walked away.
It was also about that time that he realized that somehow, in the midst of this mess, he’d gotten to like the person that Melanie was, or at least represented. It had been a little over twenty-four hours since he’d met her, but it felt like it was so much longer with everything that had happened to him today.
How long was long enough, really, to get to know someone else properly? He’d seen lots of things that suggested you needed to know someone for years, but he felt connected to Melanie in some weird way. Part of it was that they both wanted to play baseball. He just knew someone was going to bring his DNA into this whole mess and say that he couldn’t play because he was a girl.
Who cared, for the moment, what he looked like? The school had to declare what was, and wasn’t a girl. Would they go with surface?
He climbed out of bed and began to search online for what really defined people’s gender and got more than he bargained for. Not in the skin department, in the education one.
It was eye opening to see all of the people whose mind didn’t fit either their body or their DNA. When compared to them, he didn’t suppose he had it so bad. Imagine feeling like he did now, but looking female. He really couldn’t conceive how difficult that could be for a person.
Or worse, in his mind, he imagined what it would be like if he thought he was always supposed to be female. The fact that he was XX would then be the cruelest joke that the universe could play on him. ;Yes, you’re female, but no one will ever accept you as such.’
He signed off his computer and shut it down. He could hear his parents begin to fight and for the first time he could remember they were fighting about him.
Jay threw on a robe over his boxers and tank top and went out to see what was going on.
“No son of mine would ever be anything like that. These tests are wrong, or you cheated on me. This isn’t my fault.” Dad yelled as Jay came into the room. Jay wanted to smack some sense into him, but restrained himself.
“Actually, dad, this is all your fault. The guy determines the gender after all.”
“What you’re saying you should have been born a girl?”
“No, I’m saying that this is all your fault. You know what, though? It doesn’t matter. You can go on thinking that Candy, or Cindy, or whatever her name is will love you for yourself. Chances are the only thing in your pants she really wants is your wallet.”
His mother’s jaw dropped open and his dad began glaring at me.
“I hear what you guys are saying, and I can figure out what you aren’t. You’re my parents, but you really need to get a clue, alright? I called mom today to be with me at the hospital. Did you know that dad?”
He shook his head and began to reply, “You know how busy I am…”
“Really? Busy? You? You just don’t want to be bothered. It’s been like that for years. Mom is the managing partner in her firm. She not only has to deal with her own clients and, when necessary, protect them in court, but she has to deal with the problems of all of her partners and associates.”
Dad continued to glare in my direction and again opened his mouth to speak, but Jay cut him off, “Dad, I get it that you think you’re important in your company as well, but get a clue. You’re a glorified accountant. That’s what a CFO is. You push numbers around on spreadsheets and try to make them prove your company is solvent.”
Now he was really getting pissed, but Mom was beginning to grin.
“You’re not a girl, Jay. There’s no way any boy of mine…” He began, and then trailed off when he saw mom and Jay glaring at him.
“No way what, dad? No way that any child of yours would be convinced that DNA was wrong? That no matter what they look like, not matter what the world thinks about them, that they know who they are inside?”
His dad mutely nodded, not wanting to voice the opinion he had in the face of two people glaring at him. He said something quietly, and Jay didn’t catch it.
“What was that?”
“Her name is Cynthia. I’m not sleeping with her, but I’ve thought about it.”
Mom looked shocked, “But you said…”
“I know what I said, alright? I feel inadequate compared to you sometimes. You make three times what I do. It bothers me.”
“Why didn’t you ever say anything?”
“Because I’m embarrassed. I feel week and incapable. I invented the fiction of me with a younger woman to try and make you feel as inadequate as I feel.”
“Well, it worked, you know. I always thought I was beautiful for my age. When you started bringing up your…mistress…I felt old for the first time.”
“Can we get back to me for a moment? You can then go on to try to patch things up later, somewhere far away I hope.”
They were both a little startled to see Jay there. It was almost as if they’d forgotten that he existed
“Dad, I don’t think of myself as a girl, and I never have. If I had, I’d like to think that you’d support me, but I didn’t. I love you both, but I need you to put aside your differences, ok? I need my parents to support me, since I’m sure that life is going to be difficult for the next little while.”
“Why would it be difficult? Nothing’s changing for you, is it?”
“That’s not the issue. Someone told the school about the DNA profile.”
“Tell me again how it all transpired that you were talking about it in school,” his mom asked.
Jay knew when his mom went into lawyer mode, and this time was no different. Jay talked about the DNA profile, and how the teacher clued Doogie into the fact that there was something wrong, then about how they talked in the bathroom and then went to talk to the coach.
“Hmm, and it was while you were talking to the coach that Lawrence told you that everyone knew? Did you leave the folder anywhere?”
“I kept the folder with me.”
“Ok, well it’s too late tonight to start working on this, except in generalities. I’ll get on it tomorrow.”
“Get on what?”
“Suing the school district.”
“Why? It’s not like we need any money.”
“Huh? Oh, no not for money, to keep you on the baseball team. If it hadn’t been for the DNA profile then no-one would ever have questioned your right to be on the team. As it is…”
“Mom, if you’re going to do that for me, then help out Melanie.”
“Who’s Melanie?” Mom asked him.
Jay blushed and looked away from her for a moment, “She’s a girl who wants to play on the team, and she’s good enough, but…”
“Honey…”
“Mom, you know how much I want to be on the team. The thing is I wouldn’t feel right being there if she wasn’t allowed to be. Only a slight difference and I would be her.”
“Fae, my son has a point here.”
Jay looked at his father in shock. His Mom was only slightly less shocked.
“What? I can admit I was wrong, about more than just this, but I was wrong. That’s not why I think that he’s right though. If a woman can compete with a man on a level playing field then she deserves to play on that field.”
“If?”
“Look, there are men that can’t compete with women in certain areas. There are women that can’t compete with men in certain areas. Everyone has different talents.”
“Dad, I think you’re digging yourself a hole here.”
“Ok, let me try again. Anyone who can meet the minimum physical requirements of an activity should be able to participate in that activity. Does that work?”
Jay laughed a bit at that and his mom just smiled.
“Now, go to bed, Jay, your mom and I have a lot to talk about.”
Jay blushed and ran up to his room. After a few moments the music came on and Fae laughed.
“I know that I’m sorry won’t ever be enough to fix the problems that I caused. And I still feel inadequate letting you support this family.”
“But you shouldn’t…”
“Logically, I don’t. Logically I understand how it all works. Emotionally, however, it’s a different thing.”
Fae began to laugh at him, “Why don’t you just quit your job, then, Henry?”
“I can’t…”
“You don’t like it, it doesn’t support us at all, and you feel inadequate. So quit. Find something you like better.”
“Who would hire me? You? It’s not like your company needs a glorified accountant.”
He took a deep breath and shook his head. “Never mind. So, what are we going to do about our son?”
“Nothing, Henry.”
“But, Fae…”
“No, Henry. Our son has to make this decision on his own. He states that he wants to be a guy, and we respect that. I don’t want to push him away.”
Henry looked out the window at the darkness and wondered if this was the best of the options that they had in front of them. After a few moments of this he realized that it was really the only option available to them, and he told Fae as much.
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
“I get it now. I do. He has to choose who he is on his own.”
“Isn’t that the way that we all have to grow? We all have to decide who we are on our own as we grow. Some people just have more growth to make than others.”
Fae looked at her husband with new appreciation.
“What? It’s how I’ve always felt, it doesn’t change the fact that I want to protect Jay from the more obvious threats. If being what people expect protects him, then that is partially what I want. It’s hard to let go of the child that you cleaned, fed, and protected for almost eighteen years.”
“Tell me the truth, did you really never sleep with that woman?”
“Not for lack of trying. She invited me over to her house one night. We made out for a while, but I couldn’t stop thinking about how this was killing you. No matter how bad things get between us, I just couldn’t do that to you.”
“But you could lie to me and tell me that you did?”
I’m ashamed of my behavior. I kept telling myself that I could fix it, that I could always tell you later what really happened, but the longer it went on, the more I was pushing you away.”
Fae seemed more angry with Henry than she’d ever been in the past. He couldn’t understand her anger. “Fae…”
“Just don’t talk to me.” She said with tears in her eyes, “On some level I knew you were lying to me. To have you tell me you had intended to do the very things that you’d lied about…just leave me alone.”
Henry hung his head in shame and allowed his wife to go to their room and lock the door.
“Hey, Jay! I have a bat you can play with!”
“There she goes. I wonder why she plays baseball.”
“Dude, you know why. It’s because hitting balls around is the other use she puts the bat to.”
“You should be wearing a dress so the rest of us don’t confuse you for a boy.”
The walk from the front doors to his locker was probably the longest it had ever been. Jay hadn’t thought so many people hated him. He’d thought that he was somewhat liked. He’d never bullied any of these kids, anyone actually, but here they were taking all this hate out on him.
It didn’t really make any sense, he thought to himself.
Getting to his locker didn’t give him any respite. There was a used condom stuck on the dial and he had to remove it before he could open the locker.
He was at a low boil by the time he opened his locker, and what he found just increased the heat of the flames. Someone had dumped an entire bottle of perfume through the openings in his locker. If it hadn’t happened to him, he probably would have thought it was funny. It did happen to him and he still kind of thought it was funny.
The openings in their lockers were almost designed to prevent this sort of thing. The opening itself was at the bottom and then angled up into the locker. They were likely there to make it so someone who got stuffed in one could breathe without difficulty. You could easily slip something solid up there, like a note or something, but volatile liquids like perfume would be another matter.
It had likely been done yesterday, as there was no liquid left, but the smell was overpowering. It was likely that it would continue to linger for weeks. And there was the real reason that someone had gone through the trouble of setting this up.
Jay would smell like a girl until he either got all of his books replaced, or the perfume wore off on its own. And not any high class girl either. The smell was cloying and flowery. It seemed the sort of thing that you would find on a drug addict trying to cover the smells of vomit, unwashed body, and illicit drugs.
“Nice scent, Cinderella” a freshman said as he walked past Jay’s locker.
Something in Jay broke. He grabbed the boy and slammed him into the lockers. The look of terror in the kids eyes only increased Jay’s rage. Jay gut punched the boy and watched him collapse. Jay began to kick the other boy. He smiled in maniacal glee as the boy covered his face with his arms and curled into a fetal ball.
“Jay, what are you doing?”
Jay looked around and saw the terrified faces of his peers, and then turned back to the boy he’d just been beating senseless. All feelings of power left him and he felt his knees give way beneath him.
There was a cut over the younger boy’s eye, and his breath was wheezing a bit.
Jay left his locker open, forgetting everything that had pissed him off for a moment. He picked up the younger boy and carried him down the hall, Doogie trailing after him. They got to the nurses office, and Jay put the boy down on the bed.
“What happened, Mr. Sims?”
“I’m sorry to say I did,” Jay replied, almost in tears. He’d felt the grinding of bone on bone as he’d been carrying the boy, and wondered if that was the right thing to do. Jay wasn’t thinking clearly, only reacting to everything that was going on around him.
“I’m going to the principal’s office now. If the police need to find me I’ll be there.”
Jay walked out, ignoring Doogie for the moment. He needed to do this. He’d probably just gotten himself suspended, not to mention kicked off the baseball team permanently, but that didn’t matter.
What mattered was that there was enough hatred in himself to hurt someone who made a snide comment.
Jay was sure that the kid hadn’t been the one to put perfume in his locker. He definitely hadn’t been one of the people taunting him between the entrance and said locker. He wouldn’t have been the one who started the rumors.
He’d been a freshman not too long ago, and the kid had probably been dared into it, or just done it to prove he was one of the cool kids. Now…he was really hurting bad and it was all Jay’s fault.
Jay walked in and sat down in the principal’s office.
“Mr. Sims, how can I help you?”
No one had told him. Jay had apparently gotten here before even the rumor.
“Mr. Ford, I beat a kid half to death today.”
“Jay, is this some sort of joke?”
Mr. Ford was floored to say the least. Jay was a very smart student. He’d never been a discipline problem, and seemed to be well liked by the other students. Sure, the rumors yesterday had troubled him, but he thought it was just more of the normal teasing that seemed rampant in schools these days. It wasn’t up to what the school board defined as bullying…but.
“Tell me what’s going on in your life, Jay. This isn’t like you.”
“Aren’t you going to suspend me? I really hurt someone.”
“I’d like all of the facts first.”
Mr. Ford was calm, at least on the surface, as he listened to what Jay told him. Underneath was another matter. He knew the kind of rage that Jay was talking about firsthand.
“Jay, I’m not going to suspend you this time. However, you’re going to have to perform some restitution to that boy you hurt. You get to make sure that he is able to get from class to class without hassle. You are going to carry is books for him to and from classes, at least until he heals from his injuries.”
Jay simply nodded at this.
“I’d like for you to take an anger management class.”
“What?”
“This isn’t like you, Jay. I want to make sure it’s never like you. If you take one now, before you begin to form habits, then you should be able to stop something like this from happening again.”
“Okay, Mr. Ford.”
“Unfortunately, I think cutting you from the team would send the wrong message to the kids at the school.”
“But…”
“I’m in charge of this school, Jay. Cutting you from the team would seem to tell them that I can be swayed by bullies. I can’t. If the surveillance system recorded sound, I would suspend every student that was involved with this morning.
“It does have video, though, and I am going to publicly suspend whoever put the perfume in your locker.”
“Mr. Ford…”
“No. This is final, and my decision. Until I take care of this, don’t say a word about what is going on.”
“Yes, sir.”
Jay left his office, and he walked down to the security room.
“Hey, Bill. You know which camera covers locker 419?”
“Yeah. This one over here.”
“Someone poured something into the locker. Could you find out who it was for me?”
“Sure thing, boss. I’ll get right on it.”
There was an edge to the message that no one had ever heard from the normally affable principal. Everyone had heard about the fight that Jay had gotten into this morning, and many wondered if the assembly might not be about that.
The bell rang, and an abnormally subdued student body made their way to the gym.
“I’d like for the following three students to join me here on the court: Katie Laughlin, Rick Alder, and Joseph Kingston.”
There were murmurs as the three students made their way to the front. There was almost nothing that should link the three students together. Katie was a cheerleader and Jay’s ex. Rick was a tight end on the football team. Joseph, or Joey as his few friends called him, was on the chess team and had a GPA as lofty as Jay’s own.
“There is a strict no bullying policy at this school. At an assembly to begin the school year, the entirety of the document was read to you. Every one of your parent’s signed the policy. Over the past twenty four hours, some of you seem to have forgotten what was in that policy.”
He pulled out a dark blue booklet that most of the students recognized as the student handbook, and he began to read: “Section 4, paragraph 9: Bullying is not limited to attacking other students physically. Bullying can be taunts, insults, or cutting remarks. It can be in person, in print, or in digital media like on facebook. Bullying is anything that causes another student to feel trapped to the point that the only option they feel they have is to lash out at themselves or others.
“Section 4, paragraph 10: Anyone who is caught bullying will be expelled from school. There is no appeal. For this reason cameras and other surveillance equipment have been installed at the school. This is for the protection of each student.”
Katie had gone pale. Her small smile of a moment or two before had completely disappeared. Joey looked green.
Mr. Ford looked at the three children standing with him in front of all of their peers, then he turned back to the student body.
“Did you think that I was kidding about any of this? These three former students will be escorted off school grounds by the security staff where they will wait for their parents to come pick them up.”
Mr. Ford looked up into the bleachers for a moment before continuing.
“There is no excuse for the fight that occurred earlier today. I have assigned what I feel is a just punishment to the student who won. The student who lost has punishment enough. I have talked to a number of you about this, and it seems that both students were at fault to me.”
He turned to look at the three who were with him and continued talking, “that is not the case with what these three students did. Not only did they break into the school after hours, but they vandalized personal property.”
He turned back to the rest of the student population, “I will not tolerate intolerance at my school.”
A couple of the brighter students chuckled at this. Mr. Ford smiled.
“Being a teenager is hard enough without someone trying to single you out. Consider for a moment that every one of you has something that they wouldn’t want the rest of the student body to discover before you open your mouth to taunt someone about their secrets.”
He took a deep breath and then continued, “The students still attending this school can return to class.” He turned off the wireless mic and walked slowly back to his office.
You sell drugs to a kid and for some reason the kid thought you were his, or her, friend. They’d tell you all sorts of things, in confidence of course, that they would never have dreamed of telling anyone else.
That lead him to the three who were even now being lead away. Of the three he actually felt sorry for Joey. Well, not that sorry. Hacking was a felony after all.
Truth be told, power was a heady brew and one that he fully planned to sip as he continued to control the school.
Joey’s debt to society was paid by the other job he’d done. The young druggie smiled at the thought. Yes, Joey was debt free after this. The drive with all the proof of his illicit activities was in his hot little hands.
Now, what to do with the video that proved to anyone who cared to watch it that Jay was just the sort of bully that he’d always suspected.
There was no real decision here: it was going to the police.
“Hey, Leon," he said as soon as the phone was picked up.
"Hello, Oscar. I haven't talked to you in a while."
"Yeah, I know, it has been too long."
"You needed time to heal," the voice on the other end of the phone said. "No one could have just bounced back after what happened to you."
"I know. I’m glad to be in a better place, emotionally, but it does have its own difficulties. About those difficulties. You know the Sims boy I told you about? There is video of the assault that is about to make its way to you."
"You decided to send it to me after all? I thought you wanted to handle this in-house, so to speak."
"No, this is not from me. Bill tells me that the entire assault was deleted from our server"
"Oscar, if you had anything to do..."
"I know how bad it looks. Can you just let me finish? The person who will be delivering will likely not be the person who stole it."
"Who do you think stole it?"
"Francis George. Or at least he caused it to be stolen."
"Who would name their kid Francis if their last name was George. That even looks bad in print."
"Be nice. It’s not easy having two first names, Leonardo Andrews
“Anyway, I’ve sent an image of Mr. George to your cell."
"I can't believe I didn't connect him with an ongoing investigation we have. Seems everyone in his organization calls him Pasty, though, so the boys have started referring to him that way. He's a low level drug dealer that we can't ever seem to catch with any drugs. He sends his buyers to individually prepped stashes."
"Really? Drug dealer? That explains this a bit better."
"I would suggest that you let us handle it this time. I mean all of it. Suspending Mr. George won't prevent him from selling at your school anyway. I mean it, Oscar. Don't do anything."
"You know me too well. I leave this in your capable hands Mr. Chief of Police.”
Calling in a favor wasn’t something that he ever felt comfortable with, and he didn’t feel like he was calling in a favor. Unless the freshman or his parent had wanted to press charges he was okay with not sending the evidence into the police. However, now that was out of his hands.
The kid had just gotten beaten up, and now he would be charged with assault for his bullying.
Yes, Jay would also likely be charged with assault and gross bodily harm, but now both of them would be in the system.
This wasn’t the way that he’d wanted things to go. Time to really call in a favor.
“Andrew…what?” Began the older gentleman behind the teak desk. The superintendant wasn't a slow man, normally, but he'd been contemplating the photos of his grandchildren and wondering when he'd get the time to visit them.
“I want you to get your head out of your butt, Harald and let Melanie play baseball on my team.” Andrew was furious and let his friend know it.
“What are you..?” began Harald. He was still on the back foot in the conversation.
“You’re aware that Jason Sims is a girl, genetically at least?”
Harald just opened and closed his mouth at this. He’d known Andrew since he personally interviewed him for his present position almost thirty years ago. He’d been the principal back then, so he’d had a real stake in that school.
But to hear…
“What are you talking about, Andrew? I seem to be a couple of lines short of a complete scene on this one.”
“Melanie Deverau wants to play baseball.”
“Well, there’s a wonderful girls…”
“You didn’t understand me, Harald. She wants to play baseball”
“Oh…and softball…”
“Isn’t baseball.”
“Oh…The board has declared that anyone born female is not allowed to play sports with genetic males where it doesn’t go counter with title IX.”
“And there is the second problem. The wording. Jay Sims is genetically female. So, technically…”
“And she wants to play…”
“He is the captain of the team.”
“He? I thought you said…” Harald was completely lost now.
“I did say he was genetically female. Physically he is completely male.”
“Oh…and if we let him continue to play, then there is no reason…” A small smile appeared on Harald's face.
“There never was a reason. While there is occasionally full contact at a plate, baseball isn’t really a full contact sport. It is outdated to think that anyone who can compete shouldn’t be allowed to compete.”
“But girls are weaker…” Harald didn't actually believe the party line he was spouting, and George knew it.
“Give it a rest, Harald. Girls are usually weaker than boys, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a huge amount of overlap in our capabilities. Women don’t have testosterone, which means they miss out on the easy muscle building that men enjoy. That doesn’t mean they can’t build muscles, just that they have to work harder at it.”
“And I don’t think I work at it at all,” Harald replied rubbing his belly. He wasn’t fat, but he did have a bit of paunch.
“Jay has testosterone. So, that’s the first problem with banning him. He was raised as a boy, which is the second.”
“So, Jay stays, but what about Melanie?”
“Melanie is a great athlete.”
“I’m not going with just ‘she’s a great athlete’ when I tell the board why I’m allowing her to play baseball.”
“Actually, that’s exactly what you tell the board.”
“Pardon me?”
“The only thing that should be judged is whether or not an athlete can compete on the same level as her peers. At the top end of any sport, you get more of a division between men and women, but whether that’s talent or desire I don’t know. It might also be bias from the people who recruit for the sports. They want male players, so they look for male players.”
“That doesn’t change anything…” Harald began only to be interrupted by Andrew again.
“It should. You tell the board that their ruling on this issue is contrary to the spirit of title IX because baseball and softball aren’t the same sport. Boys who want to should be able to play softball, and girls should be able to play baseball if they want.”
“I don’t think…”
“Harald, just do it.”
“Fine, but when this all blows up in my face you are taking the blame.”
Andrew thanked him and walked out of the office laughing.
While she was with him she’d give up anything to make him smile.
That was the problem. The feeling part of the equation was perfect. Even being frustrated with him felt perfect to her.
The thinking part of the thing just didn’t balance out well. She wasn’t some slave to his good looks. She was her own person who had a right to her own choices. She had a right to her desires, wishes, and dreams, but whenever she was near him she didn’t even care about herself.
“What is wrong with you, Girl? He’s just a boy.” She almost threw her books into her locker.
She sighed as she picked up the books for her next class. What was wrong was she was in love, or infatuated, or something. She really wanted to know where a relationship with Jay could go.
If she got on the team, then the relationship could go nowhere. She wouldn’t be just another groupie girlfriend, especially one who was also on the team.
On the team.
For a moment all thoughts of Jay left her mind. To actually be on the baseball team would be the culmination of a dream and a lot of work. She knew she was good. She had a talent for the game. It went beyond talent, though.
Melanie spent all of the time she wasn’t in school playing baseball. Usually it was just with herself, but sometimes with the boys in her old neighborhood.
She missed all of the games out at the old field. Baseball had been big in the town they’d come from. That was part of the problem. No one there would have even considered letting a girl on the team. It just wasn’t done.
Her dad had accepted a job with a new company just so she could get a shot on a high-school team. That was the only way that she’d ever get a shot of going further, to get seen playing competitively.
It was an even greater longshot for her to get onto a college team, but maybe, just maybe…
She sighed again as she took her seat in her next class and waited for the last students took their seats.
Jay wasn’t worth losing out on an opportunity like that, no matter how nice he seemed to be, or how kissable his lips looked…
For a moment, the freshman looked terrified, but only for a moment. He realized that he wasn’t being attacked anymore, even if he was still in pain.
“I’m sorry for what I did,” Jay continued, “I over reacted. I should have let it blow over, but…no buts. I over reacted.”
“I’m sorry too. I should have started running as soon as I called you Cinderella.”
Jay smiled at this, and the freshman laughed.
“What’s your name?”
“Palmer.”
Jay chuckled at that. With a name like Palmer it was a sure thing that the kid had been tormented himself. High school was like that. Palmer smiled at him.
“So, good news is that I didn’t break anything, so mostly it’s just bruises and such you have to heal up from.”
“I almost wish that you had broken something. Then they’d probably give me something stronger for the pain.”
Jay smiled sadly at the other boy. “I’m really sorry about this.”
“No, I’m the one who’s sorry. I knew that we were all pushing you too far, but I thought it would be cool to be part of the majority for once. I never thought that I’d end up hurt for it.”
“That’s life, unfortunately.”
A couple of police officers entered the room.
“Palmer Henderson?”
“Yes?” the boy in the bed said, a little worried.
“You’re under arrest for assault.”
“What?” Jay exclaimed.
“Who are you?” one of the officers asked.
“Jay Sims.”
The officers looked at each other and put their hands on their guns. “Step away from the bed, son. We’ve been looking for you as well.”
“What’s going on here?” A voice asked from the doorway.
“This is none of your concern, ma’am.”
“It is my concern. I’ve been retained by the school to represent the interests on these boys.”
“Oh, a lawyer,” sneered one of the two.
“Yes, a lawyer. Mind if I get your name and badge number?” she asked. There was nothing sweet or pleasant about the way she said it. She turned and winked at the two boys at the bed.
“My name is Hank Laramie.”
He gave the woman his badge number, and then his partner gave his information.
“Alright, so you’re arresting these boys?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
A call came in over officer Laramie’s radio, and he turned away to talk for a moment or two. He was blushing bright red and glaring at the woman when he turned back. “Come on, William, apparently they’ve recalled the warrant.”
“What?”
“Sorry for this, ma’am.”
The officers left the two boys looking stunned. Jay looked at the woman with a bit of awe. “Who are you?”
“Julia Fore. Your principal retained me to take care of the two of you. The main problem the police have is that the person who stole the footage of the two of you fighting deleted it from the school servers.”
“How is that a problem?”
“It means that it can’t be proven that the footage is authentic. It could have been doctored or obtained illegally.”
“Someone stole it. Of course it was illegal.”
“This country still has problems with people being filmed without their knowledge. If it was not one of the school’s security cameras then it was an illegal film of minors.”
“Can’t they just retrieve the data from the hard drive? I mean nothing is ever really deleted, right?”
Julia laughed.
“That is one of the big myths about technology, propagated by those procedural TV shows. Yes, until something is overwritten it can be easily retrieved, because it is only the table of contents on the drive that is altered. The problem is that as soon as it is overwritten it becomes part of the background clutter.
“There are even a couple of minor things that can be done to completely erase data, like overwriting the data with all ones or zeroes and then alternating a couple of times. In the end, however, after something is overwritten the first time it is very time consuming and costly to even attempt to retrieve the old data.”
“Why are you telling us about this?” Palmer asked.
“Because the data on the drive has already been overwritten. When you have as many cameras as that school, with as much data as they do that needs to be encoded at any one moment, you tend to have all of the open portions of the hard drive used at one point or another as a swap file…” seeing their blank looks, she modified what she was saying, “basically, it is the real world equivalent of repeatedly overwriting the drive. That data, if it was ever there in the first place, is gone forever.”
“What does this mean for us?” Jay replied.
“It simply means this: unless there are a number of eye witnesses who suddenly come forward, then there won’t be any charges against either one of you. Especially since any witnesses would also be suspects in the entire morning's events, including the bullying of Jay from the moment he walked in the door.”
Another question came to Jay, but before he could voice it, Julia stopped him, “It’s complicated, just assume for now that I have both of your best interests in mind. If there is ever a conflict I will appoint another lawyer to your case, Jay, okay?”
“Fine.”
Julia said her goodbyes and left.
“So, you okay, then, Palmer?”
“Yeah, I’ll be fine. I’m sure my mom will be by later to keep me company.”
“I’m really sorry about this.”
“If you’re sorry, then get me a tryout for the baseball team.”
“Okay.”
“I was joking,” Palmer said a little scared.
“I wasn’t. If you really want to try out for the team, then I’ll make it happen. We don’t have a freshman team this year, but I’m sure that the sophomore team would be glad to have you…provided you’re any good.”
“I’m not good at anything.” Palmer said while looking away from Jay.
“Ok, well, if you want to try out, or maybe just meet somewhere for some batting practice and going over some skills, then let me know.”
“You’d be my private coach?” Palmer said looking a little shocked.
“Yeah, I guess I would. Everyone has to start somewhere, right?”
“That would be kewl,” Palmer replied.
“Well, as long as I want to stay on the team I need to run. I’m going to be late for practice as it is.”
Jay left a smiling Palmer in the room as he rushed out to get back to the school.
“Crap, sorry.” Jay said and turned away.
“What are you doing in here?”
“I was late getting to practice? What are you doing here?”
“Dressing out for the team. Coach though it would be okay if I did, since the entire team would be on the field.”
“Why aren’t you dressing in the girl’s locker room?”
“It’s on the other side of the school.”
“Well, if it’s on the other side of the school…”
Melanie punched him in the arm.
“Hey,” Jay said looking up and preparing to defend himself from any further attacks. He noticed that she’d switched shirts and was just finishing getting dressed. He was doing his best not to think about the glimpse of her in her underwear that he’d just witnessed. She had a seriously smoking hot body.
“Jay?”
“Sorry, sorry. I know you want nothing to do with anyone on the team and I’ll respect that. I’m sorry I looked.”
“Am I that ugly?” she asked, a little anger showing in her voice.
“No, that impossible to ignore. Now, you mind? I need to get changed myself.”
“It’s only fair.”
“I have to put on a jock strap and a cup,” he stated. When she still didn’t move, he continued, “which means I have to get naked…”
“Oh,” she said, going bright red. She turned to leave but Jay stopped her.
“Melanie.”
“What now?” she said turning around.
“I’m really glad to have you on the team. You’re one of the best players we have.”
She smiled and then sashayed out of the room. It’s the only way that he could describe it. He was going to have a hard time getting that cup on.
But NOOOOOO! He sidesteps that little landmine as if he’s a friggin ballerina.
“That’s it, Miss Jay Sims. You’ve made me resort to violence now. You should have taken your licks like a good little…whatever. Now you get to spend time in the hospital with your new butt-buddy.”
He dialed a number on his phone from memory.
“Hello?”
“Hi, Rick.”
“What do you want, Francis.”
Frank’s complexion turned a deep red for a moment, and then reverted to his normal pallor.
“For that comment, Dick, you get even deeper in the hole to me. Here I was thinking of forgiving your current debt, but no. I own you until I’ve used you up completely.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I want you to tear Jay into bloody little pieces.”
“There’s no way I’m doing that. I’m in enough trouble with my folks as it is.”
“As much trouble as when they find out their little boy has sex for money? Oh, and I’ll make sure to tell them that your ‘clients’ are all older gentlemen.”
“You promised…”
“I promised that I’d keep it to myself as long as you fulfilled your end of the bargain. That bargain isn’t done. Beat the tar out of Jay Sims and we’re square. Keep yourself from getting caught and there might even be a little something in it for you. I got a new shipment in just for you.”
“Wait, you don’t mean…”
“Yes, and like I said, the whole thing is yours as long as you don’t get caught.”
“It’s a deal,” Rick said eagerly.
“Hey Melanie, who’d have ever thought you were a girl? You’re a better player than Jay,” Said one of the players, looking for the obvious pickup from the other players.
“Haven’t you heard, Neil, Jay is a girl.”
A lot of the players stopped at that. They’d all known where it was going, but Ramirez had been the only one who was dense enough to actually go there, or so the other players thought.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you something, Ramirez.”
“What, Jay?” the other boy asked a little nervously.
“Can I borrow that miniskirt from your closet? It would go fabulously with that pink top we saw the other night at the mall.”
Everyone else busted up laughing with Jay joining in after seeing the look that Ramirez threw his way. After a moment or two Ramirez joined in with the rest of them.
After practice, Melanie stopped him before he went into the showers.
“What happened to you today? This morning you beat that kid up.”
Jay’s smile left, and he began to scowl a bit. “This morning I was a stupid Neanderthal who was only thinking about how people were belittling his manhood. This afternoon I almost got arrested for showing a freshman the error of his ways.
“Now? Now, I realize that it’s part of who I am. I choose not to let my genetics choose my identity for me. I’m a guy, and I don’t care what anyone else thinks.”
Melanie leaned up against him and kissed him on the cheek.
“What was that for?’ Jay said rubbing his cheek. He was smiling the whole time.
“Because you’re a good guy in spite of everything.” After pulling back from him, she smacked him on the butt. “Now, go in and get changed so that I can get through and take a shower.”
“You’re going to…”
“No, in the girl’s locker room. I just don’t want to walk all the way around the outside of the school to get in.”
Jay laughed and went in to get showered and changed.
“Don’t forget, you owe me a view of you in your underwear,” Melanie called out after him. He just waved and went inside.
The scenarios kept going through his mind. All the ways it could easily get really hot in a shower.
He had to keep the water ice cold because of it. After a while even that didn’t work, so he decided to just towel off and go to his locker to change. The other guys quieted down as he entered the room.
“Point that somewhere else.”
“What?”
“We know you’re different than…”
“Huh? Dude, I saw Melanie half naked before practice and she’s right outside the door.”
There were a couple of chuckles around the room and Jay went over to get his clothing. Someone had put a pink frilly braw in his locker.
“Really, guys?” Jay asked, while pulling on his underwear.
He picked the first person to chuckle as his target and threw the bra. “Thompson, keep your bras in your own locker please.”
“It’s not mine,” Michael Thompson said, going bright red.
“I think it’s mine,” said a voice from behind them, a feminine voice.
Jay tried to cover up, but Melanie just laughed, “Looking good, Jay.”
As soon as she was gone, the other guys started commenting on her butt and breasts.
“Guys, she’s a member of the team.”
“So’re you, Jay, but we never let that stop us before.” Davidson smirked at the other guys trying to get them to join in the joke. It had been so hard to play out there today with not one girl, but two, and if only Coach Peters hadn't been there he could have let both of them know how he really felt.
There was a forced chuckle or two as Jay turned to look at the person who’d made the comment.
“Davidson, I think you might want to reconsider that statement.” Coach Peters stood at the door to his office with his arms folded across his chest.
“But Coach…”
“No buts, Davidson. I’ll not permit this behavior if you wish to remain a member of this team. Melanie deserves your respect. She’s has just as much right as any of the rest of you to be here.”
Eric Davidson grumbled at this, but let it go. He wasn’t going to get any traction on this argument, especially not against the Coach. It would obviously take a different approach. Maybe if he could get the other members of the team…
Most of the rest of the players let the cut go, and they joked with Jay as they continued to get dressed and then leave to go to their homes.
Eric simply couldn’t believe what was going on. They were treating the thing as if it were normal. How could they do this? It wasn’t male or female after all. He’d just have to have a talk with his parents about this.
A smile spread across Eric’s face. That was the answer. The other players were just children after all. He’d get his parents to support this, and there would be such an outcry from the other parents.
Maybe they could even get Coach Peters fired over this.
Like a single drop of dye into clean water, the ideas spread from that single point until Eric’s entire mind was consumed by the darkness of the concepts that had spawned.
It wasn’t, but neither her father nor she moved it. It was their chair, and they took turns at vigil in it.
“Hey, Mom,” she said as soon as she sat down in the chair. “I made it on the team. We had our first practice today, and it was really cool. It’s harder than I thought it would be, but that’s not a bad thing.
“You know how I liked the challenge in the past. Well, I’m up to the challenge now. Jay makes it a lot more challenging though.
“I told you about Jay yesterday.” Melanie sat there in silence for a while just listening to the machines that were keeping her mother alive. Her thoughts were in turmoil. She felt elation over being allowed on the team. She felt the pressure to perform well. In general she felt the need to be herself. And under it all, she realized that eventually none of it would matter. From what she’d already experienced with Jay, she knew that if the right guy came along, she’d likely make the same decision that her mother had.
“I wish you could talk back, mom, I could really use some advice. It’s so hard to know what I should really do. He’s a boy though. I can’t throw away my dream for a boy, can I? I know that you gave up tennis for dad, but…”
“You think she’d tell you she regretted her life?” Her father had walked in quietly and stood behind her as she spoke. He didn’t like to interrupt her, usually, but sometimes it was important, like now.
“But she had to give up her dream. She’d been invited to the US Open.”
“Melanie, don’t think like that. Her dream was to be a mother. She loved you as a kid, you know that.”
“But if only…”
“Don’t think that, sweetie,” her father said soothingly. “She made a decision to live her life, and not watch it pass by from on the court. There is a point where everyone has to decide what is important in life. For you, for right now, it’s baseball. Maybe next year it will be fashion.” He laughed at the face she made when he mentioned it.
“You never know, Sweetie. It could happen.”
“I think I’d start dating Jay first.”
Her father got a knowing smile on his face, “Why don’t you tell me about him. I know, it’s easier to talk to your mom, but I might actually give you some advice, and it sounds like you could use some.
Slowly, as if looking for the right words, Melanie began to talk to her father and tell him all about life at her high school.
Taking a deep breath, Jay got out of the car and locked it. He was stalling and he knew it. It was something he could laugh at, this stalling,
He ran out of things that he could effectively do to stall, and walked across the street and into the dojo.
The students were all young. All of the students were young. The Sensei only felt comfortable when teaching children. It was them who he loved to mold and helped to grow. The precepts that he taught were supposed to serve these children for a lifetime, and he had broken one of the cardinal rules.
Jay took off his shoes and kneeled at the edge of the mat.
“Jason?”
“Permission to enter, Sensei?”
The man nodded, and Jay stood and entered.
“I have failed, Sensei. I beat up a defenseless opponent.”
“Why don’t you tell me about it, Jason?”
Standing there Jay felt like he had the last time he’d been to the Dojo. He was ten years old again, looking up into the eyes of one of the men he truly respected. There had been coaches who had taken this man’s place in his life, but they always had to measure up to the example se forth by his first coach. His Sensei.
Tears streamed down his cheeks as he continued talking about his fears for the future.
“Jason, everyone makes a mistake now and then. That’s nothing to be ashamed of. You accepted you made a mistake, and sought forgiveness.”
“But, I could have killed him, Sensei.”
“You didn’t kill him.”
“But Sensei…”
“If it will make you feel better, I’ll accept you as a teacher here. You can help train my young ones to be as considerate as you.”
“Sensei…”
“I know you have baseball practice, so for this to be truly the punishment you deserve, I’ll expect you here for the evening classes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and three classes on Saturday.”
Jay smiled at that. He wasn’t sure that his Sensei was doing anyone any favors, but he felt better about the direction that his life was now heading.
“Thank you, Sensei.”
“Don’t thank me yet, you have a class to teach. They’re waiting for you already.”
“See you next week, Lisa,” Jay responded to the nine year-old.
The evening classes only lasted an hour, but it had felt longer to Jay. Not because of anything specifically onerous about the task, just that there was so much that happened. Usually, when he was happy, it seemed that time simply sped by and there was no really connection to what he normally associated with a single hour.
This time he was so focused on every minute detail that each moment lasted an eternity.
He went out to his car and let himself in so that he could drive home. He smiled at how his Sensei was going against his normal teaching rule. In teaching the younger kids, Jay learned something that the five years he’d spent as a student had never taught him, and that was restraint.
Not in a way that he needed to hold his emotions in check, but in a way that he needed to moderate his force. If he’d been using restraint earlier today, he might still have attacked Palmer, as he’d completely lost control of his emotions, but he wouldn’t have hurt him nearly as badly.
The time in the class reminded him that there were many ways to take someone down, and you didn’t need to destroy someone to protect yourself. Something else he realized was that he was so far out of practice. If he’d followed the last words that Sensei told him, he wouldn’t have overreacted like he did, and it was an overreaction.
Palmer had just been making a comment, nothing big. It was even mildly amusing. If it had been someone else, Jay might even have laughed at it. There was the real problem. You never really considered how all the little slights that you use in day to day life might affect someone else.
Insults hurt, no matter what all mothers tell their children about sticks and stones. Words may not cause physical pain, but they still hurt. Each one causes another cut in someone’s heart. With each new slight the person dies a little inside.
Jay was as bad as anyone else and he knew it. You joked that way with your friends, but when they took it personally, when you’d gone too far, it was too late to truly make it better. Sure, you usually just laughed it off so that the other person wouldn’t see that they hurt you, but they did hurt you.
And the more that it happened, the more that you lost trust in that person.
That was the reason that friendships died, not because people grew apart, but because they grew tired of being hurt by you, or you by them.
It was all so stupid, really. Sure, there was a moment of glee when you came up with a really creative insult, but happiness was not formed out of moments of wicked glee. Happiness was helping a student like Lisa realize that she could actually throw someone as big as Jay.
It had so surprised them both, that Jay had landed hard, and had the air knocked out of him for a moment. She’d almost been in tears before he explained that he was alright, and that it was his own mistake that had hurt him, and nothing she had done.
After the initial shock of the moment, she had been all smiles, and the rest of her class had looked at her in awe. It was the last time he fell unexpectedly, but that moment had raised her in the esteem of her peers, and given her much needed self-esteem.
Jay pulled into the driveway and shut off his car, still smiling at the lessons that he’d learned tonight.
Something charged into him from the side and he flew a few feet to land in the grass. He was up almost as soon as he came to a stop, looking back the way that he’d come.
“So, you looking for more, then, Champ? How does the bully feel now? I’m here to show you.”
“Show me what?” Jay shook his head to clear it. Nothing felt out of place, but that had been a really hard shove, almost a tackle. The other guy was wearing a mask of some sort, knitted. Probably a ski mask, even with how cliché something like that was.
The other boy didn’t say a word, just came at him. Jay sidestepped and kicked him in the stomach, hoping to knock the air out of him. The boy grunted and grabbed for Jay’s leg. He was a moment too slow, but Jay couldn’t take the risk that he’d get him next time.
The guy was big, and there were a lot of things a big guy could do to you, even if they have no formal training. Keeping out of his grasp became Jay’s number one priority.
The other guy had no training as far as Jay could tell. He was slow, and wasted a lot of his strength moving his body in a parody of a traditional boxer’s cross. It was as if all the guys knowledge of fighting came from watching other people fight.
Jay slid out of the way of each of the attempts at connecting a blow that the other boy made.
“Jay, what’s going on?”
Jay was too engrossed in avoiding getting hit. His dad distracted him just enough, though, that the boy clipped his shoulder. It hurt. For the first time since this fight began, Jay realized he might be in trouble. Sure, he had the better training, even if he was still a little rusty, but even without proper form this guy had a lot of strength to throw around, and it would only take one good hit to end the fight permanently.
The next time the guy lunged forward, Jay slipped to the side and tripped him, again jumping out of the way. The other boy was quick to get up, and he was after Jay without a word.
“Stop this, there’s no reason for us to fight.”
“I have to do this.” The other boy grunted out.
His breathing was a little labored. For a moment, Jay wondered if he’d cracked one of the other boy’s ribs. It shouldn’t have been high enough for that to happen, but stranger things had occurred recently.
It seemed like another eternity, his second for the night, before the sound of sirens approached. Lights flashed and voices called for him to lie on the ground. The other guy slammed into him with his full body weight.
The light went dim, and he could hear shouting from a long way off before everything went black.
Jay was staring up at the night sky when he realized that he was aware of his surroundings again.
“Are you okay, son?”
Jay looked numbly around him and slowly sat up.
“Do you know where you are?”
There was someone speaking, and Jay smiled. The words didn’t register though.
“Jay?”
“Yes, Dad.”
“Are you okay?”
“I think so.”
“We need to question you some more, Jay, if that’s alright?”
“What about?”
“About what happened here tonight.”
“I was getting out of my car, and someone hit me from behind. I don’t really remember anything after that.”
“You can’t remember anything else?”
“He said so, officer. You saw what that other boy did. Jay immediately surrendered. The other boy…”
“We saw, Sir, but we’re still going to have to question your son.”
“What exactly are you questioning our son about, officer,” Fae said as she exited the house. “Does he need to have a lawyer present?”
“At this time of night? I don’t think we need to bother with a lawyer.”
“Officer, you’re being a bit evasive don’t you think?”
“It’s okay, mom, it’s just Officer Laramie. He tried to arrest me earlier today.”
“What?” Jay’s mother exclaimed.
“Julia Fore said that the principal told her something was up, and she stopped it.”
“Of course she did,” Fae said with a little smile. “Let me introduce myself. I’m Fae Sims of Sims, Anderson and Fore. I’m going to have a talk to my partner tomorrow about secrets. Apparently, however, my office has already been retained to represent this boy, which you already knew. I suggest you take the assailant and contact Ms. Fore at my office tomorrow if you wish to speak further with Mr. Sims.”
A couple of EMTs had driven up while Fae was speaking to the officer, and they began to examine Jay. It only took a moment before they were loading him into the back of the ambulance.
“What’s going on,” Henry asked.
“He has a slight concussion, and we want to take him to the hospital for a couple of tests.”
“Henry, go with our son, and I’ll finish up with the officers.”
“Yes, dear,” Henry said with a little smile.
They drove off from his home, and Jay was still a little out of it. It wasn’t that he was loopy or anything, but his thoughts just wouldn’t keep…
There were so many things in the back of the ambulance to look at. Surfaces…
His dad was looking concerned so Jay just smiled for him. It’s not like he was in a fight or anything.
For a moment Jay wondered why they had the ambulance siren on. The EMT asked him to lie back and…
“Jay? Wake up. We’d like to keep you conscious until we get you to the hospital.”
“Why are we going to the hospital?”
“Jay, do you remember what happened?”
“I was knocked across the lawn by someone?”
The EMT looked in his eyes, “Is that a question?”
“No, I was pushed. I know that.”
Jay’s attention wandered as the EMT went back to talking to his dad in a worried voice. The EMT shouldn’t have worried. He just was surprised is all. He’d taken harder hits this evening in the Dojo.
Especially from little Lisa.
He’d never noticed it before, but Lisa looked a little like Melanie. That’s a strange thing to think, he thought a second or two later.
They got to the Hospital and wheeled him into the ER. He only waited there a few minutes before they took him for an MRI. After that he was taken back to a room to wait while the doctors spoke to Henry.
“It just looks like a minor concussion.”
“But it was just a concussion?”
“There doesn’t seem, to be anything else wrong with him. It’s likely just caused a by his head coming into contact with the ground. There don’t seem to be any other injuries, but as a precaution we’d like to keep him over-night.”
“You’re sure that there’s nothing wrong?”
“I can’t be a hundred percent sure, which is why we’d like to keep him here.”
“Ok, I’ll be by to pick him up for school tomorrow then.”
“Lisa?”
“Senpai, what are you doing here?”
“Apparently I got ambushed by a brick wall on the way home.”
“Oh,” she said, her smile fading a little.
“Hey, the lessons we learn are important, Lisa.”
“Not that. I hoped that you might be here to see me.”
“Well, I see you. Why are you here, Lisa?”
“I have to give blood a couple of times a month. We moved here because they have a great research clinic here, and they hope to suppress my illness as much as possible.”
“What illness?”
“HIV.” She said with a sad little smile.
For a moment, the world stopped. She was nine years old, and had to be perfectly aware that she had a death sentence.
“That’s…”
“Horrible? Yeah, I know. I can’t let it affect me, Senpai. I’ve got to live my life.”
“How bout I go up with you?”
“You’d do that for me, Senpai?”
“Of course I will.”
“You can keep my sister company then.”
“You’re sister?”
“She’s parking the car. She sent me in to get signed in. She doesn’t want to be late to school again.”
“Well, if I need to I’ll just let her go and I can drive you to your school.”
“Really? You want to stay here with me?” Lisa said with a little blush.
“Don’t get the wrong idea, Lisa. I’m your Senpai. I feel responsible for you.”
“I know, but a girl can dream, can’t she?”
Jason chuckled a little and then looked at his parents. He’d been driven here in an ambulance so his car was at home.
Seeing his look, Fae responded. “Here, you can drive the Porche, Jay,” she said, tossing him the keys.
“How are you…” Henry started.
“I thought I’d get a ride with my husband.”
“Oh really?” Henry said with a smile.
“Don’t get any ideas. I’m still a little upset with you for lying to me.”
“Well, what can I do to make it up to you,” Henry said as they moved out the door.
“You’re so lucky,” Lisa said watching Jay’s parents banter back and forth as they left.
“How so?”
“That your Mom is still there for you.” Lisa lost all pretense at a smile when she talked about her mom.
“Did you lose your mom?”
“Kinda. The man who…took me attacked my mom.”
“You don’t need to talk about it if you don’t want,” Jay said as he pushed the button on the elevator.
“Lisa, you were supposed to wait for me in here.” Instantly, Jay knew who it was. He hadn’t connected it all together, likely because he’d only gotten first names the night before.
“I’m nine, Melanie, not three. I can go up and sign in on my own. Besides, my Senpai is here and he was going up with me.”
“Oh, it’s your Senpai is it. I’ve wanted to see this older man you have a crush on.”
Jay turned slowly to look at Melanie.
“Hello.” Jay said with a smirk.
Melanie was speechless.
“Wow, I thought only Jay got to my sister like this. She couldn’t stop talking about him last night. Looks like Jay has some competition.”
“All night, huh?” Jay said with a genuine smile this time.
“Shut up.” Melanie said while she smiled and blushed at the same time. She tried to hide her face in her hair, and when that failed, she put her face in her hands.
“Wait…” Lisa said, a smile slowly coming to her face.
“Please to meet you, Lisa. I’m Jay Sims.”
“My sister has good taste for once.” Lisa said with a little giggle. The elevator arrived and the three of them entered it. Melanie hit the button for the third floor.
“I certainly hope so,” Melanie said, “Since it would be really bad to insult him now that you spent almost as long talking about him yourself.”
It was Lisa’s turn to blush. “He is cute, though, you do have to agree,” Lisa said.
“Oh, yes, I agree he’s cute, but you know I can’t.”
“Then can I have a shot at him?”
“Ladies, look, I like you, Melanie, and think of you, Lisa, like a little sister. If I can’t have Melanie, then I don’t want anyone.” Jay realized how what he’d just said could be interpreted, but just shrugged his shoulders. After a moment he continued, “You know, it might not end up going anywhere, but I’d at least like to give it a chance, Melanie.”
“Are you asking me out? Don’t I get a say in this?”
“Of course you do, you can say no.”
“Then no, Jay,” Melanie replied. It obviously gave her no happiness to do so.
“Why not?”
The doors opened, letting them out into a waiting room. They signed Lisa in and then went to have a seat in the mostly empty room.
“Look, Jay, just no, ok?”
“It’s not okay. I think you’re beautiful, and would love to get to know you better.”
“I’m not just going to be the girlfriend.”
“What?” Suddenly Jay was confused. All he’d wanted was a date or two. Now she was talking some sort of permanent commitment.
“I’m trying to be an asset to the team. I don’t want the guys to just think of me as your girlfriend.”
“Ok, that’s not how guys think about it,” Jay said with a smirk.
“What are you talking about?” Melanie asked.
“Well, you see, until you’ve got a boyfriend, then all of the guys on the team are going to think they still have a shot. That means that they’ll continue to ask you out, and generally harass you.
“Now, I understand if you don’t want to date someone on the team, but…” Jay just trailed off, waiting for her to get it.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Melanie said with the shock evident on her face.
“These are teenage boys we’re talking about. When it comes to a pretty girl, they stop thinking, and listening is optional.”
“You don’t act that way…” Melanie said with a little smile.
“Lisa Deverau?” a nurse announced at the other side of the room.
Lisa got up and walked over to the nurse and then followed her back.
Jay turned back to Melanie after Lisa left. “I don’t act that way because Sensei would kill me. And possibly my Mom. Coach Peters…”
“If Coach Peters…”
“He expects me to adhere to a higher standard,” Jay said with a smile. “So, like I said, they stop thinking when it comes to a pretty girl. Most of them will only stop if you get a boyfriend.”
“You really think I’m pretty?”
“Of course I do.”
“And you wouldn’t feel weird about dating a baseball player?”
“Not unless you did. So, will you…”
Melanie shut him up by kissing him.
“I’ve wanted to do that for a long time,” she said with a satisfied little smile.
“I generally like to get a date first,” Jay said with a little chuckle.
They didn’t kiss again, but they did lean against each other and talk quietly while waiting for Lisa to come out.
“So, I missed out on my chance with my Senpai, huh?”
Jay and Melanie just laughed with her.
All Mar ever wanted to do was server her King in the same was as any man was allowed to. Anhelette had the same desire to serve her captain. Neither expected the connection they would feel or the danger than they were about to be thrust into. In a world far from our own, the next battle for the future of mankind is about to be entered into with nothing more than black powder and lace.
Enter Science Fiction, or a specific sub genre called 'After the Fall.' This is not in any way a post apocalyptic story. These types of stories are usually focused on what happens centuries after man loses technology, and usually are set on other worlds, ones on which man was not specifically meant to live.
Many of the greats of 'Military Sci-Fi' have written in this genre, something that I am not. I am a dabbler into military history myself.
This genre, however, allows me to get into something I'd like to do, without the need for exhaustive research, or being left with that disquieting feeling that I have missed something. I am one who takes the view that the people who were there, even the unnamed masses, have stories. This does not keep me from reading, and enjoying, historical fiction. It does, however, keep me from writing it.
I like to be able to know what all my characters have done, are doing, and will do. I like to be in control. With a completely fictional setting, this allows me that freedom to create.
In this case, I am using a science fiction back drop to create a twist on an era that is long past on our own world.
I am writing this story for me. Comments are always welcome, and will be appreciated, but I am aware that this sort of story will not be everyone's cup of tea, and it may be that I completely fail at it. It will be a learning experience either way.
If there is a huge uproar of distaste I can stop posting this, but that will of course depend on what all of you think of this humble offering.
The veterans made sure that the damp of the fog wasn't affecting their powder.
The long bore muskets that they were using were heavy and almost six feet long. This created a problem for the men trying to use these weapons. Since the time between pulling the trigger and the ball being ejected from the end of the muzzle was measured in seconds, they needed to either be steadied by a second man, or rested on a fork, when you had time to set up.
The men had been standing there for almost an hour, and their forks were placed and at the ready.
Their officer felt a sneeze building in her nose.
This was something noteworthy in itself. Not the sneeze. That was normal for the officer, and something that her men though funny. She was the only person they knew who always sneezed when they fired their weapons.
No, what was amazing was the fact that she was a woman, and that her people had no clue.
"Sir, how much longer are we going to wait here in the cold for these smugglers?"
"Keep your voice down, Sergeant!" she said in the tenor tones that she affected whenever she was in uniform.
"But sir, I'm cold…"
"Sergeant Sikes, if you keep talking I'm going to kick you so hard that you'll forget how cold you are."
There was a round of chuckles at this. Not so much because the short officer would do it. No. They'd seen her carry out corporal punishment before.
More it was the fact that Sergeant Sikes was acting for their benefit, and the officer, and her men, knew it. Sikes was a master at pitching his voice so that no one he didn't want to hear him could possibly hear him.
The officer hadn't mastered that trick yet, but she was new to the platoon. New to the musketeers. Sikes though her a decent enough bloke, and a much better officer than many he'd broken in through his years of service. Sure, she was small, and skinny, but she knew where to hit a man to get him moving, and usually just had to voice a choice word or two to do the same.
The rest of the men looked at her diminutive size and saw nothing more than the dandy they took her for. Impeccable grooming and a habit of taking baths at every opportunity did nothing to lessen this image that they had.
Tension mounted when the sound of tack jingling at the open mouth of the alley alerted the men to their quarry.
The officer smiled, her teeth shining in the near darkness. At this time of the evening, she doubted that it could possibly be anyone other than her prey, but she would make sure, just in case.
"In the name of the king, stand to and prepare to be searched for contraband!"
The scrape of swords being pulled from their scabbards was unmistakable, but still the officer held her fire. The men began to charge, trying to get past the thirty feet separating them before the slow firing weapons could discharge.
As soon as they blocked the alley, the officer said in a calm, quiet voice, "Fire."
Hell was unleashed on earth. The sulfur stink permeated the alley, and the officer sneezed, twice.
One of her men yelled out, "God Bless," to general snickering, through which they lay down their muskets, some more forcefully than others, and drew their swords.
Still calm, the woman called the charge, "For the King and Fleese! For the Musketeers!"
Two rows of muskets five men across had shot ten musket balls into the packed mass of humanity charging at them. Two had curved into the sides and pancaked against the walls, leaving smears of lead behind. One had fallen short, as the powder had become partially fouled.
Seven reached their targets and tore completely through the front line, lodging into the one behind.
Blood poured into the street making the slick cobbles even more treacherous for men now forced to jump over their comrades. A number failed and went crashing into the ground. From seven shots, fourteen men were wounded.
One of the men at the rear lit the flares they'd kept for this point, and a blinding magnesium light shown from behind the king's men. The officer pushed past her men and charged into the fray. It was over the moment that they lit off the flare, but didn't end until the enemy stopped moaning.
A ragged cheer rang out, and Sikes sought out his officer.
"Well, Lieutenant Handel, it seems you've brought us through safely after all."
"Not without your help, Sergeant."
"A good officer knows how to use his NCOs, but a great one knows to let them lead. You have the makings of a great one."
"Sergeant Sikes, get your ass back in line and let's get back to the barracks."
Those who heard the interchange laughed, and Sikes called out to them in a parade ground bellow.
"Alright you momma's boys. Collect your kit and form up."
"The sergeant's cold and wants to get home to his fire and blankie!" one of the men called out.
"Bearings, if you make one more comment, I'll make you march back to your bunk naked."
When Bearings, a natural born exhibitionist if there ever was one, began to strip, Lt. Handel called out.
"Bearings, if you don't stop stripping, I'll bury you in the latrine."
The laugher was a little more raucous at this, and Bearings stopped stripping.
"But, sir."
"Bearings, what did I tell you about making another comment! Strip!"
The laughter was uncontrolled at this point, and even Lt. Handel joined in.
Sikes walked over to the officer and whispered, "Are you really going to bury him in the latrine?"
"Only up to his neck."
Sikes snickered and clapped the young officer on the back.
"Gather your gear, Bearings, or it comes out of your pay," called Lt. Handel.
Bearings grumbled at this a bit, put his boots back on for the march back home, and saluted as best as he was able.
While they stood there in their lines, Lt. Handel searched the bodies. She cut the crests from a couple of the men's tunics as evidence.
"Sergeant, take a couple of men and secure the horses. Take ones who can ride this time," she said with a smile.
Sikes called out a couple of names and they went to get the wagons to bring along.
"March!"
Lieutenant Mar Handel wondered for a moment if there was something wrong with her. She knew that the men around her could easily become aroused at even the tiniest bit of the proper scintilla of flesh showing. She felt no stirrings at all seeing the naked Bearings marching in front of her.
She found the naked male body to be a bit repulsive. Not that she found the female body any less so. She just never felt herself aroused by anyone. No quickening of the heart, like her sisters had talked about. No blood flow to the nethers like the guys.
Nothing she could pinpoint.
Mostly she saw it as something to get in the way of her goal of leading a regiment into war some day.
The boys began a marching song, one that would have made her blush a few short months ago, but only made her smile now. She let them have their fun. There'd be time for discipline tomorrow.
"Hey, Mar. You up?"
"I just got to sleep, Wil, can't it wait?"
Having people share her room with her required more care than she would otherwise have needed, but being an unmarried officer she was forced to live in the barracks with her men. She only had to share with two other junior lieutenants, but it was a hassle never the less. She had to make sure never to get undressed in their presence. They thought it a bit peculiar, but everyone has their peculiarities.
"It's after nine o'clock."
Mar let loose a profanity or two and leapt from her bed. She quickly donned the uniform jacket she'd hung at the foot of her bed and did up the buttons.
She'd have to skip the farce of shaving this morning, hoping no one would notice. Men seemed to miss little things like that regularly, a fact she didn't mind, but not something she could rely upon for the long term. Eventually someone would notice that she never needed to shave.
"Sikes already dismissed your men, and the Colonel said that they would have light duty today. He's like to see you however."
More profanities as her boots refused to go on her feet. Eventually, her sleep deprived mind realized she was attempting to put them on the wrong feet and fixed the problem.
Men were at drill. Some marching in perfect formations. Some loading, firing, and reloading to the cadence of the drums. Each motion part of a complex dance. A dance that quickened her heart like none she'd ever known before this life of sweat and honor.
She was the master of this dance, and it always…
She sneezed as the smallest whiff of powder smoke reached her.
"Good Morning, Lieutenant Handel!" the troop firing called out in a sing song upon hearing her sneeze.
Her expression hardened, but she didn't have the time at the moment to lay into them. A command appearance with the colonel was more important.
The colonel's adjutant, Captain Briant, a man even more foppish than Mar, looked up as she entered the antechamber.
"Ah, Mar. How pleasant to see you here!"
There were rumors floating around camp about Cpt. Briant's…predilections…and Mar suppressed a shudder. If he were turning his sights on the too pretty Lieutenant of muskets then Mar would have to watch herself. Even he wouldn't accept a sheep in wolf's clothing like her.
"I was called in by the colonel, Captain."
"Then go right in, Mar."
She glared at him, but he only laughed.
"Ah, Mar. Come in. Have a seat."
"Colonel," she said as soon as she was seated, "I haven't done anything wrong have I? My unit has completed the task given to us admirably. The wagons and horses have been added to the train. The contraband is under guard…"
"Relax, Mar. This isn't a punishment, unless you consider lace and petticoats to be a punishment."
Mar blanched a little, and allowed her confusion to peak through. Could he possibly know…
"A dance, Mar, a formal ball. What did you think I was suggesting?"
Mar began to laugh. "Sorry, sir, It was a long night. For some reason I thought you might be suggesting I parade around in one of those confections."
The colonel began to laugh, "that, Mar, is one of the funniest things I've heard all day. Imagine requiring one of my soldiers to march in that. Talk about a punishment to humble even the most crass among us."
Mar smiled politely at his comment.
"No, Mar, a dance. I was thinking to reward your action last night. Got your report by the way. Reading between the lines I can tell that you greatly underplayed your part in that. I have it from good authority that you led the charge? Well, I expected you to be a lead from your bunk type…pleasantly surprised I must say."
Mar colored and allowed a bit of her anger to peek through. The colonel had been on the edge of calling her a coward, but without a more specific statement…
The colonel glowered at her. "You know how I feel about dueling between the ranks, Lieutenant. And need I remind you that I have survived more than ten times the duels that you have."
"I'm sorry, sir."
"I should have thought a bit more carefully before making my statement. I know you are not a coward, Mar, and I saw your duel with Lieutenant Hicks. He never even knew he was dead. Letting your men charge in is not a statement of cowardice, Mar. It is just a statement. A pitched battle is not a duel, and I wish more of my men would understand that. This time it worked out for you, but I truly wish that you would use that head of yours for more than just holding up your hat next time. I meant it as a hope, not a suggestion of anything you lacked."
The shock on Mar's face was evident.
"You…want me to send my men in first?"
"Mar, your men are more easily replaced than you are. Back to more important matters. On Thursday there is a dance. My adjutant always seems to neglect his duty at these, and I thought to give you an opportunity to accompany me."
"His duty?"
"Stay sober. Dance with the ladies. And make sure I leave before I make a complete fool of myself."
"Sir…"
"Before you say that I could never be a fool, realize that I am an old campaigner and I know a feint when I see one."
Mar genuinely smiled at this.
"Just wear your best uniform and we should be fine. Who knows, you might even wheedle your way into a patronage. Heaven knows some ladies like a man who is prettier than they."
Mar marched into the hall a step to the left and a step behind the colonel.
"Colonel Leftbridge, at last!"
The man, one Lord Amherst, was wearing a parody of the colonel's regimental uniform. Not intended to mock, more intended to flatter. It was something Mar's father would have called borrowed honors. The woman standing beside him had Mar's sympathy. Mar could hear the slight creaking of her corset as she attempted to breathe.
Mar was so glad to be rid of those for what she hoped would be forever.
The ladies in the room wore confections of silk and lace, and for a moment Mar felt a longing to be back there among them. To be pretty and desired. The moment was pushed aside. She wanted more to command men. To be on the field of battle. To achieve glory by the sword, and one day, to possibly die by the sword. The prattling of the other women about flowers and woodland animals that went on at one of these social gatherings used to bore her to tears.
What sane person actually likes the sciences?
Mar brought herself back to the issue at hand as she was being introduced.
"May I present Mar Handel."
"Handel …did I know your father? Strange, I never thought he had a son …"
"My father was many things, and insane was one of them. You knew he dabbled in the sciences?"
The look of shock on Lord and Lady Amherst's faces was exactly what Mar had been looking for. She might as well have accused her father of witchcraft.
"He kept me away from the public eye, attempting to teach me to enjoy his pursuit."
"You poor dear," Lady Amherst intoned, "He didn't do anything …untoward to you, did he?"
"No, Lady Amherst. Nothing like that."
"Well, I think this is enough dwelling on the past, and as you two seem to be our last guests, let me introduce you around."
Lady Amherst took Mar by the arm and all but dragged her off to meet the ladies scattered around the dance.
Ale chuckled as he watched his wife go, "Looks like young Mar might have a patron already, eh Kei."
"Ale, I'm surprised at you! And your wife?"
"Stop right there, Kei. You know that my wife and I have … and arrangement."
Kei Leftbridge grimaced in disgust.
"I see you're still not married, Kei. You are one of my older friends, but until you get to deal with the trials of marriage, don't look down upon how I deal with them."
"How many of your children are yours, Ale."
"The first one." Ale said with a chuckle. "Hence the reason he's the only one who gets anything from me."
"Well, I need a drink after that revelation," Kei said. Ale said that his friend needed a drink after every revelation and the two old friends wandered off to find some refreshment.
Lady Amherst's innuendo was becoming more and more obvious as the night wore on. Mar was doing her best to extricate herself politely, and having no luck.
She looked around desperately for an escape route, and finally spied one. What Mar first noticed about her was her hair. Unlike most of the women around her who had hair varying from dark brown to almost black, the girl's hair was golden. It set off the pale blue of her dress almost as if it were a gem placed upon her head for that very purpose. It cascaded down her back, loose over the pale skin and silk alike.
She turned in that moment, and for the first time Mar saw her face. Her eyes, the color of amber, met Mar's for the briefest moment, and Mar disappeared into them. Then her gaze passed on, unseeing. She was looking around the room, as if searching for someone, and Mar used that as an excuse.
"Lady Amherst, I have just seen an old friend. If you'll excuse me?"
Her heart raced as she approached the unknown beauty. More than it had when she had been standing in that alleyway a couple of nights ago. Mar did not slow down as she approached, hoping that this unknown beauty would play along. Hoping the girl would … something. Mar was confused by her own emotions in that moment, and only knew that she wanted something indefinable from the other person.
She put her arm around the girl's waist and drew her into an embrace.
"If you don't mind, please don't scream out. I'm attempting to escape the attentions of our hostess and I've told her that you're a dear old friend."
"Well, it seems we'll both be useful to each other, then, as I know absolutely no one here, and I was beginning to worry I was drawing unwanted attention." There was a slight lilt to the woman's voice, an accent that Mar couldn't place.
"You would draw attention no matter who you were standing with. It is rare that a woman allows her daughters to be seen in public with loose un-dyed hair. And with that shade? Scandalous."
The girl blushed prettily, and Mar's heart skipped a beat. Mar's smile faded. She couldn't risk this. She knew that any relationship she had would have to be at a distance, but for the first time she felt drawn to another person. It was the hair. It had to be. It was just the strangeness of the hair.
For a moment, the girl seemed shocked by the revelation, but then her face smoothed and she smiled. All of Mar's fears melted in the heat of that smile.
Mar took a step back, and took the girl's hand. "Mar Handel at your service, ma'am." She brought the tips of the girl's gloved fingers to her lips in the merest suggestion of a kiss.
The girl blushed, and Mar realized that she was going to be spending a lot of time trying to get this girl to blush.
"Anhelette, Anhelette Livingston."
"Pleased to meet you, Anhelette. Would you care for a dance?"
Anhelette smiled and gave the slightest of nods. Mar offered the girl her arm, and they entered the complex form of the dance.
My working on this story does not mean that I am dropping any of my other projects. I am still working on a complete revision and edit of '12-String: Opening Act,' and I will be continuing 'What was lost...' as well sometime soon. I just simply want to get this story established first.
"Remember who you are, girl. The dashing young gentleman may be handsome, but you're not here for that."
"Wise words, corporal. And I never knew that he was your type."
Anhelette's breath caught in her throat stifling the scream that wanted to be born. She threw her glove at the figure lounging on her bed.
"It isn't done for a man to be alone in a lady's room, lounging on her bed, in the middle of the night."
"Good thing you aren't a lady, corporal."
Anhelette threw her other glove at him.
"Temper," he cautioned, "so, what news do you have?"
"None, sir. None whatsoever. These people are as tight lipped as any you'd ever care to know. Apparently Collins should have figured out that the hair color thing is dye. And it is just not done for a woman to be seen in public with her hair down." Anhelette blushed, "Or at least I should say in civilized society."
"You mean…"
Anhelette just nodded and blushed even hotter.
"Well, that would have been a good thing to know, but this wasn't Collins' fault. Two days, corporal. Two. And half that time he spent in jail for public indecency. That left you as the only choice. He was only able to figure out that all of their scientific writings are in Latin."
"It still amazes me that they were able to hold onto that knowledge when so many other things were lost."
"Well, since you are the only one on my ship who speaks Latin, and that fluently, you get the job."
"But this? I'm suffocating!" Anhelette was gesturing at the clothing she was wearing. When they'd first recruited her it had all been about scientific discovery and safeguarding the future of humanity. Not parading about like a trussed up ham on its way to the banquet.
"Get used to it. You look good in a corset, corporal."
Anhelette fell to the ground trying to get her boot off so she could throw that. There was a knock at the door and a maid came in.
"Is everything alright, Miss Livingston? I thought I heard a man's voice in here."
"No, as you can see I'm alone…although I am having trouble with my boots. I think my feet swelled with all of this nights dancing. I am not used to this."
"I can imagine not," the maid said with a glance toward Anhelette's hair.
"It was normal for a woman to wear her hair down where I came from, Monique."
"You should have listened to me earlier, Miss. Now it is simply too late."
"What do you mean?" Anhelette paled as the blood rushed from her face.
"Because you started a complete riot, Miss. Lady Amherst said that she will have to wear her hair down for the next dance."
"She didn't."
"She did. It seems that it is public knowledge that she has set her sights on the young lieutenant, and she feels that if she were to…conform…to his preferred look that she might have a chance."
Anhelette just stared at her maid. Well, it was the house maid that had been assigned to help her when she rented the room, but Anhelette felt a bit of pride for the diminutive thirteen year old.
"It's true, Miss. I overheard Lady Amherst's maid tell Marquise Chanteux's maid all about it just before I left. It seems that they, the grand ladies mentioned, feel he spent too much time with you this evening."
Anhelette blushed crimson, and smiled. Why did she feel this way? She couldn't be close to these people. She would have to betray them in the end, wouldn't she? That was the mission after all. Mar wasn't even her type.
"The Lady thought that she had a chance as Mar has never in the past paid the slightest attention to any of the eligible girls thrust upon him."
"Why all the interest in one junior officer?"
"The Handel family is one of the oldest, and wealthiest, families in all of Flees, Miss. It is not the man, but the gold that they all seek."
"He didn't seem wealthy."
"That is because he decided to strike out on his own. Some think that it was a term of the will."
Anhelette smiled at the thought.
"I thought that is why you spent so much time with him tonight, Miss."
"Caleene, I spent so much time with him because he is flattering, and an excellent dancer."
"He doesn't look bad either."
"Just get me out of this dress, Cal."
Caleene blanched, and Anhelette turned around to face her directly instead of looking at her in the mirror as she had been.
"What's wrong? What did I say?"
"It's just not done, Miss. My name is Caleene. I am a woman and proud of it, Miss."
"I didn't…"
"I know you're foreign, Miss, but that is…it is…"
"I am so sorry, Caleene. I truly am. What can I do to make it up to you? I think of you as friend more than servant. I do not want to lose you."
"You…thank you, Miss."
"Call me Anhelette, please. I do still need help getting into and out of these…torture devices called clothing, but other than that…"
"Other than that, Anhelette? That is the bulk of the duties I perform for you. I have to say that you strip the bed even before I can get to it. You really act as though you've been cleaning up after yourself your entire life."
"Don't tell anyone, but I have."
Caleene's jaw dropped. Confusion warred with a pleased smile for a few moments before the smile won out. "You are a strange woman, Anhelette."
Anhelette thought to herself that the maid didn't even know the half of it. Caleene helped her to remove the over dress, hoop skirt, and corset before finally ensconcing Anhelette in her bed. Anhelette breathed a sigh of relief when she finally found herself alone, and free to breathe, in her bed. She was asleep before the door closed.
Anhelette grimaced as she downed the concoction called, but totally unlike, coffee. If anything it tasted a bit like burnt unsweetened chocolate with a hint of sage as an afterthought. It was hot, however, and the caffeine content fairly buzzed in her veins after the first sip.
If she knew what the local word for a sugar variant was, she'd ask for it.
"Caleene? Do people put milk in their…coffee?"
"Why no, Miss…"
"Anhelette, please. If you need to call me Miss Anhelette when other's are here, by all means. But when it is just the two of us…"
"No, Anhelette. It is felt that diluting it in any way…"
"Well, let me have it diluted. I dare say this is strong enough to clean off the cobbles outside."
Caleene snickered at this, but when to fetch some milk. Anhelette allowed the saucer to rest there on her table as she looked out the window at the rising sun. The mountain's surrounding the city state meant that even though it was only just peaking over the horizon the hands on the clock were well past the eleventh hour.
She heard a sound from behind her. "Just place it here on the table, Caleene and I'll add it myself."
"I'll do no such thing, child."
Anhelette rose and spun to see her intruder. It was one of the older ladies from the previous evening. Anhelette wasn't sure whether to bow, or curtsey, or…whatever. Feeling that something was better than nothing, and knowing by the tone of voice that she was used to command, Anhelette dropped into the lowest curtsey that she could.
"A curtsey, how quaint. I'd heard that you were not versed in our customs, and now I see that this is the case. A proper woman tilts her head to her betters, child. I assume that lack of knowledge is also the reason you neglected to visit me upon your first arrival here?"
"I…yes…I mean."
"Well, spit it out, child. I'm only the city's matron, after all."
"Matron, I'm sorry. You are right. I simply didn't know the city's custom."
"How far away are you from?"
"Roma, Matron."
"Roma? I've never heard of that city."
Anhelette smiled at this, albeit a small one. Roma was the name of a planet.
"It is a long way from here, Matron. I've been wandering so long that even I no longer know where exactly it is. My home was on the shore of the most beautiful azure sea."
"You poor dear. How did you come to be here in my city?"
Anhelette had no way to tell her the truth, and the story that they had concocted suddenly didn't ring true enough for her. She began to cry.
"There there, child. Peace. By your bearing, I take it you were noble?"
"Yes, Matron. I was the first born child of the legate."
Two things occurred to Anhelette as she spoke this last sentence. The first was that the word she'd said was not 'legate' but 'legatus'. The second was that she'd used the masculine ending for the word child.
"Child, you should not speak that tongue where men could hear."
Anhelette blushed bright red and found herself unable to reply.
"So, you were a scientist, were you my dear?"
"Yes, Matron. I didn't mean to cause offense."
"Hush, child. It has been years since I have heard more than the patois that my fellow sisters choose to assault my ears with. I must say, however, that your pronunciation is not something I am used to. You must be from far away indeed."
"Yes, Matron."
"So…natural, physical, or chemical."
It took Anhelette a moment or two to piece together what had been said to her. She should have stated chemical, but something made her change her mind at the last minute. Something about that white light from earlier in the week.
"Physical sciences, Matron."
"Physics. Well, if you'd like, I could introduce you to some girls your age who are interested in the same discipline."
Anhelette's smile glowed. Her mission was finally moving forward as it was supposed to.
"So, Lieutenant, we hear you dipped into the treasure that this town has to offer."
"Attention!" Mar said, but she was smiling all the same. "Sergeant Sikes. It seems that the men have an excess of energy today!"
"Aye, sir. A sad state of affairs if I ever saw one."
"What shall we do about it?"
"Well, you did promise to bury Bearings in the latrine…"
"Sarge!"
"An excellent idea, Sikes. And since you volunteered…oversee the men mucking out the latrine."
There were general groans, since that was one of the worst duties that they had to perform. The women always promised that they had some new invention just around the corner that would remove the necessity. However, they always seemed to put it at a lower priority because the men were the ones who did the…dirty work.
That, and the fact that they found the entire concept distasteful.
A boy ran up to the formation of men, stopping just short of Mar.
"Lieutenant Mar Handel?" he asked, out of breath.
"Relax, boy. You've reached your destination."
"My mistress requests a response."
"Sergeant, see the men through their drills. Light labor today as we are on night watch again."
There were cheers from the men when they heard their real task for the day, quickly silenced by a glare from Sikes. "All right, you layabouts. You're slower than dog snot in winter. I've seen raw recruits reload faster than you lot. We should have been able to put two shots into those ruffians the other night, but you lot just fired and went to swords. We're going to drill until your dead, or I'm satisfied, and mama Sikes boy is never satisfied!"
There were some groans at this, and Bearings mimed the last line back at Sikes, but they went off to their drills in high spirits. The best of them knew that these drills might save their lives some day, and the worst of them knew not to complain too loudly.
Mar took the letter back to his room. She tore it open eagerly only to find it wasn't from the object of her interest, but Lady Amherst.
Mar was tempted to crumple the missive into a ball and throw it into the corner, but the messenger was still waiting for a reply, so reply he must.
The Esteemed Mar Handel,
You seem to have caused quite a stir with your actions at my party last night. The ladies of society can't seem to stop talking about you, and many seek to become better acquainted with such a dashing figure as yourself. News of your actions only two days ago in safeguarding this city have reached even these lovely ears.
While it would be over stepping my bounds to invite you openly, I am in dire need of an escort to Mme. LaFleur's event this Saturday. It is sure to be the social gathering of the season, and escorting me would ensure your ability to attend.
I stand ever at your disposal,
Lady Lorentia Amherst
Immediately, Mar's mind went back to the events of the night before. She replayed all of the moments that she was captured by the force of Anhelette's presence. Never had she ever felt so drawn to anyone, and to have it be another woman…
Mar recoiled at the very thought. It was not right, no matter how she presented herself. Someday she would have to give up this life, she knew it. When that time came she would just have to resign herself to a loveless marriage and the bearing of children, should she still be able.
She could not…do that.
But even as she tried to push thoughts of the bewitching creature from her mind, she again saw that first moment when their eyes met. The twinkle of amusement that sparkled in the amber depths.
Almost of its own accord, she found her hands taking out paper and quill and beginning to pen her response to Lady Amherst. If there was even a chance of seeing Anhelette at this party, then she wanted to be there. She might never be able to do more than watch her, but Mar wanted to do just that.
To watch her, study her, commit every movement to memory so that Anhelette would be with her no matter where life took the young soldier.
"Take this to your mistress, boy. And take this for your trouble." Mar pressed a few coins into the child's hands and watched with amusement as the boy took off running again. As soon as he thought he was out of earshot, the boy let out a whoop of joy.
Mar shook her head, smiling, and dug into the paperwork that seemed her lot in life any more.
Anhelette followed the Matron into the sitting room. This time her hair was properly done up and netted as it should have been previously. She wore a dove colored outer dress this time, hoping that the more muted color would help her better to fit in. The girls in the room grew quiet upon seeing the Matron.
"Girls, may I present Anhelette Livingston."
"What sort of a name is Anhelette?" one of the girls whispered.
"Mine," Anhelette replied, "and I have excellent hearing as well."
The Matron smiled at this, but said nothing about it, "Anhelette states she is of the physical discipline. Please make her feel welcome."
Anhelette sat down in the gaggle of young women, feeling completely out of her depth. As soon as the door was locked, they began to speak exclusively in Latin, and Anhelette sat there smiling.
"I think we have left our compatriot behind," said one of them after a couple of minutes.
"She seemed a bit daft yesterday at the dance. Imagine arriving with your hair down. I'd as soon arrive without a stitch of clothing."
Anhelette began to laugh, "I grew up speaking Latin in my home. It wasn't a secret language there, but the only language. That you country bumpkins think yourselves my superior because you have a passing understanding of my native tongue…" She made sure to use the proper gender of her terms this time, so when they began to stare she blushed. She didn't know what she'd done to offend, but she knew it was something…
"People speak Latin somewhere? We all thought it a long dead language."
"If there is a language that someone else doesn't understand there will always be people who use it for just that reason."
"We all know your name, Anhelette. Let me introduce us to you." Starting at the left end of the circle, the young woman went through and introduced each of the girls she was sitting with: Natallia, Brianne, Lucette, and Orellia.
"It's a pleasure to meet you all."
"The pleasure is ours."
Anhelette still felt like an outsider in this group, but their topic was something that she could understand completely. The primary concern related to making the wall around the town proof against cannon. Anhelette smiled as she began to explain to them what a glacis was.
They marched into the dark of the sleeping city. The torches had long since burnt out, and Mar smiled to herself. She only truly felt alive when she was on patrol like this. The last time they'd had a clear goal: Stop people breaking the king's laws.
Now, however, there was no clear goal. Like usual on night watch they were simply there to keep the peace.
Something about the air didn't feel right to Mar. The night wasn't quite as still as it should be, and she heard the occasional furtive scuttling sound coming from somewhere up ahead.
"Sikes," she whispered.
"Yes, sir?"
"Who is the quietest?"
"I'd say you and I, but in a pinch Bearings isn't too bad."
"Pass on to the men that they're to stay here until we call them forward. You Bearings and I will then move forward. There's something not right about the air tonight."
"Someone's out and about, besides us, that's for sure."
Mar could hear the sounds of creaking leather from the other members of the platoon long after they'd left them behind. The sounds of scraping became louder the further they went, and the slight glow of a lantern became visible.
The three of them stepped into the alley way, drawing their swords as they did so. Mar stopped in shock at the sight that met her. It wasn't the sight of the men wearing uniform of the elite guard of Genin that surprised her. It was the bag of gold that Lord Amherst was counting.
That was as far as she got. The group of soldiers around Lord Amherst charged, drawing swords as they came. In a running battle, having your swords already drawn gives you a momentary advantage. Sometimes a moment is all that you need.
"Musketeers! To Me!" Mar yelled, a bit of her normal soprano creeping in, but she no longer cared. She was fighting and that's all that mattered.
The first opponent to reach her tried to parry her blow with his mailed arm, as his sword was tangled in its sheath. She ducked out of the way of his counter blow and used his own momentum to impale him on her sword. His twisting body yanked her sword from her grasp, but also freed his sword. She drew it and went onto the next foe.
A man was advancing on Sikes flank so she slashed her new sword across his hamstrings allowing Sikes the advantage.
She turned in time to barely avoid a slash to her ribs. Her leather over shirt was cut, but the mail middle shirt took most of the lethality out of the blow, but she would be feeling it tomorrow. She grinned at her opponent. There were different styles of combat used for each type of foe you would be fighting. Whether they were wearing mail or plate or nothing at all, there was a style that helped you to get through their defenses.
Her opponents lapse was her gain. A quick, but powerful, thrust and she watched the back of his tabard tent away from his body. She quickly removed her sword and then she was surrounded by the green of her company and the remaining enemy soldiers were throwing down their arms.
"Looks like you're going to need a new tabard, sir."
Mar ignored Sikes and walked over to Lord Amherst.
"I demand you release me!"
"Lord Amherst, you were accepting money…"
"All you have is your word. How will the king know that it wasn't you and your men who were accepting the bribe for getting these soldiers into the city."
"Lord Amherst. You may very well say that later, and impugn my honor. I dare say you might even get the king to listen to it. However, know this, if I ever hear about it then I will meet you on Harral's Field and I will get satisfaction."
Lord Amherst paled visibly, even in the poor light of the lantern, at the almost casual mention of one of the cities more notorious dueling pitches. It had not been a casual reference by her colonel that she was a duelist.
When she first entered service in the company there had been others, soldier and officer alike, who thought her weak and unfit for service. One had even called her a woman. She defended her position well and left every duel she'd ever been in without a scratch on her. She always chose death and not blood. For a while people had even started to call her Angel of Death.
Some of this must have come back to the Lord as he stood there. He began to tremble a bit, and even turned and vomited. Her men laughed at him.
Corporal Laramie pulled rope out of thin air, like usual, and tied their prisoners together for the walk to King's Prison on the other side of the city.
Mar grimaced when she realized that she was making a slight clinking sound when she walked. The chain middle shirt was freed a bit and rattling as she walked. Depending on the extent of the damage to the leather over the top she'd likely just have to apply a bit of resin to bind the leather over and under together and then sew up the cut. The armor was heavy, but worth the protection it afforded, especially when it tricked an opponent into a misstep like tonight.
For a moment or two after she woke up, Anhelette was disoriented. The dream been so real. She still felt the joy of Mar's arms wrapping around her, and being accepted for everything that she was. She shook her head angrily and got up to prepare for Caleene. Her maid may have helped her with all of the over garments and corsets and such, but Anhelette took care of getting properly situated in all of her under garments.
"What I wouldn't give for a nice pair of briefs at this point. Even a bra would be a welcome change…"
"What's a bra, Anhelette?"
"A wonderful invention I was introduced to since leaving my homeland. Beats a corset for support any day of the week."
"Support?"
Anhelette gestured toward her breasts and Caleene blushed.
"Well, let's get me ready for the day, Caleene, and if you could possibly consider letting me breathe a bit I'd much appreciate it."
Caleene just laughed as she began pulling the corset tight.
"Ale, we were friends. How could you do this to me…to our city?"
"When are you and the other families going to look up from your knees and see that we're already lost. Genin is not just a city but a nation. Three…In the past year they've captured three other cities."
"Through treachery and the greed of its nobles no doubt," Mar said from the other side of the room. "They would have no reason to try to bribe you if they didn't feel that there was something in it for them."
"They told me it was to ease the transition. I would be the governor, as they put it, of this city."
"You would govern your people for this foreign power? You would sell us out of a handful of gold and a promise of power?" Colonel Henries could barely contain his rage. "We are a city of over ten thousand, Ale. We field an army to rival any two other cities. Our foundry is the best of any city in the world. And you would sell us out to a third rate city with a couple of towns to its name? You are worse than a traitor, Ale, you are a fool."
"They took the first city by force, Kei. You know the rumors going about. They were firing up to ten shots per minute per cannon."
Mar snorted. There was no way that the rumors could be accurate. A well trained team to get shots off every twenty-five seconds or so. Even then, there was the very real danger of the gun just bursting on them. A smart commander shot once every couple of minutes.
But ten shots per minute? Six seconds per shot?
Impossible.
"You think I lie, Lieutenant? I saw them firing myself. They told me that it was a relaxed rate of fire, but I counted five shots from a single cannon before my watch showed a single minute had gone by."
"Get the matron in here, Mar. I think we need to talk to the women about this."
Mar ran out through the door and up six flights of stairs to where the Matron sat in her office. Mar wondered where all of his reverence for the office had gone. As a young girl, Mar had been afraid to breathe every time that the matron came to their home. She had been such an august personage.
Now, Mar realized that her only power existed in the minds of the women who put themselves under her power. She wasn't even really part of the government. More just a high level bureaucrat.
"Matron," Mar said, a bit out of breath, "We have need of some women to verify the prisoner's story."
Requests like this were uncommon, but not unheard of. The matron smiled at Mar.
"You know I realize now where I've seen you before. I saw you practicing the sword in your father's salle d'armes one day. Of course your attire was much more…traditional, shall we say?"
Mar stood there gaping.
"Close your mouth, dear. I was never one to stand by tradition for much of anything. I doubt any of the other ladies really remembers you, as you were always climbing a tree, or practicing your swordsmanship. You never enjoyed our company much, did you?"
Mar just shook her head with a little grimace of disgust.
"Well…Mar was it? One word of caution. Be careful about showing your affections for the Livingston girl. While you may be able to survive…the scandal of it, I doubt she would be. She already has a mark against her as a foreigner after all. Then there's the matter of her hair," the matron said with a little sniff.
"The prisoner, Matron?"
"You know what gave you away, Mar? None of the other men add that tone of deference when saying my title."
Mar laughed and the Matron joined her.
"I'll do what I can to belittle your office…matron."
"See that you do, Mar."
The matron entered the parlor alone, as Mar had left her to go back to the dungeon under the Palace of Justice. That they would house most of the bureaucracy of the city in the same place had always been a little incongruous to the Matron, but she was not one to turn down the beautiful offices that they had assigned to her. "Anhelette and Natallia. Your presence is requested at Justice."
"But Matron, they have never requested the presence of two before…"
"Natallia, I chose two. Anhelette does not have time to be properly instructed in her duties to the city, so I've decided that observation would serve best. You are the one I have chosen, and she is there to see how you go about your duties."
"Yes, Matron."
"Both of you should probably change, since the prisoner is being kept in the dungeon. Brown woolens would be best."
Anhelette began to worry a bit. All of the clothing sent with her was…elegant. Designed to be seen and not worked. No one on the ship had ever dreamed that they would have her crawling around in a dungeon.
"You have a question, Anhelette?"
"I don't have…"
"That's alright, Matron, I have a dress that will suit her." Natallia said with a bit of a glimmer in her eye. Anhelette was relieved, but unsure as to the cost that this little offering would exact.
"Come, Anhelette, we've no time to waste."
There had been moments when Anhelette was sure she was going to show off more than she felt comfortable with, but in the end, and covered in what Anhelette was sure was out of fashion clothing, Anhelette stood looking at herself. Natallia's flash of anger was gratifying as well, if not for the reasons that another girl might have had.
Anhelette knew that her face was too angular to ever be truly beautiful, especially by this societies standards, but she had to admit that her body looked sexy even in what amounted to sackcloth.
"Tie up your hair with this, Anhelette. It will tend to prevent getting anything in it that you wouldn't like. You know how borers like untreated hair."
Anhelette blinked a couple of times, and then everything fell into place. These people didn't dye their hair for fashion. They did it for their health. Anhelette blushed as she wondered whether the girl standing next to her dyed all of her hair.
"I didn't know."
Natallia looked at her confused for a few moments, and then her jaw fell open. "You mean…we just thought you either self absorbed or insanely brave. They don't have borers where you're from?"
More than you know, Anhelette thought to herself. She just shook her head.
"Well, then, we might just have to get your hair treated before we head back there the next time. It stinks to high heaven but it protects you."
"All of my hair?"
Natallia looked shocked and blushed bright red when the import of her words finally got through. "Of course not…all of our undergarments are properly treated. As are these dresses we're wearing. I keep trying to convince the Chemists to come up with a treatment that doesn't dye everything brown, but what can you expect. They are more interested in new perfumes than in something no one will ever see…"
Natallia blushed at this.
"Except for your husband?"
"Or your Lieutenant."
It was Anhelette's turn to blush.
Natallia laughed. "I'm sorry for my previous behavior, Anhelette. It's not every day that a woman with the body of an angel comes and declares that she actually is an angel to everyone."
Anhelette opened her mouth to speak, but Natallia stopped her. "Don't worry about it, Anhelette. I know that's not your real name, and if you don't want…"
"Minerva," Anhelette said, almost without thinking. It had been her mother's name, and no matter what Natallia thought she wanted, Anhelette was sure that her real name would have caused problems. It's not every day that your name just happens to be the same as a peoples prime devil.
Hence the reason that the captain had thought it would be funny to give her the name of Anhelette.
"That…is so foreign sounding. I'll stick with Anhelette if you don't mind," Natallia looked at Anhelette expectantly. Anhelette shook her head so Natallia continued, "I can almost believe that you are from as far away as you claim. This will be something for the Naturists to consider. They believe that borers were endemic to the human condition on this world."
Natallia colored and shut her mouth. Anhelette didn't even notice the other woman's discomfort as the words passed by her without note. Anhelette already knew that mankind had not originated here after all.
Natallia helped Anhelette to pile her hair into the cloth cap, and made sure all of her hair was completely covered. After pronouncing her 'more beautiful than is fair,' the two women made their way out into the world.
"Oh good. They're here."
Mar looked up in reflex to the women entering the room, and her breath caught. Anhelette stood there, covered from head to toe in brown, and still she looked amazing. Upon seeing Mar, Anhelette smiled. Mar let a foolish grin slip out before she could return to a suitably reserved expression.
Anhelette walked over to stand next to Mar as she waited to see what would happen.
"Lord Amherst!" Natallia called out as she turned to see who the prisoner was.
"Ale has been stripped of his title and lands, and his wife will be joining him here in short order. You are here to verify his claims of the enemies capabilities," the colonel said.
"His claims?"
Mar spoke up, "he states that Genin has a cannon that is capable of a sustained rate of fire greater than two shots per minute."
"I said ten," the man in chains wailed. If any part of his story proved false, he knew what the punishment was.
"And then claimed to have only seen five," Mar replied.
Natallia was shocked, "Sir, there is no way that a cannon can keep up that rate of fire."
"Thank you, Natallia…"
"Wait!"
All eyes turned on Anhelette. She tried to shrink into the wall, but it was too late to take back her outburst.
"You have something to add, Anhelette," the Matron asked.
Anhelette tried to think fast. She knew that the sort of information she would be giving to these people would change everything. They were already progressing far faster than they should be, or was even healthy. This city had been picked as it seemed to be the furthest advanced of any of its neighbors. They were the only one with matchlocks after all.
But this…she wracked her brain, trying to remember what type of gun, of this period…
Then she smiled. She didn't need specifics. They didn't want her to build one for them. She just needed to bring up the possibility.
"Matron, if they were loading the cannon from the breech as opposed to the muzzle, then it is possible they would be able to load faster. As far as sustained fire, bronze or steel would be the best way to do that."
"Bronze?" The matron asked, but the colonel laughed.
"Of course. It's less brittle, more malleable. I'd think that it would be unsuited to cannon, though, for that reason," the colonel said as he jumped into the conversation.
"It needs to be retooled occasionally to keep the bore correct, sir, but Bronze will work as a material to make cannon."
The prisoner, however, was looking at her as if she were an apparition of some sort.
"How did you know?" he whispered.
"Know what?" Anhelette asked.
"It was a rear loading cannon. I would have taken that to my grave as my revenge, but you…you couldn't have known that."
"So you were lying to us, lord Amherst."
The prisoner's look of anger was replaced by one of horror. "Have the jailers come and take this filth away," the colonel said to Mar who immediately left.
"Miss Livingston, I believe that it is time that you and I had a long chat. Matron, if you would be so kind?"
Color drained from Anhelette's face as the Matron and colonel gestured for her to precede them through the door.
One thing I have decided is not to have a clear good/evil dynamic. People are people, by and large be they from America, France, or even Genin. Genin may be expansionistic, but that does not make them inherently evil. So, it's time to see their point of view.
Helmet, check. Armor, check. I'm ready, you all. Let the onslaught of angry readers commence ;)
The straining soldiers in the purple of Genin struggled to get the wheel of the caisson out of the mud. The cannon was disconnected from everything else, having already been dragged through the mud hole.
"Marshal Freid," a boy said as he ran up to the man observing the muddy soldiers.
"What is it, Eron?"
"Grand Marshal Eamon sends his regard and requests the pleasure of your company."
"Would you relay to the Grand Marshal that I am overseeing the process of pulling the guns out of the muck that he so graciously guided us into and can't currently please him with my company."
"The Grand Marshal thought that would be your response, so he gave me another that he expected delivered by rote. 'Tell that good for nothing sack of river rocks that he is my subordinate, and not I his. If he doesn’t step to it and report on my time table I'll put demote him to able man, patron in the senate be damned.'"
Fried chuckled at the statement, knowing full well that the Grand Marshall loved his bluster. He also realized that if he were threatening demotion then it were something serious.
Before being inducted into Special Weapons he would never have thought something like it, but he marveled that horses faired so well on this planet when so many other species of animal brought with them didn't. He pulled himself into the saddle, and set off at a trot to the Grand Marshall's tent.
"You wanted to see me, Eamon?"
"You will show me the respect I deserve, Marshal Freid!"
"I show you the respect you deserve. The only reason you outrank me here is because the senate, may god preserve it, chose to create a new rank for you. If they'd really wanted you to be in charge, you would be a Field Marshall, or even a Marshall General. No, you are a Grand Marshall. Have you ever considered that it's because of your size?"
Eamon's round face turned a brilliant shade of red as he shook with anger.
"I am in charge of this…"
"Eamon, you are in charge of nothing. You will stay out of my way. You will stop calling me to your tent like a puppy every time that you need someone to change your diapers, and finally you will stop threatening things you can't get away with. Seriously. Threatening to demote me and take away my commission in the same breath? No one can take my commission from me. Not even the senate. So, while you could try to demote me all the way to page, you can't make me an able man."
Eamon laughed at the unintended joke, and after a moment Freid joined in.
"It's just that I am so bored, Freid. I expected being on campaign to be exciting, as it is…"
"It is mostly mud and marching, Grand Marshall. You could always head back to Genin City…"
"No, Freid, I can't. While I would like to, I am banished. Don't try to deny it. They don't want me in the city, so they foisted a commission on me, thereby taking away my name, title, and lands."
Freid smiled sadly at the man. A commission cost a lot. It was a year's wages in the fields to even buy the rank of Page. Each higher rank was, as was expected, even more. To become a Marshall, Freid had to pay his entire portion of the tribute from taking Aliaster. That had left him very little to live on over the past few months, and then they'd saddled him with this…person.
Eamon had lost even more than Freid, however.
"So, Eamon, what exactly is it that you wanted to see me about."
"The men in those wagons have come up with something new." Eamon's disgust at having men behave so unseemly as the people riding in the oversized wagons did was obvious. Even Freid could barely contain his disgust most times. Unfortunately, with the army being as far from home as it was, he couldn't complain about updates to his weapons. Since women weren't permitted to go to war, that left having men decipher the texts and work on the innovations that he would so desperately need.
No, need was to strong. That he wanted. He wanted all of his men to come home alive. He wanted to take Flees bloodlessly.
"Well, what have they got for us? Have they finally figured out how to make that…interrupted screw that they've been promising me?"
"No, no. Not that. They have, however, come up with this." Eamon gestured to one of his men, who went out. The man came back with a cloth cylinder. It didn't seem solid, in fact, it sifted a bit under its own weight.
Freid took the bag in his hands, and smelt it. "Black powder? Why would…"
The significance of the bag in his hands came to him. It would fit perfectly into one of the charge mugs for his guns.
"They tell me that it’s the powder that would fit into one and a half ladles. Exactly what we have found to be the best charge base. It will still be subject to damp and rain…"
Freid was already seeing the changes that this would make to his teams. No more ladles and half measures. It would be a perfect load every time. And quick. Drop a bag, drop a ball. Now, the loading of the mugs would be almost as fast as the loading of the cannon. They would be able to leave the quenching of the embers to just before they needed to load the mug.
"While there are many wonders in that book I would prefer to this, this brightens my day," Freid said with a smile.
Eamon laughed as Freid returned to his men.
Yes, this would be wonderful. And maybe, just maybe, they would be able to beat ten shots per minute.
Anhelette, on the other hand, was a conundrum. The girl had been there to observe, to see protocol. See that we served the city as loyally as any of the men. Then she'd broken the edict. Not only that but Anhelette had known what she was talking about. The colonel was one of the few men, the few people that knew of the extent of the edict. Knew the reason for it.
And here was this slip of a girl who couldn't be older than fourteen or fifteen…
Sometimes she actually wished that they used standard solarian years. It added a granularity to the calculations of age missing for anyone using this planet's own orbit time.
The matron shook her head, as once again she realized she was heading into proscribed waters, but she couldn't help it. She was first, and foremost, a scientist. She quantified, catalogued, parsed and probed. She wanted to push forward the realm of human understanding, but the research was beyond the bounds of the edict. The tools to even attempt the research were beyond the bounds of the edict.
To pass the time as they went, the matron calculated the girls age in solarian years. Twenty years old, most likely.
She smiled ruefully with the thoughts of how old twenty seemed to her. A year as short as old earth used to have was like…stopping the year at September.
She snorted at the thought.
"Something humorous, Matron?"
"A lot is, Colonel. And I've told you in the past to call me Alecia."
"That would be lese majeste, Matron. I might as well ask you to call me Kei."
"Ok, Kei. If that's what it takes." The matron blushed like a girl at how forward she'd just been, and hoped that it would work out as she hoped.
"Women. There's a reason I have never married. I don't understand you at all. Give me a field of battle any day. Not only is it understandable, but it's also less dangerous."
The matron's musical laughter rang through the halls, and Anhelette's shoulders hunched. The girl must think herself truly in trouble for laughter to cause her anxiety.
"Kei, I find that the title Matron makes me feel old and grim. Nothing like the beauty I was acclaimed with in my youth."
"Alecia, you will always be a beauty."
Again, the matron blushed. She was saved from any further embarrassing revelations by the fact that they'd arrived at their destination.
"Child, please enter the room on your left," the matron said, raising her voice so that Anhelette would be able to hear her.
The room was better appointed than the cell they'd left, but the heavy lock on the outside of the door suggested that this was not a room you wanted to have to stay in very long. As soon as the three of them entered the room, Anhelette turned and asked, "did I do something wrong? It was my impression that I was there to make a scientific observation."
"Child, where have you heard of breech loading a cannon?"
Anhelette's expression betrayed the shock at not only what the question was, but what it implied.
Mar watched as Anhelette left the room with more than a twinge of regret. The woman was more than beautiful to the young lieutenant, and she likely didn't even know that the lieutenant even existed.
"They're going to kill us all, you know. All of us."
Mar looked over at the former lord and sneered. "You are the most graven coward I have ever met. It is not a question of whether or not they'll win, but of how we carry ourselves until then."
"You're a fool, Mar, a fool!"
"And you are a cuckold or a pimp, I haven't decided yet which. You aren't man enough to keep your wife in line, or you whore out your wife to gain influence and favor. Which is it lord Amherst."
His face turned a shade of purple that Mar had never thought she would see on a human being. His mouth opened and closed, but no sound escaped. Mar'd had enough 'lord baiting' for the moment, and simply left and locked the door behind her.
"Sergeant, I'd like you to make sure no one enters this room. No one. If he kills himself, he kills himself. Only the colonel or myself can change this, is that clear?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good."
Mar left the unknown sergeant behind her as she went in search of more familiar faces. She'd never been a big drinker in the past, but for the first time she had a feeling that it would be welcome to deaden her senses.
The matron's revelation that she already knew Mar's secret was more than enough to make her doubt everything. Wondering who else was 'in the know' threatened to bury her in despair. Was she only fooling herself that her men accepted her?
"Sikes," she called out as soon as she left the Palace of Justice. He was sitting there with a couple of the men, patiently waiting for her to appear.
"Yes, sir?"
"I want to get drunk."
Sikes and the other men laughed, thinking it was a joke, but when Mar failed to join in, he sobered his expression.
"Sir, I can help you do that, but is it really something you want to do?" There was concern in his voice that made Mar even more certain that this was something she wanted to do. He thought she was weak. He thought that she was a woman. She was sure of it. She'd have to prove to all of them that this wasn't the case.
Seeing her determined look, and knowing it from times when she'd laid into deserving wretches, he pulled her aside to talk to her out of earshot of the men.
"Sir, I don't know what crawled up your ass and died, but I sure as hell don't want to let you go out and get smashed for the hell of it. You don't drink. The men all know this and respect you for it. You've more balls than any of them to stick to your guns. Don't go throwing that away now."
"Sir…balls…" Mar laughed bitterly. "Don't you really mean, 'ma'am?'"
"Don't listen to what that lick-spittle has to say, Sir. We know you're a man. Sure, you're a bit slight, but then so if Collins."
It occurred to Mar that Sikes really had no idea what she was talking about. He thought that she was upset by something that Ale Amherst had said to her. She began laughing, and realized that she wouldn't be able to stop. There was a hysterical air to it. The other men were looking at her a bit worriedly, so Sikes waved them off and dragged her back into the building. It wouldn't do to have witnesses to what he was going to do next.
As soon as they found an empty room, he dragged her in and locked the door behind them. Then he slapped her as hard as he could.
"Sir, this is unbecoming. I don't care what stresses…"
Mar no longer cared about any of it. It was all too much, and she was tired of hiding herself. As he was beginning to berate her, Mar just stripped out of her tunic and shirt. Then she removed the bandages that kept everything out of sight.
Sikes couldn't help himself and just stared. A couple of times he began to reach up, as if to assure himself that they were real, and stopped before getting anywhere close.
"Sir, I suggest you put your shirt on before anyone else comes in." Sikes said quietly.
Mar was about to just put on the shirt, without the bandaging, but Sikes stopped her, "Sir, you need to make sure that wound is properly bound. It wouldn't do for everything to break loose, now would it?"
With a bemused smile on her face, Mar quickly redid the bandages and put her uniform back together.
"I assume that you are…the same below?" He asked.
"Yes, Sikes," Mar said in her normal soprano voice, "I am the same below."
"Damn, sir, I never would have realized. I mean, sure you were small, but you kick the ass out of the rest of us in determination. I've seen you fight."
Mar was shocked. This wasn't the response that she expected. Then she got a shrewd look on her face, "what do you want, Sikes? You're not looking for…"
Sikes looked horrified. "No, sir! I'd sooner lie with the colonel, no offense, sir. Besides, I know you'd have my guts for garters if I ever suggested it." Sikes looked at her again, cocking his head to the side as if trying to see something that wasn't there, and shuddered.
"No offense, sir, but I can't really see it. I know, I saw it, but I can't see it, if you know what I mean."
Mar looked a bit confused, and Sikes continued.
"Look, I know you tend to keep to yourself in the barracks, but you are a man as far as anyone has been able to tell. You act like the rest of us, sir. You even laugh at our jokes. The last lady I made the mistake of telling one of your jokes to a girl, well, it didn't go off as well as I'd hoped. You know the one about the vicar's daughter and the highway rogue?"
Mar laughed at the reference.
"Not what I expected, but enjoyable all the same," Mar said, referencing the joke's punch line, and Sikes again began to laugh.
"See, there's no way a respectable woman would ever tell that joke."
Mar gestured at her outfit, and Sikes smirked, "point taken, but you knew what I meant."
"I did, and I thank you for the sentiment."
"That being said, we need to find you a respectable woman of your own, and from what I hear that Anhelette is mighty respectable."
The expression he was using was at odds with the accepted meaning of the words, and Mar was shocked to realize she knew exactly what he meant.
"You'd like to assault her walls with your cannon, would you?" Mar asked.
Sikes just smiled and let her realize the response she'd made to his suggestion. She smirked back at him, but brought the conversation back to her original problem of the idea, "you don't think it strange that a man like me would want to chase after a woman?"
"Only goes to prove that you are man enough, Sir. Man enough for me or any of the men."
Mar smiled and clapped his sergeant on the shoulder. "So, not that this is out of the way, what say we go out and I can watch the rest of you drink like normal."
Sikes just grinned, happy to have his unique officer back. Sure, he was ever more unique than Sikes thought a few minutes ago, but what are a couple of breasts between friends.
"Matron, I heard about it the same place that I heard that a carbon filament immersed in an inert gas and charged with an electric current produces light."
Anhelette was thinking furiously, trying to determine what was going on here. Not being trained as a field agent, she was doing her best to try to minimize the damage she'd already done. If the matron knew what in the world she was talking about…
"Colonel, leave us."
"Matron…"
"Please, Kei. I need to speak to Anhelette alone."
The colonel looked at the two women, and then turned to leave. He stopped as he reached the door. "I'll be right outside, Alecia, if you need me."
The matron began to walk around the younger woman. When she got to the girl's front again, the matron stopped. "How old are you, Anhelette."
"Sixteen, Matron."
"Still so young for so much responsibility. What was your own Matron thinking to initiate one so young?"
"Initiate into what, Matron?"
"Don't play coy with me, girl. While that is the most unique response I've heard before, you obviously know of the edict. Or are you going to try and tell me that you don't know what a 'light bulb' is?"
Anhelette swore. Her worst fears were confirmed, and they'd have to do something she would forever regret. She didn't consider herself one of those types of girls, truth be told she wasn't any type of girl, but the thought of everyone here going up in flames really got to her. She began to cry and just sank down on her knees, her dress spreading out around her.
"Child, it's not so bad. There is no problem that I know."
"Isn't there?" Anhelette asked with venom in her voice. "If you let me out of this room, I have no choice but to have this entire planet bombed back to the stone age. All of you in this city are sure to be a target, and likely every other major city on the planet."
The matron's knees failed her, and she collapsed. Her face completely white. She was focusing on nothing, looking at nothing. Then she turned the weight of her attention on the girl sobbing in the middle of the room.
"But we followed the edict. We follow the edict."
"No choice," Anhelette said to herself, as she began to cry even harder. She knew that there was no hope of Mar accepting her as she truly was, and yet…she'd had hopes. Hopes that would burn her up every time she closed her eyes.
The matron regained her composure enough to rise from the position she'd been sitting in. She walked over to the door and let herself out. Anhelette heard the sound of the lock being thrown.
She ran to the door and pounded on it, "Let me out of here! You don't understand! I must tell them what's going on. They must hear from me or it will be worse for all of you."
Although how exactly it would be worse, Anhelette didn't know. She knew, however, that as soon as she failed to report this evening, the clock would begin to tick down. In a little over eighteen hours, twelve after her next check in point, this city would cease to exist.
Yes, I am drinking tons of water.
The problem is that I am not 100% sure I am coherent. Please, do NOT bear with me ;) I need to know exactly where things break down, so for once I actually welcome bad press. PMs for this will be preferable, but if you want to let everyone know where I messed up, comments are fine too.
I realize that I am still in the early part of this book, but this is one of the important chapters for understanding things that will be coming later, and if it is unclear it might lead to misunderstandings.
Lorentius was in the basement, as usual. The nature of his work was such that he could not allow others to see. There was so much prejudice about lightning. Sometimes he wondered if the ancients weren't right to revere it's power in the form of a god.
Once again, he sealed the glass ball and turned on the mercury drip. As the air left the sphere, there were momentary flashes of light, and a popping sound. When he was pulling out the air like this, he always worried that something would happen to the carbon filament that was so fragile in its clamps.
To distract himself, he looked around his laboratory. So many things he wished to try out in the open that the college of sciences refused to acknowledge. They had no vision. They thought some of what he was proposing had merit, like the pump he had invented. Such a simple concept to put a screw inside a tube. The simple rotation of the shaft drove the water up the tube. It was simple, and yet no one had ever thought to combine those two concepts. The 'pump' he was using was much the same. Combine simple concepts to come up with something no one else have ever thought of before.
It was the flying machines, and the other, less recognizable, models that they really questioned. He needed to prove that he could achieve a steady light so that they would take him seriously. Slowly the popping became quieter and quieter until the steady flow of mercury out of the drop tube slowed and finally stopped.
Taking a deep breath, he connected the wire to the anode of his battery, mentally praying to Jupiter, even though no one did that any more. Lorentius held his breath as the light began to glow brighter from the filament. It grew brighter. Always before it would grow bright and then suddenly fail. And as soon as it got to the level where he was sure that it would fail…it stabilized and held.
And it continued to hold.
He turned over the glass and watched as the light continued to hold. Just before the last sands of the glass fell the light began to fail.
"No. No no no no. No!" It faded completely. The anger spiked in him, and he was about to yank the bulb from the clamps and hurl it across the room when something occurred to him.
It had faded. There hadn't been the flash the of other experiments. He looked carefully into the bulb and realized the filament was still intact. He opened up the battery and looked at both the anode and cathode. There wasn't any corrosion on either of the leads, but the levels in the cells were low.
He carefully filled them back up, and reconnected the light to the battery.
It light up, much faster than last time, and stayed steady.
"I've done it! Mother, I've done it!"
He ran upstairs and into the group of men waiting with his mother. Minerva looked at the excitement that her son exhibited and shook her head.
"What now, Lorentius?"
"I've made light! Electric light!"
"This again, Lorentius? For how many seconds? I'm sorry gentleman, but as you see my son is not the genius that you take him for. The water screw is the only practical thing he's ever developed."
"Mother! It is still going!"
Her stunned silence set Lorentius to smiling and he ran downstairs into the lab. The light continued to shine.
"Shit, captain. It's a Sprengel pump. Archimedes screw. Ornithopter. This is well beyond a class A infraction, sir. No one ever even classified what this is. He's Leonardo Friggin DaVinci in a toga," one of the men said gesturing toward the drawings and paintings at the back of the room. Most of them containing more sketches of ideas, but one or two were vistas or still-life. There was even a portrait of a woman at the back.
The somber looks of the two man flanking the one that they'd called captain was enough to quell even Lorentius' enthusiasm.
"You're not from the college, are you. The fabric in your robes is…not quite right. Sure the color is accurate as far as I can tell, but it is so…fine."
"Lorentius, you are being given a choice," the man they called Captain said. Only now Lorentius noticed the slight delay from when the man spoke, and the words arrived. The lips didn’t match what they were saying either. "Either you come with us, and we destroy your lab and all of your notes, or we destroy you and your lab."
Minerva's look of shock and fear was crushing. "Go with them, my angel boy. I never realized…just go with them. It is better that you are gone and alive than here and dead."
"But mother?"
"You would never have amounted to anything great here, my angel. I don't understand who this Friggin-DaVinci is, but from their tone he is important. If he can teach you even more, then go. Become who you were meant to be."
Anhelette woke with a start. She hadn't thought of that moment for so long. The portrait of her mother still hung in her cabin on board the ship. That moment when she'd thought that she was truly on the pinnacle of creation. When she had created electric light.
She laughed bitterly to herself. No one remembers the person who rediscovers something. Not even the protectorate. People who they want to make disappear. People who learn too much about the world around them. People who invent.
People who threaten the very existence of mankind in the universe.
Roma had been so far down on their priority list as a possible infraction planet that it had been on a thousand year schedule. Visits once every thousand years.
Anhelette shuddered to think of what would have happened to all of their plans had they been even six months, let alone a year, later.
One man had bridged centuries of innovation. Anhelette had bridged centuries of innovation. She had come so close to condemning her entire city to death.
"Well, Lorentius, it seems you've really stepped in it this time."
Anhelette put her hands to the back of her dress, grabbing onto the ties of her corset. It was too late already for her to complete her…no his mission. Pretending to be a woman had no more point.
But even as he was ready to throw it all away, the words of his mother came back to him, "Become who you were meant to be."
His mother had been dead for seven hundred years, but still her words had power over him.
"Who am I supposed to be, Mother? This? Is this what you saw for your angel? Dressed as a woman and waiting to die on a planet so far gone that we have to destroy it?" Anhelette screamed at the ceiling. She collapsed again crying. She didn't care about the planet, but Mar…she cared about him. She would do anything to be with him, and if that meant continuing with the charade, then so be it.
It also meant that she had to get out of here and report back in to the Captain before things advanced beyond the point of no return.
She got up and applied her scientists mind to getting out of this room. She saw so many useful items, all of which would have taken time…
If she had her tools, she could get out in no time. She only needed to get out to get her tools. Damn the captain and his rules. Next time she was going to strap her tool to her leg under her dress, and propriety and rules be damned.
Mar didn't really enjoy watching other people drink. Sure, she'd said that she was fine with it, but that had been before they had begun drinking. She stayed with them for a while, and then, with a wink from Sikes, she said she was off to find more interesting company.
Yes, she was thinking about Anhelette. That seemed to be about all she did these days. They were threatened with war, one of the lords had become a traitor, her entire world was about to fall apart, and all she could think about was that beautiful, strange, wonderful girl.
One evening alone that they'd spent time together and she was completely enamored with the idea of spending more time. She was so wrapped up in her thoughts that she almost missed the sergeant standing at a door he had no business guarding.
"Sergeant, what's going on here?"
"Sir, I have orders."
"What exactly are your orders, Sergeant?"
"That I am to keep Miss Anhelette in here and not allow anyone to enter."
The sergeant took an involuntary step backwards from the Mar. Her prowess with a sword was almost legendary among the other musketeers, of which the sergeant was one. That Mar hadn't even laid a hand on her hilt didn't matter to the sergeant. The look in her eye suggested that she had already run him through in her mind.
"Let me in, Sergeant," Mar said in a voice cold as steel.
"But sir…"
Mar softened her tone, "I never told you to release your prisoner. You have done your duty to the best of your ability. Allow me to enter and I will take the blame for your lapse."
The sergeant sighed, and then smiled at the young officer, "begging your pardon, sir, but I never liked taking orders from a woman. That matron, though…"
Mar gave a rueful little smile, "I understand completely, Sergeant."
Mar was still smiling when Anhelette launched herself at Mar. Noticing her body language, Mar took a step to the side, tripping Anhelette and then offered her a hand.
"Anhelette," Mar said with a smile, "Even taking me hostage, should you be able to do it, isn't going to get you out of here."
Anhelette looked up at Mar, and then at her hand, and glowered. "I need to get out of here, Mar. We're all in danger the longer I stay in here."
"What are you talking about? Are you working with Genin? Is that why…"
"No, I'm working with…some people who are even more powerful. I can't explain it to you."
Mar's expression darkened. She felt her heart being ripped out, but steeled herself against the emotion. She wouldn't cry. That would be unbecoming of the role she played. "What did you say to the Matron that led to you being held here?"
"I told her that this world has to be destroyed." Anhelette wasn't under the same limitations that Mar was. She began to cry. "We can't have any radiating emissions coming from this planet. If they were to pick up on them…the entire human race would be lost."
"Radiating…you mean radio waves, television, that sort of thing? Any electromagnetic radiation really?"
Anhelette looked up at Mar as if she'd suddenly sprouted a second head.
"My mother was terrible at keeping secrets, and when the previous Matron told my mother about the edict, she shared it with me. I was supposed to follow in her footsteps after all."
"But you're a man! Men do not dabble in science."
"I'm a woman, Anhelette. I know. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have lead you on…"
Anhelette rose to her feet as Mar was talking and kissed her.
"Wa…" Mar was stunned and off balance.
"I was so worried that I was falling for a man, Mar. It was just you all along. So, back to the matter at hand, what is this edict?"
Mar shook herself, but couldn't get rid of her grin. "It is all of the proscribed areas of research."
"Proscribed…"
"Yes, like electricity, steam power, pneumatics. I thought you'd know all of that."
Suddenly, the fact that they'd achieved iron, and then steel, when so many others weren't even able to rediscover iron, became clear. Somehow they knew about the threat to all sentient life in the galaxy. Somehow they knew about the Protectorate, and its role in safeguarding human life. Somehow they knew technology that was proscribed.
But iron wasn't specifically proscribed. It never had been. The Protectorate had just put the colonists down without the knowledge of it as a deterrent to future generations' progress.
The problem with iron, was it began to allow the development of other technologies. Other areas of research. It allowed for labor saving devices that then allowed for more leisure. More people working not to stay alive but to move the progress of human understanding forward.
The existence of Latin on a planet that didn't speak Latin became clear as well. They'd adopted the language as their scientific code because of all the Latin words that were already a part of science. Part of the science of Earth.
"Mar, we're in terrible danger. We have to get out of here."
"It's going to take a bit before…"
"No, we have to get out of here now. I need to talk to my captain. I have to tell him what's going on here."
"Your…captain?"
"Corporal Lorentius Arrelius, sir," Anhelette said with a strange salute, "Protectorate Space Force."
"They allow women in this…military?"
"Yes, but I only look like a woman. Sir, we really must move. They have enough power to be able to destroy this entire planet. And if I don't report in, that is the most likely outcome."
"Space…how are you able to communicate with something orbiting the planet without the use of electromagnetic radiation?"
"I'm not, but using a communications laser we minimize the escaping radiation."
"Laser?"
"Apparently your information only includes the basics of the proscriptions. Don't worry about it. That's our job, sir."
"Well, corporal, let's see if we can get you out of here." Mar turned toward the door, but stopped short.
"Is there something wrong, sir?"
"No corporal, I just wanted to give you this before we left," and Mar kissed her deeply for a moment before drawing back. "I like the way you look." Mar said.
Anhelette blushed and mar chuckled.
"Sergeant, there's something wrong with the prisoner. Sergeant!"
As soon as the door opened Mar grabbed the front of the sergeant's tunic and pulled him into the room. Anhelette contributed by smashing his head with a heavy bookend on the table, and the sergeant collapsed to the floor.
Mar reached his hand out to Anhelette and she took it. The two of them ran out of the Palace heading for her rooms and an appointment with destiny.
"Captain, we have a call coming in from Corporal Lorentius."
Captain Manheim looked up from the report he was reading. "Direct it to the chamber, Collins."
"Aye, sir."
Manheim stood and walked to the booth at the back of the room. It was dark for a moment and then he was in the corporal's room down on the planet.
"Corporal, you're early."
"Sorry, sir, it can't be helped. We have a problem."
"A serious one," Mar said speaking up.
"Damn it corporal…"
"Hear her out, Captain."
"Her?"
"Yes, captain," Mar said shifting her voice to her soprano ranges. "Apparently you are unaware that we are aware of you and the Protectorate. We are self policing."
"What?" The captain looked at the man…woman…officer in shock.
"All members of the scientific community are either completely in the dark, which is most of them, or they have been informed of the edict against electromagnetic radiation. The Matron is the person who enforces our compliance.
"My own mother was killed by the Matron to protect us when my mother insisted on continuing her development of steam power."
The captain looked shocked. Anhelette wasn't too far behind. What they'd talked about on the way to her rooms hadn't even touched any of this.
"When she discovered, too late to save my mother, that it was my father who had been pursuing the knowledge…apparently she was part of the reason I was able to secure my commission. Or at least I think she might have been."
Anhelette put a comforting hand on Mar's shoulder, and he covered her hand with his own…her hand covered his hand…this was driving the captain nuts keeping track of who was actually which gender.
"Captain, we are not breaking the proscriptions, and we will be able to keep ourselves in check."
The captain was about to speak, when Anhelette interrupted him, "there is another problem. Genin, the other nation we were considering infiltrating, has breech loading cannon."
"What!" The captain was about to lose it right there. The veins were sticking out on his forehead, and his skin began to turn red with his rage.
"Sir," began Mar, "we believe that we have a solution to this. It isn't enough that we police our own city. We need to police our own world. We didn't understand the full reason for the proscriptions, as some of the knowledge has been lost in the last few millennia since we colonized this world.
"The plan isn't working, sir. At the rate that humanity reproduces, we should have reached the numbers needed centuries ago. It was a plan created in fear, not one created in wisdom."
"It is the plan."
"There are one billion people on this planet, captain," Anhelette said, "and we were about to kill most of them. Consider that, sir."
Captain Manheim was about to speak, and then he slammed his mouth shut. How was a ship that only operated for six months every century or so supposed to come to any real understanding of these planets it was sent to observe.
And in the two millennia that he'd been captain of the vessel since the previous captain had retired he'd been responsible for destroying five planets much like this one. Five planets that were finally up to the point where they were stable and ready to really start producing the soldiers and scientists that humanity would need to survive the inevitable conflict.
As he considered that it was time for a change, he felt the death of every planet, both the ones he'd ordered destroyed while captain, as well as the ones he'd watched destroyed while serving aboard this ship of the damned.
AUTHOR’S NOTE: The following work is fiction. The characters mentioned herein are fictional as well and do not represent anyone living. Occasionally I might mention someone real, like Victor Hugo, but that is so I don’t have to create an entire pop culture in order to write this story. Some of the places are fictional as well.
The emotions are real.
I call it a story, but I would be lying if I called it untrue. It’s up to you to believe, especially since I gave this story to a friend to publish. I don’t know why I feel the need to publish my story, and by the end, maybe I’ll have some idea. Maybe, as well, one of you could tell me.
Right, the song. If I were a good author, I’d drag out the connection to the title. I’d make you work for it. You’d be reading along and suddenly you’d think, ‘Oh, so that’s what the title means.’
You would smile and consider yourself smart all the way through the rest of the story.
Well, I’m not a very good author. I am, however, rambling so let me get back…
It scares me. The song, I mean. No, not the song itself, but what it represents in my life, what it says about my future. That’s not even right. What I mean to say is...I am afraid this is all a dream.
I have never been one to be afraid of still being in a dream before. My dreams always have clues to the fact that they are dreams hidden within them. Like when I can jump over thirty feet into the air and I spend the entire dream leaping from place to place.
A dream imagery specialist might say that it has something to do with my desires to soar above the rest of humanity, but an underlying inability to trust in my own abilities. Personally, I just think it’s cool and that is likely why it really happens. Of course, recently I have begun to dream of flying…
I’m sorry. I have a tendency to babble when I’m nervous, and this all makes me very nervous.
I was born a girl. Not a traditional girl, maybe, but I was a girl all the same. Not what you expected, is it? I’ll get to that. You see, for the longest time everyone around me was sure I was a boy, and in fact I allowed them to shape my opinion of myself. When you spend a good time as a youth bullied by people both in the secular world and in the religious one, it isn’t too hard to begin to believe that some of what people are saying about you must be true.
When it gets to that point, the point where you believe what other people are saying about you more than what you think about yourself, then the war begins. You see, somewhere inside you is your self image. This is who your mind tells you that you are. Who you are is conventionally assumed to be somewhere between this self image and your perceived image, or what other people believe you to be.
a severe disconnect comes into play when your self image and perceived image are significantly different, or at least if you believe them to be significantly different, then you will be in for a world of mental anguish.
The more you push yourself to fit into the neat little box that the world wants to place you in, the more that it hurts to be in that box. And when you are bullied and they provide you with an image that is not only disparate but erroneous in comparison with your self image...then the pain never ends.
It is, however, a pain I thought that I would live with. The longer you are in pain, the less you realize that it is there. It’s not that it goes away, but that your mind recognizes it and then ignores it. Mental anguish is the same as physical anguish.
You only really notice pain when it changes, or so has been my own personal experience with the subject.
In my dreams, however, my life was perfect. In my dreams it was no longer my conscious mind in control. My castle on a cloud was not the child like fantasy that Cosette created for herself, but there were marked similarities.
People spoke kindly to me in my castle. They loved me for who I was, not who they wanted me to be. I wasn’t a boy or a man. I was myself as myself. Sometimes I was beautiful. Sometimes not. Always, though, I was happy. That was the castle that I developed for myself and kept locked away within, only to allow it out when I slept.
That all changed when I got sick. I didn’t dream much about anything, and when I did dream, they were delerium and nothing I would call happy or restful, impregnated as they were with the pain, new pain of course, that I felt while awake or asleep.
My muscles ached. I had a fever of 101, fahrenheit of course which is about 38 celsius. Nothing I ate would stay down and left me either back the way it entered or forcefully through the other end. I was miserable when I didn’t just pray for death.
You’ve all been there, I’m sure.
thing is, when you are sick like that for a week, you begin to worry about your liFe, and wonder if it’s not more than just a cold, or at least I did.
“Well, Mr. Carson, it looks like you’ve lost close to fifty pounds since your last checkup.” The doctor said overly cheerfully. I just glared at him.
“I see here that you have a temperature at 101. How long has that been going on?”
“Since Thursday...”
“Usually a fever is only…”
“Of last week,” I concluded with another glare. This wasn’t my usual GP, and I had to say that I really didn’t like this guy.
“Oh...well...what other symptoms do you have?”
“Vomiting, diarrhea, significant weight loss…”
“You’ve lost this weight in the past week?” He was getting a little shocked now. I smiled weakly at him and nodded.
“Ok, well, get changed into this gown and let’s have a look at you.”
He left me in the room and I changed into the gown. I call it a gown, but it is actually a device of torture, especially when you’re over six feet tall with a long torso. Or it had been before I tried it on that time. Where the gown normally only fell to around mid thigh, it went almost to my knees.
“This is weird,” I said just as the doctor re-entered the room.
“What is?”
“Did you get longer gowns?”
“What do you mean?”
“Normally they’re shorter than this.” This seems to be about 3 or 4 inches longer than usual.”
“Spend a lot of time in hospital gowns?”
“Well, I got my gallbladder out not too long ago, and there was the time in the ER before that for gallstones...so I’ve been in them a fair amount over the past few years.”
“Well, as far as I know these are standard issue.”
“Out of curriosity, how tall does it say I am in there?”
“Six three.”
I grumble a bit. I’ve never gotten an accurate measurement, with it fluctuating from six one to six four. I am as tall as people who are 6’5”, so I have to assume that the fluctuation has a lot to do with the fact that I have a bad back. Mainly, it has to do with the fact that one of my legs is two inches longer than the other, which skews my hips. So, even when I stand up straight, I’m never standing up straight.
“How about we measure that?” I said.
We walk out to hallway and I get back up on the scale again. I stand up straight, and I don’t have to really push myself to keep things straight.
“This can’t be right,” the doctor said after a moment. He adjusted my feet a bit and then checked my back. He measured again. He looked through the notes and then called out, “Nurse Plinket? Could you come here for a moment?”
They conversed quietly for a moment and then measured me again.
“Is there a problem?”
“We must have made a mistake before,” the nurse said.
“Yes, you did. I’m six five.”
They both looked a little embarrassed. “We show you as six foot even.”
“Look, I know that I measure differently. The left side of my body is bigger than the right. See…” I put my hands together to do my normal measure trick. They were the same size.
“That’s not right,” and then I tried it again.
“Excuse me for a moment…”
I rush back to the room and lift the gown to check out...things. I screamed.
“What in the hell?” I yelled.
“Mr. Carson?”
“My...they’re…”
I couldn’t bring myself to say it, but they were small. When I say that the entire left side of my body was bigger than the right, I mean the whole thing. My left testicle was normal sized but my right was significantly undersized, or at least that is how it was before that moment.
Both of them were the same small size as my right used to be, or I should say still was.
“This can’t be happening,” I said, “None of this can possibly be real.”
It’s not really that I was attached to the appendage, but it’s more like I was used to it. I explained things to the doctor, whose name I still didn’t know, proceeded to poke and prod me. He listened to my breathing and heart. Checked my blood pressure and did a lot of humming and hawing. The only comment I remembered during this whole thing was, “You seem to have lost more weight around your abdomen that anywhere else.”
After he was done examining me he sat down to write down his notes, “You didn’t mention your hair loss.”
I blushed, “I shave my body.”
“That would leave stubble, even after a few hours. I couldn’t detect any stubble, and in fact there were no visible follicles that I could see.”
Everything he said was filtered through a daze. He mentioned trying a different diet to try and reduce the weight loss and in general suggested things that I had already been trying over the past week. He gave me a couple of prescriptions, which I filled, and then I went home to go back to sleep.
I think I woke up a couple of times in the middle of the night to expel more, and I remember marvelling that after a week of eating basically nothing that I still had something to throw up. I wobbled back to bed each time, barely aware of my surroundings and stumbled into bed.
For the first time I can remember I had no dreams, or at least no dreams I can remember. My alarm went off at 6:30 in the morning, like it usually does. Even if I was asking for time off work, that doesn’t mean I would turn off my alarm. I was giving my boss an update on a daily basis, letting him know I wasn’t dead...yet.
The first thing I noticed that morning was that I felt light. No, not light headed, but light. Before all this mess started I had a tendency to over-eat. It was a coping method for depression that I learned from my mom. I had capped out at a massive 320 pounds. I moved a lot easier than I had in as long as I could remember.
“How are you feeling, honey,” my wife said from the other side of the bed.
“I’m feeling a lot better,” I replied. There was something off about my voice. She rolled over and looked at me, her eyes widened and she screamed.
“What is it?” I said getting worried.
“Who are you and what are you doing in my room,”
“Sam, it’s me Bill.”
“You’re not my husband.”
“Of course I am.” It registered that my voice was higher pitched than I was used to, and...softer? I’m not sure how to describe it, but that wasn’t exactly correct.
“Ok, so if I’m not your husband, how did I get him out of here in the middle of the night without help?”
“Maybe he went willingly,” she said looking me up and down.
“I am Bill Carson.”
“I just don’t believe you.”
“I always believed that I was a girl inside, and I told you about it when we lived in our first apartment.”
“Bill..?” she said in a little bit of wonder and then began laughing. “I must be dreaming.”
“What is wrong with how I look?”
Still laughing she turned on the light and pointed to the mirror in our headboard. My hair was a mess and reached at least to the middle of my back. It was always something I checked first and usually with more than a note of disappointment.
My intake of breath was audible, because the changes didn’t end there. I could still see myself in my face in the curve of my eyebrows, my blue eyes with the familiar flecks, and the moles and other imperfections in my skin.
The skeletal structure underneath was different. It’s not that my skin sagged either. My lips were just a bit fuller and my cheekbones were just a touch higher. My jaw wasn’t as square and my nose was...cute.
My heart began to race as I started to realize what I was seeing. I was used to being able to see my chest, but that was normal with how big I’d been. Looking at myself in the mirror, I couldn’t help but notice that I had a waist. I put my hands to my sides and pulled in the top I was wearing. It made other things much more prominent and I had to tear off my shirt to get a better look.
I was used to the fat rolls, and these were definitely not fat rolls.
I put my hands to the flesh extending from my chest and I could feel it from both sides, both the feel of it in my hands and the feel of my hands on my...breasts
“I have breasts,” I said in awe. “If this is a dream, then it is one for both of us.”
“I never said it was a dream, just that I had to be dreaming. This is a nightmare.”
“Sam…”
“How could you do this to me?”
“Do what? I got sick. It’s a weird side effect…”
“You look and sound like a woman. What sort of illness causes that?”
I opened my mouth to reply, but then I shut it again. I had no answer for her, and even worse, I had no answer for myself. On the web, there are stories about this sort of thing happening to people. Oh, I know, they’re all just that, stories. They answer the tough questions by either making only the one who was changed aware of it, or they gloss over all of the details that really screw with you.
Legally, I no longer existed. Well, I should say that Bill Carson no longer existed. I might have grown up male, but who would believe me if I said it. I had a thought which a quick look into my boxers resolved.
I was, or all intents and purposes female.
“This could be a good thing,” I said quietly.
“How is this good? I wanted to have more children.”
Sam was crying and I wrapped her in my arms. It was a new experience hugging someone and having my breasts pancaked between us. Sam noticed as well and pulled away.
“We’ll get through this,” I said even though the words sounded hollow even to me.
“How? Do you even still have a job?”
“I don’t know, but I need to get ready.”
I took a quick shower and then washed my hair. I wasn’t used to having this much hair yet and unfortunately I didn’t think about how much longer it would take to wash and rinse it. I was just getting out of the shower and drying off my hair with a towel, as I was used to doing, when Sam came in with some bits of cloth in her hand.
“What’s this?”
“You need some support.” she said and walked out. It was one of her sport’s bras and I slipped it on. She was narrower in the chest than I was, but the garment fit. You could still tell that I had breasts, but they were definitely minimized.
I slipped on a clean pair of boxers and then got one of my shirts and a pair of my shorts. At the time I wore sandals, so I just made the strap tighter and they remained in place, mostly. I grabbed my lanyard and ran out the door to where my wife already had the engine running on the car.
We drove to work in silence and my nervousness only increased. Just before I got out she wordlessly handed me a scrunchie. I put my hair up in a high ponytail as I walked.
One of the things I’ve noticed in the past is that as long as you look and act like you belong, no one will question you. I slipped into my seat at my desk and logged into my computer. I had everything pulled up and I was signed into the phones before my supervisor walked up behind me.
“Welcome back,” he said from behind me.
“Thanks,” I grumbled.
“Not fully over it. I guess?”
“I’m a bit hoarse, I think,” I said.
“What’s with the hair?” he asked.
Of all the times that I really just wanted him to walk on, he had to stay here behind me.
“Um...I’m going through transition.”
“What?”
I turn around and look at him in the eye, “I’m transgendered. I’m going to start coming to work dressed as the woman I feel I am.”
“Ok, just make sure it doesn’t interfere with your work.”
That was it. He walked back over to his desk and I began working. The phone system was turned on shortly after that and I began taking phone calls, like I normally do. My job was fun, or at least I thought it was. Of course I got a lot of really weird, or I should say understandable, responses to my name.
“Thanks for calling BigWeb, my name is Bill. How can I help you?”
“Did you say Jill?”
“Sure. How can I help you?”
Apparently my voice sounded feminine. So much so that they supplied a name that, to them, fit. Since I was feminine, now at least, I accepted it and moved on. This seemed to happen on call after call, and my confidence grew as the day progressed.
“Bill, could you put your phone in meeting mode and meet me in HR.”
“Is something wrong?”
My supervisor just looked at me and I followed him to the back of the call center where the offices were.
“You’re not in trouble, I just wanted you to know that.”
“Doesn’t feel like I’m not in trouble,” I said with a smile.
He looked at me and then did a double take.
“If I hadn’t been listening to you all day…”
“What?” I said worried.
“You look really different.”
“I lost about a hundred pounds, I think, with that illness.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
“It just made me re-evaluate some things in my life. This is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time, and I figured that there was no time like the present.”
“Well, I have to say that if I didn’t know, and I just met you on the street, that I would never be able to tell that you weren’t a normal female.”
I scowled at him, even though inside I was bouncing around in a happy dance.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. You’re the first person like you I’ve ever met.”
“Are you sure?” I asked with a smirk.
“Well, no, I can’t be sure,” he said after a moment or two looking me up and down.
We got to HR and he held the door for me. I walked in and smiled at the strict looking woman behind the desk. My supervisor walked in behind me. “What’s going on here, Troy?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I wanted you to bring that tranny-freak in here so I could go over the corporate policy with him.”
I began to scowl at the woman, shooting dagger at her with my eyes. Troy just began to laugh.
“This isn’t a joke, Troy. We take this policy very seriously here.”
“Oh, I imagine you do...Sylvia” I said after a quick glance at the name plaque on her desk. My words dripped with saccharine sweetness.
“And you are?” she said turning to me.
“Why, I’m the tranny-freak,” I said with a little smile on my face, “and I’d love to hear about the equal opportunity policy that you want to share with me.” My smile was genuine now and I watched as her face went grey.
“I didn’t mean…”
“So, what is this policy where you can berate me behind my back?” I said, my smile faded and I was glaring at the woman now.
“I’m sorry Mr. Carson…”
“Mrs,” I say and there is liquid nitrogen in my voice now.
“What?”
“I’m a married woman. By definition that makes me Mrs.”
Her mouth is open and she closes it with a snap. “but…”
“My wife is listed as a dependant on my accounts.”
“So you’re a lesbian as well? This day just keeps getting better.”
“Actually, I’m presentationally heterosexual.”
“Excuse me?”
“No, I won’t sorry. Bigotry like yours has no excuse.”
“Bill, I don’t think…”
“No, no, let him speak,” she said with a gleam in her eyes now.
“Do you have a boss, Sylvia?”
“You know it’s Frank.”
“Would you mind calling him in here?”
She glared at me again and I smiled and leaned against the wall and waited. She uttered a few terse phrases into the phone and then we waited in a buzzing silence for Frank Harrison to come join us.
“Hey Troy, Bill, Sylvia. What’s up?”
“Hello, Frank,” I said with a warm smile. He did a double take and then a broad grin appeared on his face. “It’s about time. Come and give me a hug, girl!”
Frank was like that. He was about eighty, and still came in to work because he just loved his work. He sort of acted like a father/grandfather to everyone and anytime there were layoffs he handled them personally. No one ever had to be escorted out by security. People felt more sorry for him having to tell them they were fired than for being fired.
“I knew there was something special about you, girl. For the longest time I thought you were gay, but then I met your wife, and you never struck me as the bi-sexual type.”
“Presentationally Heterosexual all the way, Frank.”
“Better not keep hugging you or you might get ideas,” he said with a smirk. Did I say grandfather? I think I meant dirty uncle.
He was joking, though, and I knew it. Sylvia was glaring at me the whole time.
“Frank, I wanted you here as a witness. Apparently Sylvia feels that it is fine to be bigoted at work.”
I have never seen Frank look so pissed off, and I was glad that he didn’t turn his glare at me. “Is what she’s saying true?”
“You’re taking this out of context. He came in here, looking like that, and heard me say something to Troy. I didn’t know it was him and told troy that it wasn’t funny not to bring the transvestite in with him when I needed to go over policy.”
Frank turned to me, “First, I think it’s a little weird to keep calling you ‘Bill’ when you look like this. Do you have a different name?”
“Cosette,” I said in a small voice.
“You are no small thing, no matter what your name is,” he said with a big smile.
“So, Cosette, is that what she said that prompted you to call her bigoted?”
“Actually, Frank, she called Cosette a ‘tranny-freak’.” Troy said.
“You WHAT!” Frank said, turning on Sylvia so fast that I took a step back.
“Do you have any idea what your comments could mean for this company? Talking about her using male pronouns was bad enough, but to use a pejorative term like that?” He turned and put a forced smile on his face, “Cosette, I’ll talk to you later. Troy.”
We walked out the door and he shut it behind us. He then put down the blinds. We heard him lay into her and quickly beat a retreat. We began to laugh as soon as we were out of earshot. It was more the relIef that we survived than that we found anything about the situation funny. “So, if what I understood is the case, you’re interested in guys when you look like a girl?”
“Basically, yes.”
“You sound like Bill, word choice and all, but it’s as if a girl were speaking the words.”
“Troy, I am a girl, woman, you know what I mean.”
“I do, and I’m glad, about the whole liking guys thing. Would have been a shame if you were a lesbian.” He walked off as soon as he finished, leaving me with quite a few unanswered questions. Unfortunately by this point he was out on the call floor, and I almost felt as if I couldn’t broach the subject with him out there.
I was never this indecisive when I was pretending to be a guy.
“Troy, you know you’re married, right?”
“Sure, but so are you. It makes you sort of safe.”
“Troy, I’m not safe at all. I’m married to a woman who is decidedly heterosexual.”
“I don’t understand.”
“It means that I’m likely not going to remain married, and while I might not be bothered by your attentions, I’m sure your wife would have a problem with it.”
Troy laughed and walked back to his desk. I was just sitting down when I noticed an email in my inbox asking me to come back and talk to Sylvia and Frank again.
I got up and went back to the office. The door was open again and I walked in.
“Have a seat, Colette.”
I sat down and looked at the two other people in the room. Sylvia refused to meet my gaze.
“First off, just to let you know, you need to be under the care of a registered therapist of some sort,” Frank began.
“Um...I don’t have a therapist.”
“That’s what I was a bit afraid of. The company wants to protect itself from frivolous action, but it wants to also provide a safe environment for everyone, no matter their background or beliefs.”
“So, what do I do?”
“The company will put you on unpaid leave for the next week. If you can bring in documentation that you’re under a doctor’s care in that time frame, then we can work with you.”
“What if I can’t?”
“Then you give up this foolishness and stop pretending to be something you’re not,” Sylvia said with a sneer.
There was something that was certain. If I wasn’t able to bring the company what it needed in the next week, I would be personally suing Sylvia. If it were left to Frank, I felt there might be a chance of him giving me some leniency, but with her there…
“I believe that mental health is covered under our insurance?”
“It is, actually,” Frank said with a smile.
“I’ll need a list of the therapists in network and I’ll get working on getting this resolved.” I grabbed my phone from my desk, logged out of the systems and called my wife to pick me up. It was only while I was waiting there for her to arrive that something occurred to me: I was going to have to convince a therapist that I was a man transitioning into a woman when I was actually a man who had somehow spontaneously transformed into a woman.
“Now what am I going to do?” I said to myself quietly.
This isn’t my first marriage.
I was married before to someone who cheated on me. I’m not going to delve into blame, because even when someone cheats on you, there is at least a portion of blame to be assigned to you. Ok, there is usually a portion of the blame that you should accept.
I was an angry person. Not one who took it out on others…
Ok, so it’s truth time. I was a screamer. I yelled at inanimate objects. People, not so much, but it did occasionally happen. There was no physical component to any of this, but even so it was unacceptable.
So, she sought comfort in the arms of another. Even when I found out, I forgave her. I’m that sort of person. She declared we were getting a divorce.
Here is the problem: I know that sometimes, when people are unwilling or unable to work through their differences, marriages break up. I would personally be willing to work through my differences, because that is who I am, but there was a major and insurmountable difference that would have caused a serious problem with my marriage: My wife and I were heterosexual.
While I was still presenting as male, that wasn’t an issue. Male and female compatibility. When I became a woman that created a problem. Female and female incompatibility.
I’m not talking here about love. There is a big difference between sex and love. You can love a person all you want, but that doesn’t mean you have a sexual attraction for them. In a perfect world, this wouldn’t be an issue. In a perfect world you would find the person that you were compatible with and everything would just work.
In a perfect world there would be no problems like ‘transgender.’ There would be no variance or divergence from the norm because everything would work right the first time.
We don’t live, and never have done so, in a perfect world. We live in a world where there are outliers and anomalies. There are a multitude of psychological conditions that cause people no end of grief. In this world of imperfection you can’t expect people to be perfect, and neither should you condemn them when they are imperfect.
I love Sam. Unfortunately I truly couldn’t bring myself to make love to her. Maybe if I were drunk enough and aroused enough…
But I would feel guilty and dirty about it afterwards.
There wasn’t a universe in which I was going to keep her in a marriage where she wouldn’t be happy.
She arrived to pick me up. In the back of our car, my daughter Rose was sitting, bouncing as she usually does when she goes to pick up ‘daddy.’
“Daddy?”
“Yes sweety?”
“Why do you look like mommy?”
I look over at Sam with a sort of shrug of my shoulders. What do you tell a five year old?
“Because daddy is a girl now.” I said, as calmly as I could.
“Really?” she said, her eyes getting wide. “You mean we’re all girls now? I love girls!”
Well, there was my daughter for you. When I played video games she always preferred that I play female characters. She got no complaints out of me.
“Bill, should you really say something like that to her?”
“It’s the truth, Sam. What do you want me to tell her?”
She sat there quietly for a minute or two as we drove home, thinking through her response. I leaned my chair back and let Rose play with my hair. It was a lot longer than it used to be and I loved the sensations. Rose loved to play with hair, and I wouldn’t have been surprised if she became a hairdresser when she grew up.
“Bill…”
“Could you call me Cosette?”
“Really? Cosette?”
“Well, I like it, unless you have a better name for me…”
“Why not Andrea?”
I looked over at her and she was grinning at me. “You’re taking this well,” I said a little confused.
“I don’t like this, but this wasn’t some choice you made...was it?”
“No, you know my feelings on this issue. I wanted to remain as I was for you and because my family could never accept me if I were to transition.”
Her face lost its happiness. “What are you going to do about your family?”
“Have a horrific fight I assume,” I said. It wasn’t something I was looking forward to myself. I loved my family. They were the world to me. I’m not just talking about my own family. I loved my in-laws as well.
I had no idea where my in-laws stood on the issue, but I was pretty sure that I knew where my personal family stood. That was a problem for another day. Today I had a problem that was set to destroy me, or at least the me I used to be.
The first issue that I had to find a gender specialist in the midst of all of the people that were on our health insurance plan. From all the other stories that I have read, it seems that gender specialists are a dime a dozen and the main character or someone in their life has an in with them. They get in miraculously quickly, as all of these specialists seem to have completely full schedules, and from there all of their problems are solved.
Like all professionals there are differences between therapists, from how busy they are to how full they keep their schedule.
Since I had no other choice, and no way to narrow the list of almost two hundred people, I began at the top and worked my way down. Every time the conversation went something like this:
“Thank you for calling Dr/Mr/Ms Anyone’s office. How can I help you?”
“Does the doctor/therapist deal with gender issues?”
*click*
Sometimes I got laughter. Sometimes a response of, “oh, you poor dear.” Once I even heard the person on the other end of the line say, “the doctor doesn’t handle deviants like you.” Not once in the first fifty three names did I get anything even approaching understanding. The Fifty fourth name was slightly different.
“We’re not taking new patients,” the woman says and then hangs up the phone.
I called back immediately. “Please, don’t hang up. I understand you’re not taking any new patients, but if you could tell me, do you know of any other therapists in the area who handle gender issues? I’d appreciate it.”
“I’m sorry I was so rude. People can be really insistent sometimes and you’re not the first person to call today thinking they have gender dysphoria. Why would someone who is a beautiful woman like you, or so I assume from your voice, want to become a man? I don’t understand it.”
“I was born William James Carson,” I say quietly.
There’s dead air on the line for almost a full minute. I’m about ready to say something or hang up when I hear a sigh on the other end of the line. “Well, I deserved that. Is it because of how you sound you want to change, or something more?”
“I was born a girl, but the world disagrees with me. There is more, but I’m not sure you’d believe me because I don’t know that I even believe it half the time. The simple truth is that I’d have stayed who I was quite happily if not for a series of events that leaves me no choice. I have to be under the care of a psychiatrist, psychologist or therapist for my gender issues or I lose my job.”
“Why not just go to work as a man?”
“It’s not possible. I wish it were, but it isn’t.”
“Then I’ll see you tonight at five.”
“But, I thought…”
“I don’t claim to be a specialist in gender issues, and apparently I need to work on that. I didn’t consider myself to be a bigoted person, but apparently there is some prejudice in me. I need until five in order to refresh my knowledge on the subject.”
“I don’t mean to be rude, but wouldn’t it be better for me to go to someone who specializes in this?”
“Probably, but none of them will see you today.” There was a note of pleading in her voice that I hated to hear. I relented and told Ms. Kelly, last name not first, that I would be there at five.
I tried to lose myself in my games, but nothing would keep my attention for long. The first problem was that wearing silk boxers is ridiculously uncomfortable. The seams bunch up and dig into places that I would have loved to explore but was afraid to touch at the same time. Sensitive areas. Eventually I simply removed the boxers and wore my shorts with nothing on underneath. Not as uncomfortable, but not fully comfortable either.
The second problem was that I was truly worried that I would be walking into another situation like the one I’d had earlier today. I didn’t need to subject myself to any further bullying and I found myself repeatedly picking up the phone and dialing the number only to hang up before it began to ring.
Then, as we got closer to five, I began to fret over my appearance. My wife was allergic to all makeup and my daughter wasn’t really old enough to start playing with it, so we had none in the house, not even lip gloss.
Even if we had, I had no idea how to apply it.
My wife was only 5’3”, so any of her dresses was completely out of the question, not even considering that I had a larger bust than she did. We went through her skirts until we found one that would work. Where it reached her ankles it went just below my knees. It fit well through the hips, though, so I counted my blessings on that one. The main problem, however, was that it was a deep brown. Don’t get me wrong. I love earth tones and they seem to work well with my coloration, which hasn’t changed significantly. It’s just that her tops don’t fit me, and my tops are...masculine.
I pick a green polo shirt and put it on. I’m swimming in it, as it was one of my bigger shirts. I tuck it into the skirt and grab one of my older belts. It is black with silver eyelets in double rows. It literally goes around me twice so I run it just resting on my hips. The shoulders still aren’t quite right, but it looks better than it did. The only problem is that the sandals just don’t go with it. It’s a sort of off-casual look, but the sandals aren’t feminine enough to fit with the rest of the outfit.
“I need shoes,” I say at the same time as Sam says, “those sandals just don’t work.”
We laugh and head out to the car. I might not have enough money to buy a full new wardrobe at the moment, but at least I can buy a cheap pair of shoes. We head to a department store and get shoes and some underwear, including a couple of bras. It might be naughty and sexy to wear a skirt without underwear, but I was glad to have something on down there to separate me from the rest of the world.
I find out that I’m a 40C, which is something you should always know. The fact that my fifty two inch belt wrapped twice around me means my waist is about twenty-five or twenty-six inches.
I stood there looking at myself in the mirror for a long time, taking in my long legs and tight waist. My bust and behind seemed to be balanced, so overall I seemed to be pretty. To get beyond that I would need to wear makeup, but that was a battle for another day.
I didn’t get the full effect of my breasts when I’d been walking around earlier wearing the sport’s bra. It was almost exactly like the fat rolls that I’d had only last week. They moved, sure, but nothing noticeable. Wearing the bra I’d picked out, I could feel them move against the fabric of the shirt.
It wasn’t anything sensuous, but it was a feeling that I’d longed for and something that I’d thought would only be there in my dreams. They were mine. They made me a part of womanhood more than anything else I was wearing, or any other part of my body save that which was covered by my skirt.
I was caught up in my happy thoughts as we drove to the office and parked just a few minutes before five.
“William?” Ms. Kelly said in a little shock upon seeing me.
“Yes, although that name doesn’t seem to fit me, does it.”
“No, it doesn’t. What would you like for me to call you?”
“Cosette,” I said with a grin.
“Well, little one, why don’t you join me in my office.”
We entered the office and I looked around. There were a couple of couches and some chairs. All of them looked comfortable and I quickly sank into one. I lounged in the chair just relaxing into the soft feel of it before I noticed Ms. Kelly staring at my knees.
I quickly sat up and crossed my legs at the knee, something my body would never have been able to do before. I’ve always been flexible, but certain things always got in the way.
“I don’t mean to pry, but you look…”
“Like a woman? That’s because I am, physically.”
“I thought…” she said, looking even more confused.
“Let me begin at the beginning. Here’s my driver’s license. It’s expired, but you’ll see my name there and my picture.”
She looks from one to the other, comparing the little things that I mentioned before. “Either that is one excellent makeup job, or you are the man in this photo.”
“You’re welcome to touch my face if you don’t believe me.”
“No, I take you at your word, for now. I assume that this is the reason that you can’t go back to work without being under my care? You are transitioning?”
“Well, it seems you did your research.”
“I never claimed to be completely ignorant of people in your situation.”
“Ma’am, you’ve never met anyone in my situation.”
“While people always feel like their issues are unique…”
“I could drop my skirt and panties right here for you. I could let you examine me, but all you’d believe is I went and got surgery somewhere. I’ll sign whatever you need me to. Yesterday I was at a doctor’s office where he examined me fully. I was suffering from an illness of some sort. Today I feel more alive than I have in years and I’m a woman.”
“I understood that you always felt you were…”
“I’m not trying to tell you I don’t need help. I probably need it more than if I were to have come in here last week. When I say I’m a woman, though, I mean that for the first time in my life my mind and body are in agreement. Sure, I still have some ticks and behaviours that have been learned over the thirty-eight years I’ve been alive, but I feel...whole.”
She sat there quietly for a moment.
“This isn’t a joke, is it. You’re not trying to trick me?”
“My plan was to never transition, Ms. Kelly. This was something I planned on living with my entire life. I found a partner who could live with my quirks. I never dressed or tried to learn mannerisms that would fit a female persona. I had some, of course, but those were part of me, and things I was unwilling to give up.”
“How can I help you?”
“I’m losing my life and gaining it at the same time. What do I do? My wife is heterosexual, and I’m sure that she’s going to be unhappy to have any further physical relationship with me.”
“Are you a lesbian then?”
“No. I’m attracted to men and women. Whenever I dream, though, I am always the opposite gender of any of my partners. I’ve had some lesbian fantasies, what girl hasn’t, but the mechanics of it are sort of icky to me.”
“Pity,” she said quietly.
I had to laugh.
“Something funny?”
“It seems that you’re the second person to relate that way to me today. The first said it would be a pity if I were a lesbian. You said it was a pity I wasn’t.”
She blushed and I just smiled.
“I’m sorry, but that was inappropriate of me to say. Not even counting the fact that you are a patient, you are married. You want to remain married?”
“Sure, but how can I? I enjoyed my relations with my wife. There’s no way that can continue.”
“Have you asked her this?”
“No, but I know my own wife.”
She walked to the door and opened it, calling Sam to join us.
“Sam, among other things I am a couples counselor, and while I’m sure your husband needs other assistance I thought we’d start today with a couple’s session.”
“She’s not my husband anymore,” Sam said with a little ire and not a little hurt.
“Would you be more comfortable calling her your wife?”
Sam paled and just shook her head.
“Cosette tells me that she is afraid that you won’t be able to have sex with her anymore.” Both Sam and I flinched at her blunt statement.
“I didn’t say it that way, Sam. It’s just I’m not a lesbian.”
“Our daughter would suggest otherwise,” she said with a little venom.
“When I was a man, I could see being with you. That worked for me. I’m not a man anymore.”
“Why can’t we find some way to fix this?”
“I don’t even know what caused it. You never got sick. No one else did. Just me. And now that I’m better, I’m not who I was anymore.”
“You’re happy about this, though, aren’t you? Isn’t this what you always wanted?”
“Yes, but not at your expense. I never wanted this if it meant losing you.”
She came over to me and pushed me back in the seat and kissed me. I melted and passively accepted it. I could tell I was beginning to feel the slightest hint of arousal, but it was only a hint. I was no longer attracted to my wife.
“It wouldn’t work,” she said sadly, “I just don’t feel anything like I used to when we kissed.”
“I know,” I said with a tear rolling down my cheek. “Maybe this isn’t permanent,” I said with a sob threatening to tear itself free from my throat.
“And then what? How could I live with myself knowing that you had this moment of pure happiness given to you where you never asked for it and gave it up for me. I can’t do that to you, Cosette,” Sam was beginning to cry herself and I lost it. She sank into my arms and we cried on each other’s shoulder. I could hear Ms. Kelly sniffling a bit, but I didn’t really care. After a minute or two Sam and I relaxed. She didn’t try to get up and continued to sit on my lap. It was familiar and foreign at the same time.
For the first time in my life a woman was sitting on my lap and it meant nothing to me other than normal physical contact. There was no stirring of interest at all.
“Do you want a divorce?” I said.
“I want my husband back,” she replied to me.
“You know I didn’t ask for this,” I said. Where I might have responded with anger before, now there was only regret and pain.
“I know.”
“I would still be happy if you continued to live in the same house with me. There’s nothing that says we can’t do that is there?”
“What if I get married again? I’m not that old. Or what if you get married?” She said with a small shudder.
“Well, then the guy better accept that I want a place for your and our daughter in my life.”
“You’d tell him you used to be a man?”
“Even though there would be no way he could find out about me through anything on my body that would suggest otherwise, yes I would. I want a relationship with my family and they shouldn’t have to watch what they say around my…husband.” The world sounded so foreign coming from my mouth.
Sam paled a bit as well. I hugged her and she didn’t pull away.
“I’ll miss you,” she said.
“I won’t be gone,” I replied, my tears flowing freely again.
“But you are gone. You don’t even have the same smell anymore. Even when you wore my antiperspirant there was this smell that was distinctly you.”
“You wore her antiperspirant?”
“I preferred the smell. I like to smell like baby powder,” I said and Ms. Kelly laughed.
“Well, there’s nothing to say that you can’t get your own now with the same scent,” Sam said, for the first time truly smiling since we came in here. She climbed off my lap and went to sit in her own chair.
“Well, this is definitely strange,” Ms. Kelly said. “Every once in a while, the man that you were peeks through, like when you showed me your panties,” she said, coloring.
“You definitely seemed mesmerized,” I said with a smirk.
“See, like that. That was a little more masculine than I’d expect. Originally you blushed and covered up, which I assume was your gut reaction?”
I nod at her.
“Ok, I’ll sign what you need me to, but if I’m going to claim you are in my care, then I need you to make regular appointments to see me.”
“Like I said, I want the help.”
“I’ll keep the exact nature of what I’m helping you with to myself. For now, I’ll just let your employer know that I am helping you through your ‘gender issues.’ Will that work?”
“That will be perfect.”
We go back out to the waiting area where I fill out the forms that she requests of me. She then provides me with a carry letter and a second document that I can’t help but gogle at.
“Are you sure?”
“You are a woman, we need to get the ball rolling,” she said with a smile.
The second letter was a declaration that the individual known as William James Carson was in transition and would be changing her name to Cosette Andrea Carson. My wife won out on that one. She couldn’t see calling a grown woman Cosette and planned on calling me Andi. I could live with that.
“Take that to the social security office tomorrow. That should get at least half of your ID issue out of the way.”
“Half of it?”
“When you get your new social through the mail, and we get your birth certificate changed, you can go and get a new driver’s license.”
“It’s that easy?”
“Women get married all the time. The social security administration has policies in place to change your name. That letter should be enough, but if it isn’t then we just need a court order.”
“How will they know…”
“We’re going now to get it notarized for you. Like I said, it’s not a court order, but it should be enough to attest to the change.”
We went to a local UPS store and paid a small fee to get our paper’s notarized. They checked our ID and once more someone scrutinized my face and the one in the image. In the end the boy behind the counter accepted it. It didn’t hurt, I think, that I was shamelessly flirting with him while he examined my photo.
As we were walking out he called out to me, “Miss Carson?”
“Yes?”
“Could I get your phone number?”
“Why?”
“So I could ask you out on a date,” he said as if it were obvious, which likely it should have been.
I laughed, but not at him. It was just a happy sort of a laugh. “I’m thirty-eight, Jason.” I said looking at his name tag.
“Oh,” he said and his smile went away. After a moment or two he shook himself and looked me up and down. There was more of an appraising look than anything overtly sexual and I have to admit that I preened a bit under his gaze.
“So, can I get your phone number?”
“Her number is 555-9102,” Sam said from beside me.
“Sam,” I exclaimed.
“He seems like a nice boy, even if he is ten years younger than you are.”
When we left the store and the door was closed I said, “He probably just wants to have sex with me.”
“Good.”
“What?” I said a little shocked.
“At least one of the two of us will be getting some,” Sam said with a sad little smile.
I just stopped stock still and looked at her.
“Yes, I’m giving you permission to date.”
“But…”
“Andi, you know that I loved Bill more than anything, but you’re not Bill anymore. You are Cosette Andrea Carson. While Bill and I were married, you and I aren’t.”
“Sam,” I said, a cold spot forming in my stomach.
“I’m not kicking you out or anything, and I am happy we’ll still be a part of each other’s lives, but one of the two of us needs a new bed to sleep in.”
I just look at her for a moment or two and then a smile splits my face, “and he was cute, wasn’t he.”
Sam looks at me and then grins herself, “You bet your sweet little ass he was. If he hadn’t asked for your number I might have had to give him mine just on principle.”
“Sam, you just gave him your number.”
“Oh, I did, didn’t I?” she said, grinning even larger. The three of us laughed as we walked back to our cars.
You may be saying that you don’t think poorly of me for the choices that I am making. The problem is that I think poorly of myself. I want to believe that I’m a good person and that I live up to my beliefs. The problem is that as I read the choices that I made for no real good reason other than that I wanted to.
That’s not exactly right either. I know my wife. Sam is the sort of person who has specific goals in life and has a truly strong sense of who she is other people’s perception of her be damned. It’s part of what attracted me to her in the first place. She has aspects of the masculine without being anything other than feminine.
People defy description and don’t really like being put in nice little boxes. As many people who are, that is how many types of people exist in this world. You can make generalities, like this spectrum is ‘male’ and that spectrum is ‘female,’ but if you go beyond that you are asking for trouble.
Something we often do while trying to write literature for or about the transgender community is lessen who we are as people. Not a one of us is anything remotely approaching normal. That’s a good thing. Normal is a statistical anomaly, so by it’s definition is an impossibility in a world made up of real people.
Every one of us could find a description of at least one of our quirks in a text about abnormal psychology.
The problem occurs when you begin to try and create a baseline about what is a ‘normal’ girl and then force yourself into that mold so society will accept you.
Oh, god. I’m ranting again. You don’t need me to tell you who you are. You already know.
You know what just occurred to me? I think the reason we are afraid of being ‘found out’ is equal parts fear for our own safety from the bigots in the world and the fact that we are basically decent individuals.
A lie of omission is still a lie, and it rankles in the soul that to a certain degree we feel ourselves to be dishonest in our presentation if we don’t tell everyone our big secret. Guess what? Your big secret is that you’ve always been a girl. Accept it, believe it, and move on with my blessing, for whatever it’s worth.
Admittedly you don’t know me, save from the inadequate text that I here write. But you do know me, because I am you. We are all of us a little messed up here, to truly butcher a nice quote for Lewis Carol.
True to her word, Sam moved out into another room in our home. We had a guest room which she transferred her clothing to. That first night alone I had a horrible time getting to sleep. I was lonely. I knew that there would be nothing even resembling sex, but it wasn’t about the sex. I wanted my wife there with me. I loved this woman so much at this moment, even more so because she was in another room, giving both of us space in which to move on in our lives.
That night I cried for the first time since becoming a woman. I mourned the death of Bill Carson. As much as I was still alive I knew that he was dead. It may sound a bit like dissociative identity disorder when I say it that way, but it isn’t. The person you are today is not the same person you were when you were fifteen. Were you to travel back in your own timeline, people would notice a difference.
So I cried for someone I knew so well, someone I would never meet again, even if there is a life after this one. I cried because I was losing the future that I’d imagined for myself growing old with Sam. I cried for the children we wouldn’t have. I cried because deep inside I hoped that now I would be able to bear children, and it felt like a betrayal of Sam to even think it.
I cried because I would never get a daddy daughter dance, or get the father’s dance when she got married.
Here I was being given everything that I’d ever wanted on a silver platter, and the only things I thought about were the things I was losing, nothing that I would be gaining. Unfortunately, that was the black mood that I was in that night, and I cried myself to sleep.
The next morning dawned before the sun arose, and once again I was up and getting ready for work. This time, I would go in prepared as I now had my carry letter, something I had to laugh at. A strip search would be equal to the task, but I needed to maintain the illusion for now. Eventually I’d just admit to being physically female, but I needed time, and I could get a nice 3 or 4 week paid medical leave out of it in about a year. Not that it was a real consideration in what I was doing, but the thought did cross my mind.
I made sure not to get my hair wet this morning, remembering the problems from yesterday. Having limited options I slipped back into the Skirt and top and my new ballet flats from yesterday but with clean underwear. I grabbed my lanyard and a scrunchie and headed out the door so Sam could drive me in to work again. She liked to have the card during the day and who was I to deny her. I dropped the note off at Troy’s desk and headed to my own where I began another scintillating day of supporting people’s web sites.
Don’t get me wrong, I loved my job, but it can be grating at times. And while I didn’t feel like wanting to bite everyone’s heads off like normal, I got to see the other side of the coin where I got talked down to because I was a woman in a “man’s” job. Since my anger wasn’t as close to the surface as it had been, I used my wit to my advantage and soothed the male ego at the same time as I insulted them. You know how it goes:
“So, my Sprocket isn’t working any more. It did yesterday, but it doesn’t today.”
“Did you make any changes to the site in the last twenty four hours?”
“No, it just stopped working. It must be the crappy server you have me on.” Ok, they are usually more descriptive and insulting, but this is basically what they’re saying. Of course, when I asked them if they’d made any changes, that was a courtesy, since I can look at the time stamps for the files as easily as the next girl.
“The file problem.html seems…”
“Can you just transfer me to a higher ranked individual? I’m sure you’re good at what you do, but I don’t need tier I support. I need a specialist.”
“Oh, I see. So being the expert that you are, I’m sure you notice that you commented out all of the code related to your Sprocket? And I’m sure that you already tried removing it like I just did for you, because you of course are better informed than I am. Here, let me transfer you as requested.”
“Oh, it’s working now.”
“Really, it’s no bother if you still want to talk to that specialist. It really sounds like you have a difficult problem here.”
“Thank you for your time.”
Now, just reading the words, you realize how biting they are. Said in the right tone of voice, however, with just enough sweetness and they don’t realize how much I insulted them.
I got a lot of practice that first day.
On a high note they took me to security about noon and I got a new ID badge. It was my first piece of ID with my new name on it and I have to admit I teared up a little. When I got back Troy walked up to me.
“Take this back to Frank’s office. He’s waiting for you,” he said, handing me my doctor’s letter.
I smiled at him and headed back to Frank’s office.
“Welcome back, Cosette. You have something for me?”
“Yes, I do,” I said. I handed the letter to him and then took a seat. I made sure to keep my knees together this time. It wasn’t as uncomfortable as I thought it would be. I’d always been one to simply plop into a chair with no consideration to how I looked or how I was sitting. Now, however, I cared how I looked. For the first time in my life I was who I believe I should have been from the beginning and it mattered to me how people perceived me.
“Well, I have to say that you look much more the part today,” Frank said.
“Thank you,” I said with a little smile.
“So, you’re sure this is something you want to do?”
“Frank, this has nothing to do with desire. This isn’t about what I want or even need. This is simply about who I am.” He looked at me with confusion suffusing his features so I continued, “My mind has never agreed with anyone else where my gender is concerned. When I was born, a doctor took one look at the surface and declared, ‘it’s a boy.’ When I first began to understand what that meant, I started to realize there was something wrong with me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Most people don’t. Most people in this world have a synergy between their body and their mind. Your mind says ‘I am male,’ and your body says, ‘yup.’” He just looked at me for a moment, but he didn’t add anything so I again continued, “This is who I am, who I’ve always been. This is who I should have been from the beginning, how I should have grown up.”
“But your wife, how does that work.”
I looked at him sadly, “It doesn’t work. Part of the reason I waited so long was that I knew I wouldn’t be accepted by my family and also that it would destroy my relationship with my wife.”
“Why did you do it even now?”
“I had no choice,” I said and left it at that. The fewer people I had to tell about my spontaneous gender switch, the better.
“You’ve lost a lot of weight over the past week. Have you been to a doctor yet?”
“Yes, but I think I should go back.”
“Take care of your health, Cosette. Not on company time, of course, but take care of yourself. And thanks for the letter. It was necessary, but still something that I would have liked to have been able to do without.”
“Thank you, Frank.”
I got up to leave and Frank called out to me, “So, have you started dating yet?”
“Frank,” I exclaimed, “You’re old enough to be my father…grandfather actually.”
He blushed, “I wasn’t asking for myself. I was asking for one of my grandkids. He’s a bit younger than you, but I’ve been trying to get him together with a good girl for years now.”
“But, you know…”
“Cosette, you are a good person. I’ve never had a complaint about you, and in fact have heard many complimentary things. In fact the last time lay-offs were discussed both your supervisor and manager said that they didn’t care who they lost as long as it wasn’t you.”
I stood there a bit shocked, sure that he wasn’t supposed to be saying things like this and almost unable to believe it even though he was the one who shared it with me.
“Look, I understand that the physical stuff takes time, but I’m not asking for you to sleep with him. Just go on a date or two when you’re free. It’s all I ask.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Can I give him your number?”
“I’ll think about it,” I said and grinned as I walked out the door.
The rest of the day went without incident, something I was increasingly thankful for. I did, however, call the clinic when I returned to my desk. The same doctor as before would be able to see me that same evening, and had been planning on calling me because there were some issues with my blood work.
I told Sam what was up when I got in the car, and like everything else that had happened recently she took it in stride.
“So, do you think we have time to visit your family before the appointment?”
“I think so, sure,” I said. It felt like the bottom fell out when I said it, but I knew this wasn’t something I could put off forever. We drove south along the freeway and my trepidation increased the further we went.
“We don’t have to do this if you don’t want,” Sam said.
“I don’t want to do this, but I have to do in anyway. This is my life now, Sam. What other choice do I have?”
“You could always change back…”
“You know there is no surgery that would make me into the man I used to be.”
“You could try. Damn it, Bill, you’re just accepting this as if it is a foregone conclusion.”
“My name isn’t Bill.” I said coldly.
“Fine, Andi, whatever, but you’re just too accepting of all of this.”
I grabbed my breasts and pulled painfully on them, “Is this what you’re talking about, Sam? Is it? This is me. This is my body. This isn’t some costume that I’m putting on for the sick pleasure of it.”
“Fine, but what if it were? What if you’d finally decided to ‘transform’ or whatever it’s called?”
“What if I did? The same hormones that are at work in any woman’s body would have worked on mine. Sure, I might not have gotten the figure I now have, but I would have gotten breasts and lost muscle tone. I would have been a woman either way.”
“How can you say that a mutilation like you’re suggesting would make you a woman?”
“Stop the car.”
“Andi…”
“Stop the car. I’ll walk from here.”
“You can’t be serious. We’re on the freeway.”
“I’m deadly serious, Sam. You don’t have to agree with me or anyone like me, but I will not be insulted like this. Stop the car or I’m getting out right here, right now.”
“We’re traveling at sixty miles an hour…”
I unlocked the door and undid my seatbelt. She quickly pulled the car over to the side of the road and turned off the ignition.
“Don’t go,” she said quietly.
“Why not? I’m an abomination to you.”
“I never said that.”
“Wasn’t it what you were thinking?”
Sam sat there quietly and I opened my door. My shoes really weren’t meant for walking long distances. They were meant to look pretty. They’d have to do.
“I’m sorry. I just feel like I lost my best friend.”
“I’m not gone, Sam. It’s just I’m not your husband anymore. I’m your girlfriend.”
“I have enough girlfriends.”
“You can never have enough girlfriends,” I said with a goofy little smile on my face.
“Why did this have to happen to you?”
“I don’t know, but maybe it’s a blessing in disguise.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You know I was never as...virile as I could have been.”
“Don’t give me that. I was pregnant more than once.”
She tried to play it off, but I can’t accept that it wasn’t my fault. Sure, she got pregnant, but it was infrequently in the ten years we were married. Some of those pregnancies failed. One came to term, and that was my beautiful daughter Rose.
“Maybe a real man would have been able to…”
“You were my man, Andi.”
“But I’m not a man,” I said, tears threatening to pour out and drench the both of us.
“I know that, Andi. I’ve always known it. I just wished that it weren’t true.”
I began to cry and put my hand on hers in comfort. She laced her fingers through mine. It was truly sad that our fingers seemed to fid better now that I had much more slender hands.
“I wanted the person I loved more than life itself to be the man of my dreams, but what I got was the best friend I could ever ask for.”
“How can you say that? I’m ruining your life.”
“You gave me Rose, something I will always be truly grateful for. Sure, life is changing with this last little mess, but I wouldn’t trade anything for the time we had.”
“I’m sorry, for everything.”
“I’m not. I’m just sorry that you changed.”
We hugged and cried for a minute or two and then continued to drive to my parents’ home. We pulled up in front of the house and I began to shake. I was still shivering as I got out of the car and walked up to my parents’ door. Like normal, we walked in.
“Anyone home,” Sam called out.
“We’re up here,” my mom’s voice called out from her room, “we’ll be down in a moment.”
We sat there next to each other on the couch and waited for my parents to come down.
“Hello, Sam. It’s always nice to see you,” My dad said as he entered the room, “Who’s your friend?”
“Hi, dad.”
He stopped, turned and looked at me, blinked for a moment or two and then just stood there silently. It was even worse than I thought. My mother came into the room in her normal cheerful manner, took one look at me and said, “Get out.”
“Mom…”
“Don’t you ‘mom’ me. I’ve told you in the past that we won’t tolerate any deviant behavior from you.”
“Let me explain,” I said, beginning to cry.
“Get out of my house,” she said with venom.
“Mom, don’t be like this. This isn’t my choice.”
“Of course it is. There’s always a choice for you to make, and we’ll make our choice,” my dad said coldly.
“Dad, say something. Don’t do this.”
“I’m not doing anything that you don’t deserve,” he said.
“This isn’t fair,” Sam said. I tried to shush her, but she was having none of it. “Andi didn’t do anything wrong.”
“His name isn’t Andi.”
“Her name is Cosette Andrea Carson. She didn’t do anything other than wake up two days ago as a woman.”
“That doesn’t happen,” My mom said. There was a sneer on her face.
Before anyone else said anything I stripped off my skirt and underwear. “You mean I’m imagining this?” I growled. “Or how about these? Could these have just happened?” I said as I stripped out of my shirt. My dad beat a hasty retreat.
“Put your clothing back on,”
“Why, because I sicken you?”
“Because a lady doesn’t parade around half naked,” She said with a little smirk. I flushed bright red in embarrassment and quickly got myself dressed again.
“Well, the main question now is, are you my son or just someone who happened to look like him.”
“Mom…”
“I know, you act a bit like him, especially your impulsive nakedness.”
“Mom!”
“Sam, did I ever tell you about all of the times I had to chase him down the street because he was running around naked?”
Sam laughed at this and I just hid my face in my hands.
“Knees together...Andi.”
I snapped my knees together and looked through my fingers at my mom, “You called me ‘Andi.’”
“I still don’t know that I accept this...but you are my child. I might still have to disown you…”
“I didn’t choose this, Mom. It just happened.”
“It certainly looks that way, unless you’ve been coming here in a fat suit for months. You look really good, by the way. And you’re beautiful.”
I began to cry and my mom came and sat down next to me and gathered me in her arms. “We can get through this, Andi. Hopefully there will be someway to change you back…”
“What if I don’t want to go back,” I said through my sobs.
“I know you don’t sweety. We don’t get to choose our gender, though.”
“I didn’t choose to be a boy, mom. You know that. I never liked who I had become and it was slowly killing me. Now, maybe I can be happy.”
“With cramps and pregnancy and childbirth? Bloating and hormones and all of that?”
“Especially with all of that. I would consider it a miracle to be able to give birth, mom.”
“I always considered it one myself,” she said quietly as she just hugged me. “But that’s not for you,” she said, sadly.
“It wasn’t for me. I don’t know if this is even permanent, or some strange temporary thing. If it is permanent, though…”
“Oh, Honey. I hope for your sake it isn’t.”
“Mom…”
“Hear me out. Life is difficult enough, man or woman, that you don’t need to add other people’s prejudice into it. It is going to be difficult for you at church after this.”
I just looked at her and she smiled sadly at me. We discussed the changes that there would be for me there. I know many in my audience are uncomfortable with religion in general, so I’ll not bore you with the details. Anyone who is interested could talk to my friend Faeriemage, but for me, for now, I knew before what it would entail, and it was never part of the reasoning why I wasn’t transitioning.
The short form of this is that in my faith the men and women segregate for the last block of meetings on Sunday. The men talk about their responsibilities to the home as the patriarchal head. The men are not in charge, they just preside. The women have a much more social gathering where they provide support to one another and talk about the joy they find in the gospel of Christ.
This was a society that I simply didn’t have the language to interact with, and I would be shown as an outsider. It would be like being a new convert to the church even though I had been born into it. It would also be a great moment to run smack into the difference between ‘love the sinner, hate the sin,’ and ‘bigotry united,’ which seems to exist in any organization that has a basis in absolute morality.
My dad eventually joined in the conversation and even replaced my mom on the couch just holding me. We wound down and I just sat there, my head on my dad’s shoulder. I was more comfortable in my own skin at that moment than at any other moment in my life.
“Hey, Dad.”
“Hey, Princess.”
“Are you okay with all this,” I asked quietly.
“Not really, Andi, but I can survive. All that matters is that you’re okay with it. You know how we both feel, and you have to make your own decisions. Unfortunately your brothers and sister have to make their decisions as well.”
“I didn’t ask for this,” I said a little hotly.
“I know, but that doesn’t matter. Especially with one of your nephews already having some gender confusion.”
“That was a long time ago. He’s grown out of his wish to dress up as a princess for Halloween.”
“Has he? Have you?”
“Dad...I never wanted to dress up as a princess.”
“Technically, that’s not true,” my mom said with a smile.
“Oh?” I said, arching an eyebrow at her. I was too comfortable in my father’s arms to do any more than that.
“Yep. Wonder Woman was an amazonian princess before she came to live with the mortals,” she said with a straight face. I just giggled a bit at that and Sam and my dad laughed. Eventually my mom joined in on the laughter.
“You wanted to be Wonder Woman for halloween?”
“Or Bat Girl. I wasn’t really particular. I ended up as Batman.”
“You seemed to enjoy it,” my mom said. She was referring to the smile that I had on my face in the picture that she still had of me and my two brother’s in our gotham crime fighter outfits.
“That’s only because in my mind I was really Bat Girl. She has a similar outfit to Batman’s”
“You little minx,” my mom said in shock and we all laughed again.
She got out the album with the image in it and looked at it again. “I can see it. All we would have needed was to give you a wig and you could have been Bat Girl.”
“I still would have preferred Wonder Woman,” I said with a mock pout.
“Then we can do it this year,” my father said.
“What?” my mom and I said at the same time.
“It’s just a couple of months away. that is more than enough time for your mom to make a costume for you.”
“Do you even have the time, mom?” I asked. She’d been subtly shaking her head no, but dad, like normal, had missed it. I was trying to give her an out.
“It’s not a problem,” she said with a false smile.
“No, don’t worry about it, I’ll do something else,” I said in reply, no smile on my face.
“Beth, you can do this, I know you have enough time over the next two months,” my dad said, and I wanted to hide. My parents occasionally have had epic arguments that would make WWI look like a little border skirmish. They drew up their battle lines and they would feud for months as neither would back down from their position. They would have their battles during this time where one or the other would declare a temporary victory.
There wasn’t going to be one over me now.
“I could be a boy again before that. We really don’t know.”
“If it is going to be this once, and never again, then you deserve the opportunity to actually spend halloween as the person you chose, and I have to say that Wonder Woman is an excellent choice.”
“You would know. You watched it on TV with me.”
“But, Bill…”
“Our son deserves to be beautiful once. And if she’s still our daughter she deserves to have been able to go as Wonder Woman at least once.”
“Mom, think about it. I’m not going to be outgrowing this. If I stay a girl, then I will be able to wear it more than just the once.”
My mom stood there for a few minutes, thinking. I held my breath. I hoped with with some well placed shots of logic I might have headed off the war before it could get a full head of steam. For now, the only thing we could do was wait for my mom to come to a decision.
“Well, let’s get you upstairs and get some measurements.”
I got up and did a little happy dance and then followed my mom upstairs.
“Ok, Strip. Leave on your underwear, but take everything else off.”
I did as instructed and she began to measure. She got my leg length as well as arm length.
“Mom, she wears a glorified swimsuit.”
“Oh, I know that, honey. The other measurements are for you. You need to know your measurements as a girl. It will help you to find clothing that actually fits.”
“but isn’t girl’s clothing in arcane measurements that mean nothing regarding shape and so on?”
“Mostly, yes, of course it is. But those sizes have relations to hip and waist and leg length. Using your measurements you can quickly approximate your size. You’ll still need to try clothing on, but it should be easier to find the right selection.”
My mom sat there for a moment on the edge of her bed as I started to get dressed. “Are you sure about this?” my mom said. She was looking at her hands as she worried at the tape measure.
“I’m sure that you’ll make a wonderful costume. You’ve made so many for me in the past…”
“No, not that. With your figure you’d be beautiful in a paper bag...or a burlap sack. I’m seriously considering putting you in a fully covering costume of burlap.”
“I’ll be ok, mom. I promise.”
“I know you will. That’s what worries me. You’ve come alive for the first time in years. I caught glimpses of this person when you were first in love with someone, or you found a new hobby, but it never lasted. I’m afraid…”
“That this too shall pass?” I said with a small lopsided grin. My mother always loved my lopsided grins. They weren’t as natural with my new symmetric face, but I remembered what they felt like.
“How can you be sure that you want this more than being a boy?”
“Mom, I have dreamed so many dreams in which I was changed from a boy into a girl. I had these dreams long before I even realized that I was transgendered. You know what I always felt when this happened in these dreams?”
She shook her head as her tears began to fall and I went to sit next to her.
“It wasn’t happiness, or pleasure or even joy. It was something far more...sublime than that. I simply felt at peace. Some of the methods I dreamed up were painful or scary or both, but in the end, when I was changed, I felt at peace.”
“And what do you feel now?” she said as she put an arm across my shoulders.
I leaned my head into her shoulder, which was an accomplishment given our differences in height. “I feel at peace,” I said quietly and just stay there as she cried.
I have a 43” bust. My chest is 38” just under my breasts. My waist is an unhealthy 22”, or so I think myself. My hips are only 39” but my narrow waist makes them seem bigger than they are.
I’m going to be wearing a lot of belts, it seems, since my waist would put me into a size 0 and my hips put my into a size 20. My top is only a size 18, though, so I guess I’m not going to find anything off the rack that just...fits. Not a dress anyway. Separates, however, are going to work fine.
I’m of two minds on my waist, all things considered. My waist naturally has the cinched in look that you could only hope to get ‘normally’ though corsetting. I’m sure there must be a problem here, but I can live with it, or so I hope. I’ve always liked the look that a corset gives the female body, and now I would have that look, at least until I got pregnant.
Or until I begin gaining weight.
It was almost enough to give me an eating disorder, or should I say another one. I’d been an overeater for a very long time. I ate as a stress response. I had a number of truly stressful situations in my life. Divorce, job loss, miscarriage, and many of the other little troubles that life throws at you I have drowned in food.
It’s true that I haven’t had the same desire to eat that I did before all of this. My portion sizes were smaller than they had been and I filled up much faster than I had. There was no need for me to force the issue, so I didn’t.
When my mother was cried out and fixed what little makeup she wore I went downstairs to gather Sam and get to my doctor’s appointment. It wasn’t that I wanted to go anywhere, but I had responsibilities and figuring out what was going on with my health was one of them.
We arrived at the clinic without any further mishaps, by which I mean no further fights. We signed in at the desk and went to wait in the comfortable waiting room. One thing can be said about smaller clinics over hospitals or large corporate clinics: they leave the industrial chic behind and actually apply interior design to their waiting rooms.
The chairs were in a brown leatherette that you sank into when you sat down. There were couches on either end of the room and individual chairs along both of the longer walls. The magazines were still out of date, but at least they were only two months old.
I sat down and tried to read a Glamour, but quickly realized I wouldn’t ever be ‘that girl’ and settled for a People instead. I would never pick up one of the magazines on my own, but I have to admit that they were the best of the options available on the table. I wouldn’t have been caught dead reading a Sport’s Illustrated when I was a guy and had even less reason now and I’d never even thought about being interested in Fish & Stream.
It should be obvious that I am way too old for Highlights.
Sorry, when I am nervous I ramble, and I was nervous sitting there in that room. People came and were seated and others were called back. We waited while I idly flipped through the magazine, barely registering that it was in my hands.
“Bill Carson?”
I got up and walked over to where the nurse was standing.
“May I help you?”
“I’m Bill Carson,” I said with distaste. I tried to keep it out of my voice, but it was there. Already I was thinking of myself as Cosette Carson, and telling people that I was bill was a bit galling.
“You’re Bill Carson?”
I fished my ID out of the old purse I was borrowing from Sam and showed it to her. She examined it, once again, and then handed it back to me and blushed a deep red color. I felt a flush beginning to rise in my own cheeks as I’m sure other people in the room were staring at me, making their own assumptions about who or what I was.
Unfortunately they were at least half right so I had no grounds to fuss them out. I was measured and weighed again and then lead to an exam room to wait again. You’d think that they’d only call you back to a room when a doctor was actually ready for you, but it seems they get you in there as soon as a room is open.
It was only about a minute and a half before the nurse returned and took my vitals. She then proceeded to take a couple of vials of blood.
“What is this for?”
“There are some anomalies in your blood work and we wanted to get enough of a sample to make sure that we aren’t making mistakes.”
“What sort of anomalies?”
“It’s really not my place to say, Mr. Carson.”
I looked at her name plate before I replied and then pulled out my carry letter, “I am a woman, Jennifer. I would appreciate you treating me as such.”
“Oh, you’re one of those,” she said with a sneer.
“I’d prefer a different nurse, please. You’re done.”
“I’ll tell you…”
I just stood up and stared at her. I still had a height advantage, even if I’d lost about five inches of my previous height, and I just looked at her.
There is more to being menacing than having bulky arms or a toned physique. It is how you look at people. It is the look of someone who has seen and inflicted violence and is not afraid to inflict more of it.
I used to get in fights during Middle School. When you have a student population of pre-teens and newly minted teens, they push boundaries. The bullies see who has a weakness and they exploit it. I was a quiet student who kept to himself...usually.
People would push me and slap me around. I didn’t accept that sort of behaviour and I struck back. I never screamed or flailed around. I just economically and quietly began punching people. None of my punches really packed any sort of force, but there were a lot of them and I never stopped until someone pulled me off.
Eventually people realized that I wasn’t someone to pick on.
Nurse Jennifer didn’t need an object lesson. She swallowed and walked out of the room. It was quite a bit longer before someone else entered the room.
“You really shouldn’t be threatening my staff,” the doctor said as he entered with another couple of guys.
“Then they shouldn’t be bigoted,” I said calmly.
“Miss, it doesn’t matter what she said…”
“She called me a man,” I said beginning to get angry.
His mouth opened and closed a couple of times. He grabbed the file from the door and looked at it. I handed him my license and carry letter. His eyes grew wide and then he handed my documentation back to me.
“I’m so sorry Ms. Carson. That never should have happened. In the future simply leave the room and talk to one of the other staff.”
“It’s been a stressful couple of days. I shouldn’t have over reacted.”
“You just started your transition then?” he said looking me up and down.
“In a manner of speaking. I saw a doctor here a couple of days ago. Could I speak to him?”
“Let’s see. That was Dr. Lambert. Yes, I show he is scheduled to see you today. Again, I’m sorry for any hassle the nurse might have put you through.”
“Thank you doctor…”
“Home. I’m Dr. Home.”
I smiled at him and the three men retreated. Dr. Lambert arrived a bit out of breath a few minutes later. “So, Bill…” he began and then he got a good look at me. I have to admit that I never really looked at him before myself.
He was young compared to most of the doctors in the clinic. I quickly glanced at his left hand and didn’t see a ring and my heart did a little flip of joy. He was really good looking and was tall, hopefully taller than me. I caught the direction my thoughts were heading in and gave myself a little shake.
He was a doctor, which means he get’s to see people at their worst. He saw me at my worst.
“This isn’t possible,” he whispered after a moment or two.
“What to check me out and see how possible it is,” I asked and then blushed bright red when I realized what I said.
“I’ll likely need to, Bill.”
“Cosette, please.”
“Cosette?”
I handed him my carry letter and he read it.
“This is dated yesterday.”
“I know.”
“Anything you’ve been taking to achieve this would have to have started before yesterday.”
“Doctor, I need you to do a full examination. You saw me two days ago, you know what you saw. You’ll be able to confirm...things for me.”
“Cosette…”
“Please. I need to know if this is permanent.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’ll tell you after your examination.”
He nodded and got me another of the ubiquitous robes. He left while I put it on. I took off all of my underwear, knowing he would need to examine those parts that were covered. I spent the time while waiting for him to return neatly folding my clothing.
He began to reach in to listen to my heart and brushed against my breast and I gasped at the feeling it sent through me. He immediately stopped, took a look at what he’d touched and walked out of the room. I was confused until he returned with a female nurse.
She seemed to be there as a chaperone as Dr. Lambert did the rest of the exam himself. I was completely embarrassed at all of my reactions afterward. I felt like crying.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“It didn’t hurt. That was the problem,” I said miserably and the nurse snickered. “this isn’t funny,” I said through a couple of tears.
“Haven’t you ever had a female exam before,” the nurse asked with a grinning smile.
“She’s only been female for about two days,” Dr. Lambert said coming to my defense.
The nurses eyes got huge and she looked at me again. “He...she had surgery two days ago? Where? How?”
“This was without surgery. That’s why she’s here, correct?” he said turning to me for confirmation. I nodded and he continued, “Get dressed and I’ll be back in here to discuss the results.”
He ushered the nurse out and I quickly got dressed. I was sitting on the chair at the side of the room when he returned.
“That was...remarkable. I’ve never seen anything like that in my life. If I hadn’t examined you two days ago I’d never have believed it.”
I began to feel uncomfortable again as he talked about his examination. When I began to examine my feelings I realized that I wasn’t uncomfortable per se...I was becoming aroused. I kept having images of his hands touching and entering me flash through my head. My breath became a little short and he moved over next to me, “Are you ok?”
“I need you to back up a bit,” I said, staring up into his eyes. My breathing stopped completely and I just waited for him to do something, anything. Kiss me I thought, but my mouth wouldn’t form the words.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” he replied and backed up a bit.
“It’s just that…”
“You find doctors and exams stimulating. You’re not the first person I’ve had in here with a medical fetish…”
“What…”
“I could tell you were aroused.”
I rolled my eyes as he smiled at me. I hopped up from the chair and walked over to him. He backed up until he reached the wall. I kept going until I was within inches of him. I could feel his heat radiating from his body and I could feel my arrousal growing again.
“It wasn’t the idea that you were a doctor that had me interested.” I said in a low husky voice.
“It wasn’t?” I could hear his breath catch in his throat.
“It was all you personally. The thought of you...touching me,” I could barely get the words out. I felt a sort of explosion in my stomach and I got really warm all over. I stared into his eyes for a moment or two longer and then went and sat down.
“That has got to be horrible for my health,” I said as I tried to calm my raging hormones. I felt like a teenager all over again, only with less self control.
“Excuse me?”
“To be blunt, I would love nothing more than for you to bend me over this table and...well you get the idea.”
His knees gave out a bit and he hurriedly sat down.
“Sorry, I’ve never had this strong a reaction to anyone I’ve ever met,” I say with a shy smile. I wonder how this guy is coping with all the mixed signals I am giving out. My old self would have been growling in frustration by this point.
“For the sanity of the male population of the planet I’m going to do something that I would never have thought possible. I’m going to prescribe…”
I caught on to what he was saying and stamped over to him and got in his face, “Dont you dare tell me you are going to prescribe toys for me.” I said while a little voice in my head was going ‘yay, he’s at least six inches taller than me. I can wear heels.’
I had to fight to keep the smile from my face because I was upset that he would think a bit of plastic or rubber could replace human contact.
“I thought I was helping…”
“What is your first name?”
“Huh?”
“Your first name,” I said impatiently, a small smile playing across my lips.
“Why do you need my first name?”
“Because, doctor, I’m not having this argument with you and using a title.”
“Oh...um...is this wise?”
“You’re the one who made it personal by thinking to prescribe...toys,” I said with a lopsided grin. This one was easier than the one that I gave my mom. Maybe practice makes perfect.
“Thomas.”
“Tom, I like you. You’re the first man who has ever made me feel this way. Sometimes, fantasising I was a woman, I would be attracted to...well images,” I said and blushed to the roots of my hair. “You’re the first guy who has...gotten my engine running from a standing start.”
“You’re not really good at this are you,” he said grinning at me.
I punched him on the arm lightly. “That’s not helping,” I said smiling at him. “It’s embarrassing having a conversation like this.”
He just smiled and nodded once at me.
I went and sat back down again because I realized how close we’d gotten again. It felt like he was putting out some sort of gravitational force and I was caught up in his orbit. It scared me to think that anyone could have this sort of effect on me, but it was strangely liberating at the same time. He’d never outright rejected me and he hadn’t run screaming from the room.
“Ms. Carson…”
“I’m calling you Tom right now, the lease you could do is call me Cosette...or Andrea...Andi if you like...I’m babbling,” I said and sat down tilting my head forward. A cascade of hair flowed over my shoulders and settled in front of my face. It was safe and comfortable in here.
He brushed the hair out of my face and lay and hand on my shoulder.
“Cosette, I shouldn’t be doing this. It is unprofessional.”
I just stared up into his eyes and leaned into his hand. “I don’t care,” I said softly. “As long as you aren’t married and don’t have a girlfriend what is the problem? Wait, you’re not gay are you.”
“Apparently not,” he said with a small smile. “Cosette, I’m your doctor…”
“You don’t have to be,” I said softly and kissed his palm.
He sat up and walked to the other side of the room. “Please, let me speak. You are the only person I have ever been attracted to.”
“Ever?” I said with a bit of wonder in my voice.
“Ever,” he said with a kind smile. “I don’t know what this means. I don’t...do this sort of thing. I don’t want you getting hurt.”
“Relationships are messy, Tom. It is the nature of the beast. I’m fine with that.”
“What if I’m not?”
“How can you say that if you’ve never…”
“Not that part. I couldn’t see myself hurting you.”
“I don’t understand…”
“I’ve never liked seeing people hurt. It’s why I became a doctor. I wanted to be able to fix the hurts that people feel. I became an ObGyn to help bring life into this world.”
“What are you trying to tell me?”
“I’m trying to say that I don’t want to be the cause of any sort of pain in your life. Maybe that’s why I’ve never been able to relax enough, let down my guard enough, to realize I could be attracted to someone.”
“You’ve never dated?”
“Not really. A couple of dates in high school, but you’re not hearing me.”
“Oh, I listened to you. You’re saying you don’t want to hurt me, so that’s fine by me. It just means that you have to learn the two most important words my grandfather told me before I got married.”
He laughed and said, “What were the two most important words your grandfather told you?”
“Yes, dear.”
“Now, do you think that we can at least give this a try?” I said.
He didn’t immediately answer. He stood silently on the other side of the room, staring at a point in space. It must have been a full minute that he stared at the floor while I just watched him. I noticed a smile play across his lips for a moment and then he really looked at me for the first time. I was lost in the depths of his green eyes as he walked over to me. He took my hand, never once breaking my gaze, and brought it up to his lips.
“Yes, dear,” he said just before he kissed it.
My knees buckled and I quickly sat down. A wave passed through me at the barest touch of his lips and took my breath away.
“Are you alright?”
“Yes...but we need to wait a while before we try something like that again.”
“I just kissed your hand,” he said a little concerned.
“Exactly,” I said a little breathlessly and he chuckled.
He turned to leave. “Where are you going?”
“To get you a doctor who isn’t going to want to...do things.” He chuckled and I giggled along with him.
He left and I took that opportunity to get my breathing under control. It took him almost ten minutes to return. I was beginning to worry about Sam and what she would be thinking in the waiting room.
A female doctor entered the room and began to speak, but I lost everything she said as soon as I caught sight of Tom again. I began to blush when I realized what I was doing and looked at the female doctor.
“I can see why you decided to pass this one off to me,” the woman said with a smirk.
“Actually, this time it’s mutual. You know me, I can handle the unrequited lust of any woman under my care.”
“Don’t you think she’s a little young for you?” she said with a sneer.
“She is thirty-eight years old and can talk for herself,” I said a little coldly.
The woman turned and looked at me examining my face, for what I had no idea and began to get a little uncomfortable and squirmed a bit.
“No...there’s no way...she has to be eighteen, nineteen at the oldest.”
“Didn’t you explain what was going on T...Dr. Lambert?”
“Dear, go ahead and call him Tom. If you’ve finally been able to pierce that stone heart of his more power to you, but if you call me anything other than Dr. Wallace I’ll be truly upset.”
My head spun a bit at the speed of her turn around and Tom laughed. “Dr. Wallace has been pursuing me for years. She figured if she was patient I’d eventually notice.”
Dr. Wallace rolled her eyes and then turned to Tom. “So, Tom, what is this she’s talking about that would explain why she looks so young.”
He proceeded to provide a technical explanation of what he’d observed and measured. He even used my file and showed her the information from my visit two days ago, including the prescription that he gave to me.
“Did you take any of this,” Dr. Waters asked.
“Just the one pill before I went to bed. I woke up looking like this the next day.”
“You poor dear.”
“Why would you say that? This is likely the best thing to ever happen to me.”
“But you’re a woman.”
“Exactly,” I said with an incandescent smile.
She blinked a couple of times and I hand her my carry letter and she laughed. “I see. Only someone who had thought about this beforehand would ever have thought to use a transgender excuse if they spontaneously changed gender.”
“Pretty much. It helped that my appearance didn’t change too much.”
“How will you explain losing five inches?”
“Most people never notice, and it gives me an excuse to wear heels.”
“Now that the preliminaries are done, would you mind stepping outside, Tom?”
“I’ll catch you after you’re done,” he said and left me.
“Well, first of all, this explains some of the strangeness with your blood work. We thought there might have been a mistake, well more than one. The lab mistakenly used your blood when they did a karyotype test. Your blood said it was XX. We wanted to test your blood again as you appeared to be a male and we wanted to make sure.”
“Apparently this change is more than skin deep?”
“So it would seem. Your loss of stature supports that, as well as the other changes in bone structure that you seem to have.”
“Is this permanent?”
“We don’t even know what caused it yet, so we can’t really tell you if it’s permanent. The best I can suggest to you is treat it like it’s permanent but make plans for just in case it’s not.”
I nodded and listened to her suggestions and guidelines. Some of them were obvious, but many were not. She ended up providing a lifetime of female medical advice in a little over thirty minutes.
“And finally, no matter how much he begs, don’t let Tom have sex with you on the first date,” she said at the end.
I blushed and asked, “Why? Is there something I should know?”
“Only that good girls keep their knees together at least until they get a ring.” She said it in such a haughty tone that I couldn’t help but laugh.
“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry that it was me and not you.”
“Why would you say that?” she said in confusion.
“Because I couldn’t stand him on Tuesday. I thought he was haughty and self involved and I would have preferred almost any other doctor today.”
She just blinked at me, “But, now…”
“Oh, you mean the whole sexuality thing? I’m presentationally heterosexual.”
She looked at me as if I’d just spoken another language.
“The people I am attracted to are the opposite gender. If I am presenting myself as a male, I can recognize other men that are good looking, but the idea of the two of us ‘hooking up’ isn’t interesting to me.”
She looked at me confused for a moment or two and then asked, “How did you know you weren’t a lesbian?”
“Voyeuristically it was sexy as hell to see two women together, but the thought of me being one of those women turned me off.”
“But you could see yourself as a woman with a man and vis versa?”
“I have two daughters, what do you think,” I said with a little smile.
She looked at me and then blinked a couple of times, “I thought you might have been pulling my leg about this, but every once in a while, you make a masculine comment. I’d never think anything of it, most of the time, since people are people, but I can see the person you are through your words.”
“Thank you, I think.”
“Be nice to him, ok?”
She made a last couple of notes in the file and then told me to set up an appointment for Friday of next week. They’d likely have enough time to get some lab results back by then and they might have more news.
I walked out to the waiting room to let Sam know what was up and noticed her sitting with a man. I’d never seen him before. Whether Sam had met him before or not, I noticed that she was interested now. He lay his hand on the armrest between their two chairs and she looked shocked. She hesitantly put her hand into his and slowly relaxed back into her chair.
One thing you can say about we Carson women, we certainly move fast. I turned around and ran into Tom who had apparently been standing right behind me.
“Someone you know?”
“My wife...well soon to be ex...well actually she is currently my ex since we’re both women, you know what I mean.”
“Not really, but I’ll take your word for it that it means you’re unattached.”
I just nodded at him.
“Well, let’s go meet your wife then.”
We walked over and Sam pulled her hand away as if it were burned. The man looked a little hurt.
“You didn’t need to do that you know. He’s really cute,” I said with a kind smile.
“I know, but…”
“There are no buts. Sam, this is Tom.”
“Tom, huh,” she said with a knowing smile.
I turned and walked over to the guy who was just looking on wondering what was going on. “Hi, I’m Cosette. I’m Sam’s ex,” I said as I offered my hand.
“Sam’s a l…” he began but I cut him off.
“No, I used to be a man.”
“Um...really. You don’t look it,” he stammered.
“Isn’t he just so sweet,” I said to Sam and she giggled.
“His name’s Brandon,” she said when she stopped giggling.
“Nice to meet you Brandon.”
Brandon looked like he wanted to say something so Sam and I just stared at him for a moment with that patented girl ‘go ahead and ask,’ look. He didn’t take the hint.
“So, how do you do it, Tom, knowing that she was...well a he.”
“Tom, do I look like a guy?”
He turned and looked at me a little sheepish, “Well, no.”
“If I’d never told you, would you be able to guess,”
“No. But you told me...”
“I told you because for some reason some guys feel betrayed when they find out later that you used to be a guy.”
“It’s not like you’re going to have sex with him,” Tom said.
“No, but he will be helping to raise my daughter.”
He nodded to me in concession and I smiled at him.
“I haven’t even asked Sam out yet?”
“The ‘yet’ says it all,” I said and he laughed.
“You’re pretty confident, aren’t you?”
“You should have seen her when we were dating. You remember how you asked me to marry you?”
I got an innocent expression on my face and shook my head.
“Well, this bozo one day says, ‘when we get married, what time of year are you thinking?’”
Tom and Brandon just look at me in shock for a moment or two before before breaking out in laughter.
“What did you answer?” Tom said when he had recovered.
“I’ll have to think about it,” she said with a smile.
“Yeah, she just accepted the premise that we would be getting married,” I said with a little smile.
“We lasted ten years, though, so that’s not nothing,” she responded with a smile. She tossed me the keys to the car.
“I’ll pick up our daughter Rose on the way home.”
“Where are you off to?”
“Well, I thought that Brandon could drive me,” she said as she sat down on the couch. Brandon quickly went and sat next to her. I gave her a thumbs up before turning to Tom.
“Walk me to my car?”
“Of course.”
We left the building and were halfway down the walk before he put his arm around me. I leaned into his embrace. He opened the door to my car and took my hand to help me into my seat.
“Go out with me tonight.”
“That doesn’t sound like a question.”
“It wasn’t.”
“I have nothing to wear.”
“We’ll go somewhere you can wear what you are right now.”
“But, Tom, girls like to wear nice clothing, different clothing, on a date.”
“Fine...would you please go on a date with me tonight? I need to see you again.”
I looked up into his eyes and my breathing stopped again. He leaned into the car and kissed me full on the lips.
“Ok,” I said in a dazed voice.
“You’ll got out with me tonight?”
“No! I have nothing to we…” he kissed me again. I smiled and touched my lips as he pulled back. “Yes…”
“So, seven o’clock?”
I looked up at him, wanting to say no again...but looking into his eyes I couldn’t say no. “Fine. Seven o’clock,” I said in a martyred tone.
He punched the air and I smiled up at him, “you have to make me a promise, though.”
“What’s that,” he said growing serious.
“Kiss me?”
“Always,” he said and he did.
This is not supposed to be a synopsis of the musical, but just to give you a little background.
In the song, the child Cosette sings about a place where people love her, she is allowed to play, and there is enough food to fill her belly. These are the simple dreams of a child with nothing. Of note, these dreams come true, but not in the way that the child assumes.
I picked the imagery because much like that child had a dream that they knew couldn’t come true, so did our protagonist. She was sure she would never be able to stand in the sun and simply be the woman that her soul told her she was and needed to be.
Much like the child our adult Cosette received help from a direction she never expected.
And, truth be told, they were a way to get off. I was human, and unfortunately I had needs that I felt my wife couldn’t meet. I’m ashamed of this part of me, but that is my shame and no reflection on anyone around me.
Tom wasn’t a fantasy. Just thinking about him now I felt stirrings that wouldn’t be pushed down so easily. This wasn’t the same as my fantasies before. I just wanted to be around him. He seemed to make the entire world come alive just by being in it. I felt out of control and I was fine with that.
Truth be told I felt like a teenager again, or as close to one as I could remember. It was like everything boiled down to a single moment in time that could never happen again and Tom was the focal point.
What was wrong with me? Why had all of this happened to me? Why had Tom’s touch affected me so greatly?
I thought back over the day, and realized that it wasn’t just Tom that had caused what had happened. I’d been having the uncomfortable feeling all day long. I’d begun watching the guys at work and I’d felt a glow growing in me as I fantasized, just a little, about what they would be like in bed.
It wasn’t as if I went from zero to sixty just with Tom. My engine had been primed and running all day long as I thought about sex.
When I realized what was going on, I focused on getting myself home, and wondered if I shouldn’t call off my date. I now had a flood of female hormones rushing through my system, but I likely still had a lot of the male hormones as well...and testosterone has been known to increase female sex drive as well as male.
I was a boiling cauldron of hot and ready.
I got in a shower as soon as I got home and turned the water on as cold as I could stand it. I just stood and let the chill seep into my bones. Every so slowly, as my temperature decreased, I could feel my heartrate and breathing return to normal, only at this moment realizing that they had been elevated.
No wonder I had reacted so strongly to Tom. I had been primed and ready for anyone to touch me, and then he had. Sure, it was an accidental touch, but my sex starved body hadn’t cared and it had leapt at the opportunity and kicked everything into overdrive.
The problem remained when I got out of the shower. I was considering taking matters into my own hands when I heard the front door open and little feet come scampering into the house. I wrapped a towel around myself and hurried into my bedroom.
“Nice towel,” Sam said a moment later as she joined me. She was carrying a couple of bags. I looked at the clock and realized I had been standing in the shower for close to three hours. No wonder my legs were a little weak.
“What’s in the bags?”
“Clothing. If not tonight then soon, but that doctor is going to ask you out.”
“How do you know he’s a doctor?”
“White coat and he was in the clinic.”
I felt a little silly for asking the question after she made her matter of fact response. “Brandon drove you shopping?”
“Rose came with us.”
“He seems nice.”
“He was waiting for his sister in the waiting room and we just got to talking. I had to keep telling myself that I wasn’t cheating on you. It was hard. I like him, but it’s so difficult...”
“Moving on from ten years with the same person, especially when you still have a good relationship with them?”
“You don’t seem to have that problem,” she said a little bitterly.
I blushed and looked away, “I think I’m just horny.”
She laughed at me and dropped the bags on the bed, “well, don’t expect me to help you out with that.”
“Would you hate me forever if I invited Tom home with me tonight?”
“Probably not, but is that what you really want?”
“Yes...no...I don’t know. My body says yes, yes, yes but my upbringing tells me that if he’s worth it he’s worth waiting for.”
She wrapped me in a hug and I sat there growing more uncomfortable in my towel. We went through the bags and I was astonished at what was in there. It wasn’t the quantity as there were only a few items but the quality.
“Can we afford this?” I said, not daring to look at the price tags.
“Brandon bought all these. He thought it was a nice gesture.”
I picked up the lacy panties and raised an eyebrow, “You’re new boyfriend helped pick out underwear for me. Doesn’t that seem a little strange to you?”
“When you put it that way, sure, but it was more his sister than him doing the actual picking out.”
I got dressed in the underwear and all of my efforts before with the shower seemed to be for naught. I felt sexy and desirable. The bra was strapless and I wondered for a moment before she pulled out the dress. It was a flowing affair that would leave by shoulders bare. It was sexy without needed to be painted on.
I fell in love with it at first sight and just had to wear it. More that at any time in the past couple of days, when I wore that dress I felt like I was a woman. My lacy underthings told me the same thing. It was...special.
It was as if every stitch of clothing I wore was designed to reinforce who I was underneath it all, and underneath it all I was a woman. Sam worked on my hair as I sat there, working it into a half braid of some sort. I caught a look at myself in the mirror when she was done and all of my careful work in the shower went out the window.
Inside I was still man enough to find my image sexy as hell. It didn’t matter that I know the woman in the mirror was me because that just made it more fun. I knew that I could air my fantasies as reality, and no one would think any less of me for them. Ok, my mom might, but that was a different issue.
I was an adult who could make her own decisions…I took a deep breath and let it all go.
“Sam, I can’t go out tonight.”
“Why not? You’re beautiful.”
“And horny. Really, really horny.”
She laughed at me and I scowled at her, “this isn’t funny.”
“Oh, yes it is. It’s about time the shoe was on the other foot.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Your inconsistency. Sometimes you were very very good and I got everything I needed. On the other hand...sometimes I was more worked up after you got done than I was when you started.”
“Sam!”
“It’s true. You really tried, but sometimes you just lost focus.”
“Sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it. I loved making love to you. It was always an adventure even when I didn’t get the big O.”
We chuckled a little bit and I hugged her.
“I don’t have any makeup.”
“You look fine without it. Sure, you could look better, but then all of us can.”
“How can I do this? I don’t want to be ‘that girl.’”
“Then don’t. You have self control. Use it.”
I smiled weakly at her and went out to the living room. Brandon and his sister were arguing about something. It was too quiet for me to hear and they stopped when I came into view.
“Are you twins?” I asked.
“Of a sort,” Brandon said.
“Hush,” his sister said and then she turned to me, “I’m Brandy.”
I blinked a couple of time, “are you sure you aren’t twins?” The looked almost exactly alike. I’d never seen Fraternal twins that looked as close as those two did. They looked as similar as I did to my old pictures of me as a boy.
“Like he said, it’s complicated. Look at you, though, you’re...beautiful,” she said in almost awe.
“Thank you.”
Rose ran out into the room. “Daddy!” she said as she leapt into my arms.
“Hello my little Thorn. How was your day?”
“Great. Louis is picking on me again.” Someone needs to explain the concept of great to her.
“What did he do this time?” I said with a smile. I sat there with her on my lap for a few minutes while I waited for Tom to arrive. She played with my dress as she talked.
“Daddy, can I get a dress like this one?”
“When you’re older, honey.”
“Ok.”
The doorbell rang and Sam went to get it while I extricated myself from my daughter. “I’m going on a date tonight,” I told her.
“Is mommy going with you?”
“No, mommy is staying here.”
“Why not? Why aren’t you going on a date with mommy?”
I saw Tom enter the room and I smiled at him and then turned back toward my daughter. “Honey, I’m a woman now. I can still be your Daddy, but I can’t be mommy’s husband.”
“Why not?” She was starting to cry. “I don’t want you to leave. You left Hannah. I don’t want you to leave me.”
“Baby, I’m not leaving.”
“But you’re going on a date.”
I smiled sadly at her. “I’ll be back later.”
“Mommy, can I stay up til daddy gets home?”
Sam looked at me over Rose’s head and I nodded at her.
“Of course, Rose. You can stay up til Daddy gets home.”
Rose got up and ran over to Sam, doing a little happy dance the entire way.
I got up and floated over to Tom. It’s certain I didn’t walk there. He kissed me on the cheek and hugged me when I arrived.
“You have her home by 10,” Sam said from the other side of the room.
“Don’t you trust me?” Tom said looking deeply into my eyes.
“It’s not that,” I said leaning against him, “it’s that Rose should be in bed sometime tonight and I promised.”
“Well, in that case we need to hurry,” he said and let me go. I waved at Sam and the two of us walked out the door.
We walked out to his car and I stood there nervously as he opened the door for me. Once again he took my hand and helped me in. I sat there looking up at him for a moment before I swung my legs in. He lifted the skirt of my dress out of the way of the door and for a moment his hand rested on my thigh. I closed my eyes and just lived in that moment, relishing the feel of his hand.
I buckled myself in and waited for him to have a seat, watching how he moved. He had a well built body, and I could have watched him for hours. We were on our way almost before I even recognized he had gotten in the car.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure,” he said with a chuckle, “ and I’ll even allow another free question on top of the one you just offered.”
I stuck my tongue out at him for a moment and then continued, “Do you think all of this is just a little too fast? I know I leapt because I’m ho...attracted to you,” I said blushing, “but why are you going for this?”
“Have you considered that I might be...attracted to you as well?” he said with a devilish grin. Even if it were for just a brief moment, his gaze felt like a caress and I wanted him to stop the car and keep driving and take me home all at the same time.
“You are interesting, Cosette. Mostly I get people in to see me who are sick. I know, so were you a few days ago, but even then your illness wasn’t just another runny nose or yeast infection.” I squirmed a bit at this talk about something that womanhood had to offer that I was going to do my damndest to avoid.
“You had to have been in pain, but you never mentioned it. You went through your symptoms without offering a suggestion.”
“Why would I have made a suggestion? You’re the doctor after all.”
“You’d be surprised. Give someone access to webMD for a couple of hours and they assume they know more about their problems than I do with all my years in medical school.”
“Not to be a jerk, but not everything they look up will be wrong.”
“Playing devil’s advocate, huh? Suppose there are fourteen illnesses all with similar symptoms. Three are common and amount to nothing more than a common cold. Ten are uncommon, but still possible in the socioeconomic strata the person lives. The last is not only rare, but almost impossible to ‘contract’ because it is a genetic illness. Which of these do you think the patient assumes they have?”
“The rare one of course,” I said with a smile.
“Of course. Doesn’t mean they’re wrong, but it also doesn’t make them right. And it makes them more argumentative when I tell them it’s just a common cold. Now it’s my turn: Why did you go from disliking me on Tuesday to..well...today?”
“I thought you were kind of rude and distant. And I was uncomfortable. And sick. I get irritable when I’m sick.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said with a smile, “but why the turn around?”
“Since the change I’ve been really keyed up. I mean really. I have never been this...aroused before,” I said quietly realizing that the object of my lust was sitting in the same car with me.
“Well, that’s good to know. I’m not sure I could date a nymphomaniac.”
I stuck my tongue out at him again, only this time he grabbed it with his thumb and forefinger. Smiling I took it into my mouth and began to suck on it a little...until I noticed him shift uncomfortably in his seat.
“Oh, god. I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have done that,” I said.
“Not to worry,” he said a little hoarsely, “no blood no foul.”
“Argh. I like what I’ve seen so far about you, but with this little wanton riding herd in my head all I can think is ‘ridem cowgirl,’”
“Ridem cowgirl?”
“Um..yeah...cowgirl...it’s a sexual position…”
“I know what it is, but that has to be one of the more ridiculous statements I’ve ever heard.”
Looking into his face I realizing he was trying to defuse the situation with laughter, but I could see a little hurt look in his eyes.
“What am I thinking? I’m so sorry. I should never have thought...here I am saying and doing things that would have had me all ready to go before, if a girl said them to me, and then just divorcing you for the conversation.”
“Stop, Cosette. You are a damn sexy woman, but I want more than just sex with anyone.”
“What are you saying,” I ask, a little worried.
“I want a relationship. With you. This is not going to be something sudden or even something easy. Both of us have too much baggage for that. We need time to get used to each other before we even think about having sex.”
I look at him with a little mue of disbelief and he amends his statement, “Ok, without thinking seriously about it.”
“Fine, but can I tell you that I have never wanted anyone more than I want you right now?”
“I know…”
“No, I’m not just talking this whole physical thing that is going on. I never thought I would have anyone, let alone a guy, say something like that to me.”
“You were married for ten years.”
“Yes, I was. And it was work. There were lots of good times, don’t get me wrong, but staying in a relationship takes a willingness to bend.”
“Good thing I’m flexible,” he said with a little grin. I just started at him open mouthed as I considered a couple of positions…
“Bad boy,” I said finally
“No, not really, but I can be dirty.”
“Maybe I’ll have to help you clean up,” I said with a grin of my own.
“This is going to be harder than I thought.”
I closed my mouth before I returned with the obvious response of, ‘I hope so,’ and just grinned at him. Finally I said, “that’s what she said.”
He burst out laughing and a lot of the tension that had been building in the car flew out the windows.
After that the ride went a lot smoother. We talked about who we were and where we’d come from. You know. Normal first date fare. It might initially have been my libido that drove me into his arms, but the longer I remained there the more I realized I really liked this guy.
“Wait, not only are you a doctor, and take care of people at work, but you’re acting as a nurse for your dying mother?”
“Yes,” he said simply.
“I want to visit her, then.”
“What?”
“Look, Tom. I know it must be hard for you to take time away from her. This has to be killing you. I’m asking. This isn’t you volunteering me to meet your mother. Assume for the moment that we’re outside the parameters of the ‘guy code’ and ‘girl code’ take this for what it is: I want you to do something you enjoy, and I want to do it with you.”
We were stopped at a light for the moment so he could just stare at me, the light changed and someone began to honk behind us. He began to drive again and just silently stared at the road.
“Are you sure? A dress like that deserves to be shared.”
“And so do my lacy underthings, but that’s not happening tonight either.” He turned bright red as he digested what I was saying. “And don’t worry. You and your mother will see it.”
I paused watching him get redder and redder before putting him out of his misery. “I mean you are someone and you have seen my dress havent you?”
He laughed in his embarrassment and I just smiled at him.
I took the opportunity to really think about what was happening as I watched the light playing across his face. I realized what I’d disliked about him on Tuesday. Everything else aside, he had been uncomfortable in my presence on Tuesday, and that discomfort had added to my irritation.
“Tom…” I began and then stopped.
“Yes?” he said after a moment or two.
“Why were you so uncomfortable around me on Tuesday?”
He began to fidget a bit and then reached for the radio to turn it on. I reached out and gently grabbed his hand and settled it in my lap. His breathing eased and he simply gripped my hand in his.
“The moment I first saw you, I knew I was lost.”
“I don’t understand.”
“At heart, I am a bit of a romantic, I guess. I always thought that when I met the person I was meant for I would just know. That instantly I would know them on a level beyond mere knowledge.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
He just looked over at me, all of the hurt and pain he was feeling pouring out of him through his eyes.
“Oh,” I said. It was the only thing I could say. He tried to take his hand back but I wasn’t letting him go. “I must seem so shallow to you.”
“No, but I shouldn’t have expected…”
“Hush. Stop right there. I never said that I think you’re a nice boy, or a good guy, or any of the other ‘friend zone’ phrazes of death.”
“No, but…”
“No buts, except for yours which is really nice looking. I have never felt like this before, Tom. I don’t love you. I’m not saying I can’t but I’m a realist enough to know I don’t currently. And will you stop trying to take this hand away from me? It is mine until I relinquish it.”
“Sorry, he said with a little grin.”
“I like you enough to realize that I am willing to try to love you.”
“If you have to work at it…”
“...it’s called a marriage.”
He laughed at that and I admit I smiled myself. He looked so vulnerable, this strong doctor who was trying to let me into his heart, and all I wanted to do was cuddle into his arms and never leave. I didn’t love him, yet, but I could feel the seeds of it already taking root.
“That must have been hard on me when you realized I was a guy.”
“You can’t begin to imagine.”
“Oh, really? I’m Transgendered, Tom. You don’t think I have any understanding of same sex attraction? Really?”
“But, you’re here with me…”
“Ignore the package for a moment and tell me that my old self isn’t screaming away right now saying, ‘this is so gay?’”
He laughed at that and I brought his hand up to my cheek and rubbed it across my jaw.
“Maybe this is who I saw all along?”
“Hmm,” I asked. He’d gently removed his hand from mine and begun caressing my face on his own.
“This beautiful woman sitting beside me.”
“I have no makeup, and no jewelry…”
“Those are the trappings of beauty and not the beauty itself. I told myself, when you were so disgusted with me, that you must have realized I was attracted to you.”
“I never…”
“I know that now, but at the time I thought I’d let my one true chance slip through my fingers because of my own self hate at the idea of being with a man.”
“I’m so sorry that I…”
“You did nothing. You are perfect.”
“I snore.”
“You what?”
“Loudly, or at least I did. I’ve woken up myself snoring I did it so loudly.”
He began to laugh.
“And I chew on my finger nails...when I’m not letting them grow too long. And I…”
“Flaws like these only make you more precious to me and increase my belief that you are perfect.”
My breath caught in my chest and I bit a lip. He pulled over to the side of the road and turned toward me. I was looking into his blue eyes as he got closer and closer and then he was kissing me. Life exploded behind my eyes as we kissed and I could see everything that was being offered the two of us. A happy future and family and everything that I’d ever wanted.
The kiss ended and I was still dazed from this bright vision.
“We’re here.”
“Hmm?” I said in my most articulate mumble.
“My house.”
“Oh,” I said, blushing as he went around to my door and helped me out.
I rose into his embrace and we walked arm in arm into his home.
“Evening, Mom,” Tom called out as we entered the home.
A very handsome older woman sat on the couch reading a kindle. Of all the things that I imagined about his mother, this wasn’t it.
“Surprised,” Tom asked me.
“A little.”
“Oh, has my son been building up his mother the invalid again,”
“A little, Mrs. Lambert,” I said with a smile.
“Julia, please. My, but aren’t you a lovely young one, emphasis on young,” she said looking pointedly at Tom.
“I’m thirty-eight,” I said in my defense.
Suddenly both of them began to laugh and I just looked confused.
“Sorry,” Julia said with a laugh, “I couldn’t help it. You do seem young, but Tom told me about you this afternoon.”
“Nothing bad, I hope?”
She just smiled, and I went and sat next to her when she beckoned me over.
“So, Tom, get us something to drink while I get to know the beautiful young woman who’s captured your heart.”
We began to talk and I found Julia to be pleasant and witty. She reminded me a lot of Tom, what little I knew of the man so far, and I could see where he got his sense of humor. Tom had just returned when I had the worst feeling come over me like there was something wrong. It passed as soon as it came.
“Is something wrong,” Julia asked.
“I don’t know.”
Again, the feeling crept over me, this feeling of dread, and I felt as if the ground were falling out from under me.
“Cosette,” Tom called out to me, a note of worry in his voice.
“Something is wrong,” I said. A wave of dizziness swept over me.
Daddy!
“Rose?” I said, looking around. I knew I heard her, but there was no way she was here.
“What’s going on, Cosette,” Julia said.
There’s something wrong with Mommy. They’re hurting her!
I didn’t know how, or why, but somehow I did know that this wasn’t a hallucination.
“Tom, we have to go home now. Something is terribly wrong.”
We said goodnight to his mother and he helped me into his car before driving almost recklessly fast.
“Hurry,” I said quietly. He just laid on more speed.
Well, the warnings are there. I hope I don't offend too many people.
Most of you, I’m sure will have heard the poem by Frost at least once in your life. If you haven’t you should read it. I’ll wait. No really. I’m not going to say anything here that you will miss while you go read the poem.
While they’re all gone, I just wanted to say that I deplore the waste that the education…
Just kidding. I’ve always wanted to do something like that. This, however, is distracting from my story. The two roads, however, is all about my story.
There are choices that each one of us is given to make in our lives. Do we go left, do we go right. Do we have that extra piece of bacon in the morning or go for the bran muffin instead. Do we stay home or go out. Do we kiss the boy or do we take him up to our room for something else.
Do we were the sneakers or the black pumps. Makeup or no makeup.
Then there are the really tough questions. Am I a boy or a girl? Do I want to continue to live? Should I continue taking birth control while I am sexually active.
To a certain degree, the big decisions are made for us. Who we are is defined by all of the action we take in our lives and those actions define a course that lead us through the big decisions as if they were just another little decision.
We still have a choice, and not matter how small, all of our decisions have consequences.
Some people think that consequences are all bad. Consequences are a neutral term. The problem is that we have been told for years we should be able to make the decision and avoid the consequences. That’s impossible, you see, because all that does is change the consequences.
Whether or not you keep the baby to term and give her up for adoption or keep her you live with those consequences. If you have an abortion, that comes with its own set of consequences.
Even killing yourself has consequences. You may not have to live with them, since you are dead, but all the people around you do. I use live with in the literal sense. If there is a life after this one, then you will have the consequence of suicide continue along with you.
This decision was about none of these. I made a decision to leave Sam alone with people I didn’t know. You can’t protect people all of the time. It just isn’t possible. You are a single individual, and as such are limited in the way that any one individual is limited.
You can only be truly alert for about 16 out of 24 hours. You can only be in one place at any given time. Your mind prioritises input in order to provide you with a meaningful datastream, which unfortunately can result in a phenomena called ‘change blindness.’
No one person can fully protect the life of another from all harm. That doesn’t stop us from feeling guilty when someone we care for is hurt and we think that we could have prevented it from happening in the first place.
I was out of the car even before he came to a complete stop. The first thing I heard was the screaming. Both of my girls were screaming; Rose was screaming in fear and Sam in a mixture of fear and pain.
I was through the door and into the guestroom where Sam had moved without ever even slowing down. Dimly I realized that the door had been locked and I’d actually passed through the remains of the door, but that wasn’t important for now.
A part of my mind was analyzing the two twins even as I launched myself at them. The superficial similarity of the facial features of the Bran twins was limited to their faces. Their bodies were markedly different, from their skin tone to their muscle distribution. Even their skeletal structures were different. Where Brandon was broad shouldered, Brandy had a much narrower build.
It wasn’t just because Brandy was a woman, either, since it was obvious that she hadn’t been born female. She was...pulling out when I burst through the door. The three of them were naked. Sam was tied to the bed and screaming and crying telling them to stop. I kicked him...her...Brandy in the balls as...Brandy was the closest of the two. Brandon made a move for me and I dodged out of the way leaving him holding onto my dress. I continued moving, but he held still. My dress stayed with him.
I’ve never been one to take a slight sitting down. In junior high I would have a tendency to strike out at people who in any way physically assaulted me. I would punch them until they went down or someone pulled me off them.
That same uncontrollable anger swept through me the moment I felt my dress, my brand new dress, tear free of my body. I turned and grabbed a handful of his manhood and yanked for all I was work. I felt something tear and he went down screaming out in pain. Brandy was just getting up, awkwardly and still in obvious pain, when Tom came through the door.
“Call the police,” he yelled, and I complied. I ran from the room and went to my purse, which I’d dropped the moment I entered the door, and called the police. After I called them I went back to see what was happening, as it had grown quiet.
Brandon was still moaning in the corner. Tom was tying Brandy up in the remains of my dress. He looked up at me and stopped what he was doing in shock. Then a slow smile crossed his features and he finished the last knot.
“I guess I did get to see your underwear tonight.”
I looked down and myself and realized I was basically naked and tried to cover myself with my hands.
“Maybe you should go get dressed while we wait for the police.”
“Now, why didn’t I think of that,” i said and then stuck my tongue out at him. He laughed and I went to go get a new outfit. When I returned he had untied Sam and was holding her in his arms as she shook.
“Sam, are you okay?” I asked and immediately regretted it. Of course she wasn’t okay. She’d been raped.
She didn’t respond to me other than to begin to sob into Tom’s shoulder. I went to comfort my daughter who was still screaming in her room. What do you say to a little girl who’s had her entire world upended? Everything’s going to be okay?
How do you say something like that when you don’t even believe it yourself?
The police came and pounded on the door after about fifteen minutes and I went and let them in and lead them to Sam’s room. Rose was holding onto my leg the entire time. I would have carried her, but I was physically weaker than I had been, and I just didn’t have the strength to do so.
The officers called for an ambulance for Brandon and Sam. Sam so she could get an SAE kit taken and her general health ensured and Brandon because I’d actually separated his scrotum from his body a bit, and I might have crushed one of his testicles.
This is me not crying at all.
“Tom, do you need to go?” I asked as the police and EMTs left with their cargo. They’d refused to allow me to ride along. I wasn’t family after all. I couldn’t prove to them I was with the police there. I didn’t want to spend the time to make everyone believe...that and the fact that I was afraid the police would arrest me for using someone else’s ID.
“I’m staying here with you,” Tom said with a nice smile.
“Are you going to be my new Daddy?” Rose asked.
“Only if I’m becoming a Mommy,” I said with a smile.
Tom laughed but Rose just looked at me strangely. She had this look that always cane to her face when she couldn’t understand something. She didn’t ever say she didn’t understand, but that’s what happens when you grow up in a household of adults who treat you just like another adult.
“But, you’re my Daddy.”
“Honey, I know. I was your Daddy. But I’m a girl.”
“And girl’s can’t be Daddies?”
There were so many nuances to that statement, that don’t exactly fit. Unfortunately, sometimes as a parent you have to give your kids the easy answers for right now and hope they learn the rest of it all later.
“Girl are mommies and boys are daddies.”
“But I want you to be my Daddy.”
“Honey, I’m still your Daddy. When you need me to be, I’ll always be your Daddy, but I’m one of your Mommies now.”
“I have two Mommies?” she said, her face splitting into a grin, “just like Hannah?”
“Just like your sister, Hannah...although I think that technically Hanna currently has three Mommies.”
“Hannah?” Tom asked.
“My first daughter,” I said.
“This is so weird,” Tom said, “I’m talking to a woman, a biological woman as far as I can tell, who has fathered children.”
“This is weird for you, huh?” I said with a quirked eyebrow.
“Oh, it’s weird for you as well,” he said taking me into his arms and kiving me a quick kiss on the lips.
“So, are you a new Daddy then,” Rose asked.
“I don’t know yet...”
I just stared at him, the bottom falling out of my stomach. How could he possibly say that? Why did I feel this way? I’d known Tom for less than a week, but it felt as if he’d been part of my life for so much longer. He’d told me that he felt this from the moment he first saw me, but was that what was making me feel I owed him something?
Did that change how I felt just because he poured his soul out to me?
“...because that’s not my decision.”
I blinked and looked over at him. He was smiling at me. No, he can’t possibly be doing this, not now. Not this soon. It wasn’t long enough. I’d waited longer before proposing to my first wife and look how long that lasted. I shook my head slightly and felt myself disconnect from reality a bit. I felt as if I was hot and cold all over. I felt as though I were a million miles away, and yet in the same room, the same heartbeat, as Tom.
Trying to forestall the inevitable, I asked, “What’s wrong with your mother? She seemed perfectly fine.”
“Multiple Sclerosis. You may have noticed how she only ever used her left hand.”
I’d imagined so many things, but this...wasn’t one of them. My heart went out to this woman who had this hanging over her head.
“She didn’t appear sick,” I said quietly.
“Who’s sick,” rose asked.
“Tom’s Mommy.”
“I’m sorry. Maybe she should take the purple medicine. I always feel better after I take the purple medicine.”
Tom looked at me with a question in his eyes. “Children’s Tylenol,” I said.
“Ah,” he replied with a chuckle. “No, Rose, that won’t help my mom get better.”
“Is she going to die?”
“Yes, but we don’t know when and it should be a while before that happens.”
Internally I breathed a sigh of relief. I’d deflected his moment, his totally wonderfully inappropriate moment and hopefully I could keep putting it off.
Tom was whispering something in Rose’s ear while I smiled at the two of them. Tom was a good guy, something I was only really beginning to notice. He really cared about people, which I would have noticed earlier if he hadn’t been so uncomfortable being attracted to me.
Rose gave a definitive nod and said, “Uh huh.” which as any parent knows means yes in a mostemphatic way.
“What are you two conspiring about?”
“Nothing. We’re not con..spea…”
“Conspiring means plotting or planning. Usually in secret.”
“Oh, then we were conspinning.”
“Conspiring, Rose,” I said with a smile. My daughter hates when someone thinks she doesn’t know anything. It’s taken me five years, but I’ve learned the best way to teach her is to react as if she was never wrong, and to toss a definition in with a pronunciation. She hasn’t figured out yet I’m onto her little game. I really hope she’s graduated from high school before she does.
“Exactly,” she responded.
Tom and I laughed and Rose grinned at the two of us.
“Do you want to ask her,” Tom asked Rose.
“No, is your conspiring.”
I laughed even harder and Rose smiled a huge happy smile.
“I don’t have a ring…”
“We can’t...you can’t…”
“I can tell you like me,” Tom said.
“It’s not that,” I began.
“But you’re the only woman…”
“Please, don’t,” I said beginning to cry.
“Why not, Cosette? Why shouldn’t I ask what’s in my heart?”
“Because I’m damaged goods. I’m not worthy of this. Maybe, if we’d been together longer, I could convince myself it doesn’t matter, but I was born a guy.”
“I can’t believe you were ever a guy,” Tom said.
“I have baby pictures to prove it.”
“Contrary to popular opinion it takes more than being male to be a guy.”
“How...I never…”
“You know what I would have done if I suddenly lost my masculinity? At the very least I would have locked myself in my room, neither eating nor washing. I’d never go back to work. I wouldn’t wear a bra, I can tell you that much. There is no way in hell I would wear a skirt, let alone a dress.”
“What’s wrong with dresses?”
“My point exactly.”
“I don’t understand...”
“You’re not going blonde on me are you?”
Rose giggled at this and Tom spent a moment tickling her.
“Just because I wear dresses…”
“And skirts and bras and love me does mean you’re more girl than you were ever a man.”
“I’m a woman.”
“See,” he said with a smile, “you didn’t contradict me.”
“About what?”
“Being in love with me,” he said softly taking my hand.
“You didn’t say…”
“I never said ‘I love you,’ even if I do. I love you, Cosette. I said you loved me.”
When he said the words, it was as if something opened up for me in my heart. It wasn’t like I imagined it to be. It wasn’t like it was when I was infatuated with my first wife, or the deep and growing love that I felt for my second.
This was different. It was a delicate thing that just fluttered in my chest. It was sunshine through the trees and it was an ‘ah-ha’ moment. I wasn’t the sort to walk slowly into a relationship. I loved jumping in headfirst and to hell with the consequences.
That wasn’t what destroyed my first marriage, and besides that, I was not my first wife. I wasn’t looking for any excuse to leave mommy and daddy’s house.
It could be considered a character flaw, but the romantic in me loved love. I loved being in love, and heaven help me but I had fallen head over three inch heels in love with Tom.
“I love you, Tom.”
“I know.” he said with a little smirk. I slapped him on the arm.
“How often do you get to say that line and mean it?” Tom said.
“Hopefully just the once,” I said.
Rose was beginning to get exasperated. “He want’s to marry you, Mommy.”
I knew it was coming and still I blushed and felt a flush of excitement run through me. Then reality came crashing down on my ears.
“What about Sam?” I said.
“What does Sam...she’s in the hospital,” he said.
“We need to be there to get her,” I said.
I felt so sluggish and slow in my thoughts. I collapsed a bit when I stood up and Tom was there to catch me. I couldn’t understand what he was doing. “What are you doing?” I said, my words were slurring just a bit.
He helped me to the couch and lay me down.
“We have to get Sam.” I said.
“We have to worry about you right now. I’ll go get her for you. You stay here.”
“I need to go, please,” I said as my world began feeling like it broke apart again. I wanted to be forceful, but I was pleading with him instead. I didn’t have the energy to fight him and when he lifted me off the couch and took me to my bed I simply held onto him.
Rose climbed up on the bed with me and I just wrapped my arms around her. For once she was not the squirmy five year old and just snuggled into my arms. I quickly fell asleep.
I awoke with the sunlight streaming through the window and Rose snoring softly still lying in my arms. I kissed the top of her head and smiled. She might not have grown within me, but this little girl lived in my heart.
A father only really takes part in the conception. Sure, we get to help raise the child, but for the first few years they have a much more intimate relationship with their mothers than with their fathers. They have a place for daddy, but it isn’t the same as mommy’s place.
Don’t get me wrong, I loved being Dad to my girls, but if I could be a mom…
Then my thoughts came back around to the events of last night. My mind refused to focus on those events. It refused to focus on my inability to protect the ones I loved. That, however, I thought about. I blamed myself for the fact that Sam was raped. Sure, I didn’t actually do that to her, but I was the cause.
I was sobbing softly into my daughter’s hair.
“Is there something wrong?”
“Sam?”
“Hey, Andi. How are my favorite girls?”
“Sam? Why are you...smiling?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Those two...they…”
“What two?”
“Brandon and Brandy?”
“They left last night.”
I was looking at her, incredulous.
“Although someone else stayed the night. I’m happy for you, Andi.”
“Tom?”
“Yes, Tom,” said Tom coming in through the door.
“Tom, I think there’s something wrong with Sam. She doesn’t remember what happened last night.”
“Sam?”
“Nothing happened,” she said getting a bit confused.
“Do you remember me picking you up at the hospital?”
“I was at the hospital?”
I looked at Tom for a moment and he watched Sam. I opened my mouth, but then Tom shook his head. It was time to let this drop. I had no idea what was going on with her, but I’d let it all go.
“Don’t worry about it. You were tired. If it’s important, you’ll remember it later,” I said with a smile.
“But I can’t remember,” she said getting a little worried.
“You’re okay now,” Tom said, “It is a side effect of what happened. They said you were fine to come home, and there is no worry about this in the future.”
Tom walked with her out of the room.
“I fixed mommy,” a sleepy Rose said.
“What?”
“I took last night from mommy.”
“What are you talking about, Rose?”
“The...memory. I took Mommy’s bad memory.”
I looked at my little girl. She’d always had a vivid imagination, but somehow I didn’t think this was her fantasy. She called me home from Tom’s house last night. What was she?”
“Honey, how did you take Mommy’s bad thought?”
“I felt Mommy’s hurt last night. In my dreams. Darkness in Mommy’s dream self. I just pushed out the darkness.”
“Dream self?”
“You know, Mommy. The night time dream-self. When you dream?”
I thought that I had some idea of what she was saying, but I had to be sure.
“Did you see my dream-self?”
“Yes, I saw you, when you were my Daddy. At night you dreamed you were a girl like Rose and Mommy.”
I felt myself go cold. “What did you do for Daddy?” I said quietly. Suddenly I was truly terrified that I knew the answer.
“I made your dream-self your awake-self.”
If it hadn’t happened to me, there is no way that I would have believed it. My fear was a cold hard ball in my stomach now. How do you tell a five year old they made a mistake like this?”
“Honey...why did you do that?”
“Because I love girls. I love that you’re a girl now Mommy.”
It killed me to open my mouth and say what I had to next, but it was necessary. “Honey, you have to make me your Daddy again.”
“Why?”
“Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should,” I said, tears in my eyes.
“But, you are happy as my Mommy.”
“More than anything.” I said, openly crying now.
“They why are you sad?” she said patting my cheek.
“Because I have to go back. This isn’t right.”
“Mommy…”
“Rose! I need you to turn me back into your Daddy!”
She cringed when I yelled and I felt like such a terrible person. She leapt from my arms and ran away. I began to cry uncontrollably, sobbing into my pillows. Tom came and sat down on my bed and began rubbing my back.
“Cosette? What’s wrong?”
“I have to go back.”
“What are you talking about?”
“My daughter made me into a girl, and I want her to make me back into a boy.”
“Are you sleeping still?”
“Tom, you did my exam. Both of them. You know that on Tuesday I was a man and on Thursday I was a woman.”
“Yes, but…”
“Somehow my daughter is behind this. I yelled at her to change me back and she got scared and ran away.”
“Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why did you tell her to do something like that?”
“What?”
“Cosette, you are a woman.”
“I know, I look like…”
“No, you are a woman. You know it and I know it. I somehow picked up on it on Tuesday.”
“But I have to be a man. If I’d been a man then Sam wouldn’t have gotten raped,” I said, crying again. “I would have married you,” I said really quietly. I hoped he wouldn’t hear.
He crawled into bed with me and just held me for hours. I heard Sam and Rose playing in the other room. I wanted to be a woman. I wanted so many things that would have made my life worth...something.
If all went according to plan, then tomorrow or soon I would be a man again, back to my life, back to everything I was beginning to hate about myself.
“Tom?”
“Yes?”
“Will you make love to me?”
“Cosette…”
“I want, just once, before all of this ends, to be a woman with her man. I want for you to have me today and tonight.”
“I’m not…”
“Please? I’m not sure how I can go on, but I have to, and maybe the memory…”
“Cosette, please, you can’t do this.”
I kissed him deeply, trying to take his shirt off, but he grabbed my hands and pushed me back. “Get out,” I hissed at him.
“Cosette,”
“Get Out!” I screamed with as much hate as I could muster. I was spitting and yelling and saying things that even now I can’t bear to write. I wanted to claw at him, tear him to pieces. He just turned me around and held me until my shaking ceased and I began to calm down. I relaxed into his grip and fell asleep again.
I awoke with Tom’s hand on my breast. My body was warm, and my breathing was shallow. I could feel a wetness between my legs and I shifted a bit. As I began to feel Tom harden I rubbed against him. He began to massage my breast and a wave washed through me. I let out a soft moan and he rolled me over to face him.
I looked into his eyes, seeing a question there. With everything in my being, every part of my soul, in that moment I was his.
“I will marry you,” I said quietly and heart felt.
He kissed me, and I closed my eyes so he wouldn’t see my tears. He wouldn’t see the lie that I was hiding there. If I were to remain a woman, I would definitely marry him, but that wasn’t going to happen. I needed this punishment to make up for everything that Sam had been through.
The rest of what happened was beautiful and private. It was everything I’d dreamed and more. It showed me the depth of our love and it tore out my heart afterward knowing I would never have anything like this again.
“Are you alright?” Tom said with a concerned voice. There was blood on the sheet.
“I’m a little sore. Apparently I was a virgin.”
He laughed a little and I snuggled into him. He put his arms around me and we fell asleep.
I awoke alone in the darkness. There was a figure of some sort at the foot of the bed. Rose was standing at the edge of the room and looked like she was drawing something in the air with her finger.
“Rose, what are you doing?”
“Trying to make you a Daddy again, Mommy.” She was crying a bit as she said it. I realized that the figure she was trying to draw in the air was me, or at least her impression of me.
“How did you do this before?”
“You were the Mommy in here. I just opened the door so you could get out.”
I smiled at my girl and held her in my arms and tried to help guide her into fixing me.
A strong presence entered the room with us. “Rose, child, what are you doing?” A voice said from the darkness. It was indescribable. The only thing I can truly remember of that voice, the only thing that stuck with me, was the love that was infused in every word.
“I’m trying to make Mommy back into my Daddy.”
“Cosette, how dare you do this to your child.” There was no malice in the words, but they cut me to the core. I felt ashamed at what I’d asked Rose to do, but my response left my lips before I even thought.
“Excuse me?”
“You have hurt her deeply. You have refused a gift that few will ever experience, a gift given from her heart. She saw an imbalance and fixed it. You should be happy that she loves you as much as she does.”
“But Sam was raped…”
“That is not your fault. Some events are set into motion that can’t be stopped, no matter the choices we make. There is one inviolate thing in this universe that can’t be circumscribed. That is freedom to choose. Even I can’t remove that freedom.”
“Not everyone has freedom in this world,” I said a little haughtily.
“Really? Even those in bondage can choose to call out to their father in their need. You choose the person you will be, and if they break you, know this that even that has been felt by one who loves you and your debt is paid.”
I sat there quietly in the dark room, trying to shut out that voice full of love.
“But I’ve sinned…” I began.
“Yes, I know. You lied and you had sex. If those are the worst things you do today, then I’ll count myself happy.”
“What?”
“While I do not condone your actions, I know your heart.”
“Go and sin no more, is that it?”
“It has been said before.”
“Who are you?”
“You believe you know. I will neither confirm nor deny your supposition.”
“But...I don’t believe in magic.”
“Who said anything about magic? There are times that certain people are given a miracle. Accept yours and be happy.”
“What of Rose?”
“Rose has a truly active imagination, much like her mother when she was a little boy. She simply found a way to pass that imagination on to others.”
“Mommy wants to be a boy again,” Rose called out into the darkness.
“Rose, child, sometimes what we want we can’t have. I will not punish the innocent for the desires of another.”
“What are you saying,” I asked.
“I will not allow this power to be used to kill,” the voice said and then we were alone.
“Mommy, I don’t think I can change you back,” she said as she faded.
I stared into the darkness as this dream faded into another. “I think you’re right,” I replied to myself and fell into a much deeper sleep.
If the dream was to be believed...but did I really put any stock into dreams?
I could feel Tom stirring behind me, in more than one way.
“Good morning, Angel.”
“Oh, an angel, am I,” I said with a laugh, “after last night I feel more devil than angel.”
I could feel him shifting a little bit behind me and I pulled a bit away from him, “Oh no, mister. I think I’ve had enough for one day.”
I turned around and he gave me his best puppy-dog expression and I just laughed.
“I’m sore, Tom.”
“Oh,” he said and stopped with all the hip movement he had been working at, “I’m sorry. I didn’t think.”
“It’s alright, Tom. It was lovely last night.” The strange dream just wouldn’t leave me. There was something there that I was pretty sure I knew exactly what it meant, but I had to be sure. Also, from what I understood, or at least thought I understood, it shouldn’t be possible.
“Tom,” I said and then paused.
“Yes, Cosette?”
“There’s no way I could be pregnant, right?”
He smiled at me, “Of course not. The only way you could be pregnant would be…” and then he stopped and he paled visibly. “You became a woman on Tuesday…how could I have been so stupid.”
“Tom? I haven’t had a period yet…”
“And it looks likely that you won’t have one for at least nine months.”
“Stop kidding me.”
“This is no joke, Cosette.”
“but…”
“Contrary to how we normally track a woman’s cycle, it doesn’t start with menstruation.”
“What are you saying?”
“It begins with ovulation.”
The blood rushed from my own face and I was suddenly cold. I’d spent enough time talking with Sam about all of this that I should have known. My years as a man were showing, however, in that I hadn’t even considered that I might need to worry about this. Sure, in the back of my head the entire time I was wondering if it might be possible, I was hoping it might be possible…
“But, it was just the once,” I said quietly, not wanting to believe the logic of all of this.
“Which is all it really takes.”
The words from my dream came back to me, ‘I will not allow this power to be used to kill.’
“There’s a possibility…” Tom began, but I shook my head, bittersweet tears in my eyes.
“No, there isn’t.”
“Then marry me. Today, this instant.”
“You know I would, but I’m not legally able to.”
“You mean Sam?”
“And the fact that as far as the government is concerned I’m still male.”
He began to laugh and I just looked at him as if he were insane, “you would be the first legal male in the US to give birth,” he said and I grabbed a pillow and began hitting him with it.
“That is not funny, Dr. Lambert. Not funny at all.”
My door opened and Rose rushed in, “Mommy!” she called out and I shrieked and tried to cover Tom and myself with my blanket.
“Rose, I need you to give me a moment…”
She looked at Tom severely, “You’re not supposed to see other people naked unless you’re married.”
I couldn’t help but giggle a little at her austerity...and her accuracy.
“I know, Rose, so your Mommy and I should get dressed and fix that. Go and find your momma Sam.”
As soon as she left Tom went and locked the door and then began to laugh, “why didn’t you lock the door,” he asked.
“I could ask you the same thing,” I said as I started searching for some underwear to put on. After a few moments I turned and looked at Tom. He was lying on the bed and just staring at me.
“What?” I said as I slipped into my bra.
“I was just thinking how beautiful you are.”
I blushed and smiled at him and then slipped into a top and a loose pair of sweats. “Still think so?” I said while modelling my clothing.
“With all my heart and soul,” he said.
Smiling I climbed into bed with him and kissed him soundly.
“Now, get dressed because I’m sure that I’m going to have some explaining to do to Sam when Rose comes to her and tattles about you and I seeing each other naked.”
He laughed heartily and collected his strewn clothing and it was my turn to watch.
“What?”
“Oh, I was just ogling my fiance,” I said with a leer and waggled eyebrows.
He laughed at me and then pulled me out of bed to stand beside him. “Good,” he said and kissed me again.
We unlocked the door and went out. I stopped by Sam’s computer while Tom went into the kitchen. A thought had occurred to me during the talk about ovulation. Sam had the dates when she was most fertile listed on her calendar. She was really trying to get pregnant again and I had a sinking feeling in my stomach as I looked over the past few weeks and noticed there was nothing marked there.
I had to look at the clock on the computer to verify which day it was. With everything that had happened, it felt a lot more than just a couple of days had passed, that was all. Thursday evening had been the night of my date as well as the night when everything had just fallen apart. It was now Saturday morning, so I had slept most of the day through on Friday.
And right there in her preferred bold black font on Thursday and Friday were marked Ovulation. Simple and to the point and damning. I whispered a few imprecations under my breath and went to find Tom in the kitchen with Sam and Rose.
“Can I speak to you for a moment, Tom?”
“Going off to make out a bit more,” Sam asked with a gleam in her eye.
“No,” I said blushing, giving the exact opposite impression than I wanted.
She laughed and Tom followed me into the hall.
“There’s a problem,” I began.
“What now,” Tom asked becoming concerned.
“Sam was at her most fertile on Thursday and Friday.”
“What does,” he began and then stopped and just stared at me, “That’s not good.”
“So, they did...ejaculate,” I said getting a dirty taste in my mouth even saying the term.
Tom just nodded at me.
I swore again and Tom just looked stoic. “Well, we’ve got to tell her.”
“Tell who what?” Sam said joining us in the hall.
“Sam...I know you don’t remember this, and you’re likely not going to believe this, but you were raped on Thursday.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Rose took your memories.”
“Ok, now you’re just sounding crazy,” she said getting angry.
“Sam…”
“Not another word from you, Andi.”
“She’s telling you the truth, Sam. We would never have mentioned anything, since you can’t remember it, but...it was on Thursday,” Tom said.
“What do you mean? What does thursday have to do...oh no. No, no, no. Thursday?” Tears began to come to her eyes.
“I stopped them,” I said, “I mean Tom and I stopped them, but…”
Sam was crying openly now, “Not before they were done,” she whispered.
“We don’t know if…”
“Knowing my luck, it is exactly what will happen. Watch me not even have a miscarriage this time.”
“Sam…”
She collapsed onto the floor and I put my arms around her and we cried on each others shoulders.
“We’ll tell everyone that it’s mine,” I say into her ear.
“But it’s not,” she responded between sobs.
“Yes, it is. Any child that you have is mine. You got pregnant before the change, if you’re even pregnant.”
“I hope I’m not.”
“I hope you are,” I said quietly and sobbed.
“Why would you hope for such a vile…”
“Because I’m pregnant,” I said and broke into heart wrenching sobs on the floor, pulling into a fetal position.
She put her arms around me then and held me.
“Why don’t you hate me,” I asked.
“Oh, I’m pissed at you, you little bitch. You went and got pregnant without me. Tom?”
“Of course Tom,” I replied.
“Well, then I guess he’s going to have to deal with two pregnant women isn’t he?”
“We can have side by side birthing rooms,” I said with a little smile.
“Oh, no. You’re my birthing partner. You’re going to be there in the same room as I am whether or not you’re in labor.”
I couldn’t help it. I laughed and Sam kissed me gently on the cheek. “I hate you right now, you know that right?”
“Why?”
“Because you got pregnant on your first try,” she said with a little scowl, but she couldn’t keep it up for long and began to smile.
“It’s going to be okay,” I said, still reacting to her scowl
She hugged me to her and whispered in my ear so only I could hear, “Tom is a really great guy. I’m so happy for you.”
I sat down against the wall and Sam cuddled into me. Tom sat on the other side of me and took me into his arms. It was a wonder how I got to this point, and I was truly scared about what the future would hold.
“I’m not sure what to feel,” Sam said after a minute or two.
“Why?”
“Intellectually I know I was raped. I know you’d never lie to me about something like this, but emotionally I feel nothing at all about it. I feel more violated by the loss of my memories than I do by a rape I don’t even remember happening.”
“Talk to your daughter about your memories. I had nothing to do with that.”
“Oh, my daughter is she?” Sam said with a little laugh. “I seem to remember someone else having at least part of the blame in bringing her into this world.”
“Well, I’m not…”
The phone began to ring and Sam went over to her computer and put on the headset so she could accept the incoming skype call.
“Sure, she’s here.”
I walk over to the proffered headset and put it on. “Hello?”
“Sorry for calling you on a saturday, Andi.”
“Who is this?”
“This is Jackie...Jackie Kelly.”
“Oh,” I said, my mind finally clicking to whom I was speaking.
“What can I do for you, Ms. Kelly?”
“Well, I’ve done some more research and talked to a couple of lawyer friends of mine. We just need to get a doctor to attest to the fact you’re physically female and then I we can actually get you legally declared female.”
“Wait...what?”
“Utah is one of the states that requires that you have undergone GRS. You know Gender Reassignment Surgery? Well, this works in our favor. All they require is a doctor stating that you are physically female and we should easily be able to get your gender changed legally.”
“How long?”
“Well, the main problem is getting in front of a judge. I have a friend in the clerk’s office…”
“Is that legal?”
“Perfectly. We let a judge know we just need them to sign the order. We can arrange to meet him at any time of his, or her I guess, convenience and then we get you declared legally female.”
“Wow...how long do you think that will take.”
“Well...that’s most of the reason that I was waiting this long to tell you. I have a judge who will meet with you at his home in an hour.”
“Wait...what?”
“I spent the last couple of days figuring out how to get this to work.”
“Ms. Kelly, could you hold for a bit?”
“Sure,” she said a little confused.
I put the headset on mute and called out, “Rose!”
“Yes, Mommy?”
“Did you play around with dreams so everyone would recognize mommy as a girl?”
“But, you are a girl, mommy,” Rose said confused.
Bless the uncomplicated nature of children. She figured that since I was a woman, then that was all that mattered. I went back to Ms. Kelly on the phone.
“This is all so sudden.”
“Actually, your insurance paid me more than I expected. I quoted a price for them when I submitted my paperwork, mostly because I had no idea what gender therapy should go for, and they paid it. I immediately felt guilty so I decided I had to do more work for my money…”
This almost seemed too good to be true, but then I looked over at Sam, and remembered the events of the past couple of days. There are good things and bad things that happen in everyone’s lives. Maybe what was happening today was just karma. I had put good out into the universe and good was coming back to me from the universe.
Or maybe it was simpler than that. Maybe these sorts of things happen all the time and we only attribute coincidence to them when we shine the spotlight on them?
Whatever the reason I quickly responded, “give me the address. We’ll be there. What do I need as proof? Would bringing my gyno help?”
“You have a gynecologist already?”
“Sorta...it’d more that we met when he did my first exam...it’s embarrassing but I sort of got aroused by him touching me.”
She laughed on the other end of the phone.
“I could tell you were a little keyed up at our meeting, I assume it only got worse?”
“Yes, and now he’s my fiance.”
“You do work quick. Thank goodness Utah has no waiting period on marriage licenses.”
“Apparently we like to get married at the drop of a hat here,” I said with a smile.
“Don’t let anyone else know or we’ll have people coming here instead of vegas.”
“Never happen. You can’t buy liquor after 1am. That and you can only get a marriage license during normal business hours.”
“What are you talking about?” Tom said embracing me from behind.
“Oh, nothing…” I said with a little smile.
“Really? Nothing?” he said and began nuzzling my neck just behind my ear. I let out a soft gasp and felt myself becoming aroused.
“Before you get too involved with your boyfriend, I’ll give you the address. Don’t be late.”
I wrote the address down and went to get ready for the day. There were the usual distractions, like Rose wanting fifteen different things for breakfast, most of which Sam got for her, as well as some unusual, or should I say at least new ones.
“And why can’t we both shower at the same time?”
“Because I want a shower, not just another excuse for sex,” I said with a smile as I shut the bathroom door between us. I then locked it, to make sure I would be undisturbed. It’s not that I wouldn’t have relished the fun and games. It was more that I was still feeling guilty over my actions the night before.
I was brought up in a conservative home. I’m not talking politics, although my parents are that as well. I mean socially. I’ve mentioned that I’m religious. So, premarital sex is a huge no no...and here I was pregnant.
Well, technically it was a lot more complicated than that, but hey, I don’t need to map out all the sins I transgressed last night.
I still wanted more with Tom, but I was willing to wait. In no way am I suggesting anyone in the audience should follow my lead into the paths I choose to tread. Like I said, love the sinner not the sin.
Yes, I’m a sinner too…
Never mind, I’m stepping away from the bible now. No need to stop reading, I promise.
The point I was trying to make is that I had a personal reason that made sense to me for doing what I was doing.
I only had an hour so again washing my hair was out. I washed the rest of myself and checked for hairs. It had been five days since the last time I shaved. I had been sick at the time, but I felt so gross that I’d shaved my entire body at the time. Checking now I was amazed that I hadn’t begun to grow anything back. My face was expected. As a woman I didn’t expect to grow heavy dark facial hair. Maybe a little fine fuzz...but there was absolutely nothing.
The rest of my body was the same, save for a small patch at my crotch. Well, if this kept up then I’d not have to worry about shaving again. Yay.
I dried off and then brushed out my hair and pulled it into a high ponytail. It was only about six inches long dangling behind my head, but it was there. I really needed to take the time in the near future to really wash and condition my hair. The good brushing would have to be enough for now.
I got dressed taking a moment to realize that I hadn’t really taken a moment since this all began to really look at myself. Standing there in front of my bathroom mirror in just my underwear I was struck by how pretty I was. This was something I had longed for, something I had dreamed of, for most of my adult life.
People talk about how they always knew that they were in the wrong body. That wasn’t me. I accepted what people told me about myself. Sure, I didn’t fit with my peers, something my peers were quick to point out, but I accepted that I was supposed to fit. Responsibility, requirements...Duty. Whatever you call it, it’s a heavy burden for a child to carry. Duty really is as light as a feather but as heavy as a mountain.
So, I tried to live up to what I assumed that people expected of me, and added my own expectations on top of that. I tried to emulate my peers, to greater or lesser degrees of success. There is a reason I love RPGs...but I digress.
I was almost thirty before I realized, like a bolt from the blue, that everything I was feeling wasn’t ‘normal’ in the classic sense. In a moment of clarity all the jagged edges of my life suddenly came together into a single image and I realized that I’d been a girl all along.
People try to explain it through behavior and other outward ‘proofs’ in order to make people believe that they are something that the general public believes is...impossible.
There are no simple answers. There are women who like computers and sports. There are women who are fighters. There are women who desire to be firefighters and there are female police officers.
There are male nurses, teachers, and on and on and on.
What you do doesn’t matter. It is who you are that matters.
Now, if you take certain actions, and behave in certain ways, people accept you more as a man or a woman. And it’s more than your role in society. Masculinity and Femininity can exist no matter what you choose to do.
Maybe it’s not that simple? Maybe we are afraid and so seek those roles that we fell will hide us better in society?
I clothed myself and left the bathroom. Tome attacked me as soon as I left.
“You mussed me,” I said as soon as he was done.
“And a damn good thing I did, too,” he said looking at me with a smile. “We need to hurry if we’re going to be there on time.”
With a giggle and taking his hand I rushed from the house. Same didn’t want to come with us, which is probably a good thing because on the best of days Rose can be a handful. I took the time during our drive to fix my hair. This was one of the times I would be happy that I had no makeup, even though I really wanted to try.
Sure, I’d been active in drama as a teen, so I had worn makeup quite a bit. I’m not talking subtle or glamour makeup. I mean stage makeup that is designed to be seen from space, let alone the last row. And old age makeup is even worse, which I’ve worn as well.
I was the last one to die in Arsenic and Old Lace. Yes, I know, still pretending to be a boy remember?
We came to a stop on the curb and walked up to a middle sized house. I’m not sure what I expected but this suburban split-level wasn’t it. We went up and knocked on the door and an older woman answered.
“You must be here to see Michael. Let me show you in.”
“Thank you,” I said.
We were shown in to a study, of sorts, and the woman, who I assume was the judge’s wife, left us.
“Have a seat,” the distinguished gentleman said. “We’re waiting for my daughter.”
“Your daughter?” I parroted.
“Oh, so she didn’t tell you, huh? Yes, I’m Judge Michael Kelly.”
I giggled nervously and sat down.
“I have to say that you’ve not what I was expecting.”
“Expecting a man in a dress?”
“No, I have more reasonably expectations than that. I’ve been handling these cases for years after all. No, I’ve never before met someone in your circumstance that was just so utterly...female.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Most of the people I see have been shaped by their lives. They have tics that just don’t quite fit. No, they are women, you understand that in my line of work. They are just...more on the male side of the spectrum I guess you could say. Sure, one or two of them have overcompensated...but they all have to live with what life made them.”
“Oh,” I said, tears coming to my eyes. I knew the pain they went through, and to have the humiliation of going through an affirmation in a public court room…
“Could it be that maybe they were just...nervous being in a place where their past was made public knowledge?”
The judge got a thoughtful look on his face, “That is a possibility. I think I’ll have to meet with...people in transition in my chambers from now on.”
“Sorry I’m late…”
“Well, let’s get started,” the judge said with a twinkle in his eyes. There was a change in his demeanor as he said this. He was no longer the kindly gentleman we’d initially met. He was instead a representative of the courts.
“So, who are you both,” the judge began after starting a tape recorder.
“I’m William Carson,” I said, producing my ID.
“I’m Dr. Tom Lambert,” he said also producing ID.
“And I’m Ms. Jackie Kelly.”
“I’d like to note that William Carson is the petitioner,” the judge said. “Dr. Lambert, you have evidence to present the court?”
Tom described in clinical detail his examination of me before and after the event. He of course didn’t mention the event, or how long between examinations there were.
“What is your relationship with the petitioner?”
“We are affianced.”
“Was this your relationship when you did the examination?”
“No, I proposed last night.”
“I see,” the judge said. I wanted to ask questions, but I was afraid that I would be out of order or in contempt or something.
“What do you have to say, Ms. Kelly?”
“I have examined the petitioner psychologically and feel her to be a female in her thoughts. She interacts with the world as a female, is working currently as a female, and as Dr. Lambert has stated is physically a female.”
The judge sat there for a few moments and thought before turning back to me.
“Is there anything else you would like to add?”
“Sure, could we change my name on the...petition? Ok, the petition to be Cosette Andrea Carson?”
“That can be arranged,” the judge said with a smile, “seeing no reason to rule otherwise, and pending a copy of your credentials being sent to my office on Monday Dr. Lambert, I will grant your petition Cosette Andrea Carson, female.”
Those simple words ran through me like lightning. I was legally female. I kissed Tom full on the lips and he hugged me to himself.
“That was simple,” Tom said.
“I pulled a few strings and cut a few corners for my daughter,” Mr. Kelly said, his judge persona left behind. “She thought this was a worthy cause. I have to agree.”
“How can we ever thank you?” Tom said.
“Invite me to the wedding?”
We laughed and I replied, “There’s likely to be more shotgun than wedding veil.”
He looked at me strangely for a moment and then said, “You’re pregnant?”
I blushed when I realized what I’d said. I then proceeded to explain everything that had happened. After I finished Mr. Kelly laughed.
“Well, since I’m sure my daughter would never bring a crazy person into my home on a Saturday…”
“That only happened once,” Ms. Kelly began to protest only to be quieted by a quelling look from her father.
“As I said, I will have to believe your story. You’re likely going to have to wait til Monday, regardless, since the papers won’t be filed ‘til then and it would be basically impossible to get married, even in Vegas. Unless you don’t mind getting married as William…”
I shook my head. There was a mue of disgust on my lips.
“That answers that question,” the Mr. Kelly said. “Jackie, are you staying for lunch?”
“No, I have work to do.”
“On a Saturday? You work too much, girl.”
“I know, Daddy,” she said and kissed him. After that the three of us were shown out of the house. We said goodbye to Mrs. Kelly on the way out.
“Thank you for this,” I said on the front porch to Ms. Kelly, “but you could have just told us it was your father.”
“I know...but I really did try to find another judge who would take the case on short notice. My dad refused to talk to his buddies saying there was no conflict and that he might as well make some use of all the schooling he’d received. His words, not mine.”
I shook my head and smiled, “So, you still up for more therapy sessions? I think I need them now more than ever.”
“You’re really pregnant with this lug?”
I nodded and grinned at her.
“I probably need to talk to Sam as well then…”
My smile ran away and left a frown in it’s place, “Yes, you do,” I said as tears threatened to join the frown.
“What’s wrong?”
I looked at Tom and he got the hint. Good man, that. He told Ms. Kelly what had happened over the past couple of days to Sam, and a look of pain crossed Ms. Kelly’s features.
“I’m so sorry to hear that,” she said quietly. After a long pause she said, “There is nothing uneventful about your life. In one week more seems to have happened than happens in a whole month for most people.”
“Hopefully it slows down here soon,” I said in reply. Tom emphatically nodded his assent.
“Strong silent type, eh,” Ms. Kelly said with a smile.
“Not really,” Tom said with a grin, “but when there’s no real point in adding words to a conversation…oh, I guess that is the definition of that, isn’t it?”
Ms. Kelly and I laughed and the dark mood that had been threatening dissipated.
“Ok, let Sam know I’ll see both of you on Wednesday,” Ms. Kelly said after consulting the calendar on her phone.
“Ok, we’ll be there.” I said and hugged her. She was a little surprised for a moment, but then it was ok. Thought my choices I was deciding the person I would be in the future, and I wanted that person to be outgoing, so I would force myself to be outgoing until it became second nature to me.
Or at least that was my theory.
It was barely noon and I had nothing left to do until Monday. I took the time for my family, Tom included. Tome slept in my bed with me both nights, and I mean slept. He did, however, hold me in his arms and I lay there in the comfort of his embrace.
There would be more to do on Monday, and I would welcome the changes that would happen, but those were changes for tomorrow, today, tonight, I was loved.
I honestly don't know where in my fevered mind Ms. Grace Kelley came from. Her idea on the name, not mine.
Last night I went to bed thinking that I would right a light hearted tale about a wish gone wrong. It is titled The Third Wish, and may eventually see the light of day, or fall back into obscurity.
I dreamed a dream about my life last night, which slowly became the life of Ms. Kelley. I woke up with a knowledge of this person that I have never had of one of my other characters. She is me in some respects.
No, I'm not a teacher, but I have been. No, I'm not in transition or have I ever been. That is a long personal story that I choose not to let out into the world.
My mother is a school teacher, as are two of my brothers. I plan on teaching college, if I ever get through my schooling. I taught Math to junior high school students for three months. I prefer the immaturity of college students, thank you.
This is not directly about me, however, it's about Grace.
Grace was born in 1955 on October 31st at 6:05am. She was 9lbs and 3oz and everyone thought she was the most beautiful baby boy in the world. Of course they were all wrong. Her mother named her Albert Andrey Kelley. She would end up being the oldest of six children (3 brothers and 2 sisters)
An "accident" with a pen knife deprived her of her gonads at age 12. She had been a shy child up to this point. All she knew was she liked hanging out with girls, but that boys were who she thought about in her dreams. She kissed one of her male friends on the lips while they were swimming. He attacked her, later, with his knife. She never told her parents what really happened, and shocked by what he had done, her friend has a nervous breakdown and was hospitalized. She vowed she would be like the "other boys" and try and show an interest in girls like a "normal" teenager. She acted interested, but she still couldn't feel about girls the way that she felt about boys and was deeply conflicted about it.
Grace was in numerous plays as a teenager, both for the community theater and school. She never got to play Juliet, something she has always regretted. She chickened out even trying out for the part. That was 1972, a year before she lost her father.
Her father served in the military until Grace was sixteen, when he went back to school and became an Army JAG officer. He was killed in 1973 by a soldier who was suffering from undiagnosed PTSD. Grace had just entered the building to pick up her father when she heard the shot.
She began seeing her first psychologist when she left for college in 1974. She had begun waking up with nightmares, and while in real life she didn't actually see her father shot, she did in those dreams. After almost two years, she told her psychologist about her cross dressing for the first time. Her psychologist was supportive, and Grace began speech therapy and electrolysis, but did not start hormones yet. She continued to fear public reaction, and as 1977 drew to a close, she still hadn't publicly dressed as a woman.
Her mother changed her attitude for her. Out of the blue, in July 1978, her mother called her and told her "It's about time you get your real life going, and stop pretending the rest of us don't know that you should have been born a woman." Grace started taking hormones in August.
On Christmas day, 1979 her mother gave her two gifts that she treasured more than anything else: A diary bound in white leather, and a wig made of human hair. Her siblings gave her an entire wardrobe of clothing. She went back to school after Christmas break as a woman full time. That was January 1980, and the real start of the story.
I will be telling this story out of order, but organizing it in order. I will not be writing a post for every day of this year. I will hit the most important days however. You don't need the buildup of the week from the 19th of October through the 23rd for example. The culmination of a week in mental anguish and the eventual attempt at self disfigurement is handled on the 24th very nicely.
Eventually, you will get the whole story of 1980: its ups and downs, its twists and turns, and its hope of real love.
Her Diary - 1980: January 1st
Copyright © 2010 Faeriemage
All Rights Reserved. |
I feel so giddy at the prospects that this year has I have for this year, and even this decade.
I'm finally going to be me.
I am a woman.
Whee. I am a woman!
I can't stop saying it. I can't stop feeling it. For the first time
I get to be me, and let the world see the me that I've been hiding. I go back to school in a couple of days. It's almost the end of the Christmas break.
Wait, let's start this all out right. I know this is only my personal journal, but I might as well introduce myself a bit.
I'm Grace Kelly.
No, not that Grace Kelly.
I am an actor actress and teacher. I teach drama.
Ok, that was a bit stilted.
For the past year I've been trying to get up the courage to be the woman I always felt I feel that I am.
I've been taking hormones for a year now to try to get my body to look more like my mind thinks it should be.
Apparently, because of that little accident I had as a teenager, my body was better able to accept the treatment, and it allowed for more
The hormones caused my hips to widen, slightly, and I'm growing boobs.
Breats.
Whatever.
Since this is the beginning, I know I never mentioned that I graduated from high school early, but I did. I started a year early in grammar school, and in high school I decided I didn't need a senior year. It's tough being the smallest boy in the class even without a lot of the rumors that were going around.
I imagine that some of them might start thinking I really was gay.
Oh, to be alive and free. Oh, to be myself.
Anyway, I graduated high school at sixteen, and went on to college after I turned seventeen.
And this is the most boring journal I have ever read.
No, it's not a journal. It's my first diary. It even says so on the front.
My Mom bought me a diary.
She also bought me the most beautiful brunette wig. It's just longer than shoulder length. I can't wait for my own hair
I'm so giddy.
I have a full wardrobe of clothing, in my size, and I'm ready to take the world by storm.
I've let the principal know what's up, and we'll just have to see how it all goes.
I want for this to work out
Deep breaths Andrew Grace.
Am I ready for this? I still think of myself as Andrew half the time. Is that wrong? Am I ready for this type of commitment?
I'm just going to call my Mom and tell her that its all just been a mistake. I'll stop taking hormones and
I can do this. I am a woman of strength and I will overcome any fear.
Relax, Grace, it's not as if they'll lynch you for coming to work in a dress.
Will they?
I'm borrowing trouble. Mom always thought that I had too vivid an imagination. I only agree with her when I lose control of it like this.
Ok, so that's all I have to say. Just wanted to start this out on the first day of the first year of the new decade.
I didn't write that much here.
I hope that I can keep doing
So, to anyone who reads this, and wonders, I did start out with a fountain pen, but decided that using a normal ball point would be better. I plan on taking this thing with me everywhere. so we'll have to see what
Two more days and the world gets to meet Grace Kelly for the first time.
Her Diary - 1980: October 24th
Author's note: This is written as if it is being transcribed to digital format from a hand written diary. There is no real diary. This is all my work. I hope you like it.
I am not a woman.
Maybe if I tell myself this enough, write it enough, I will actually start to believe it. I can't allow them to destroy my life again. I will write it every day if I have to. I will repeat it every second.
I am not a woman.
Oh how this phrase cuts me. All my dreams for the new decade are shattered by this one phrase. I can't live
I need to get myself under control. I've lived for twenty five years in this body, well almost this body. I can survive for more. But oh how it hurts.
I need to think of the kids. They need me more than I need to change me. I have always been an excellent teacher. I have only been teaching high school for three years, but the parents and students loved me, or so I thought. They loved the idea of me. The male me.
My car still bears the marks of their 'love' for me. I haven't had the time to fix it. I don't have the money any more. I used my savings for her. I spent all of my energy on her. and now she sits in a storage space in boxes.
Her makeup. Her clothes. My life.
I've written about all this before. My shrink says I need to stop dwelling. My shrink is an idiot. I liked my previous shrink better. New city, new life, more bigoted idiots to deal with.
I saw my breasts in the mirror this morning and wound up taking a knife to myself to try to cut them off. They're still less than an A cup, and since my shrink is still not going to give me another prescription for hormones, they aren't getting any bigger. Do I still want them to be bigger?
Cutting them off felt like it would be easier than binding them down before heading into school every day.
Does it even matter? Do these children, other people's children, matter more to me than my own life? Yesterday I would have said yes. I got a knife out of the kitchen this morning. I stopped when I drew blood. It hurt more than my pain at them being there still.
Maybe I will take a bunch of sleeping pills and never wake up. But these children need me. I need them to need me.
What am I writing? I need to break out of it, but there is nothing
I am
I threw my diary across the room. I am glad that there was no one in here to see me this time. Bending down to pick up the book, I feel the hated bandages on my chest again. I want to be me.
I am not a woman.
But, if I am not, then what am I.
I'm really going through with it. It's not worth it any more. I need to just get those pills. I will get them on the way how, and leave this journal here. It will be my note to the world a proof of
I was interrupted. Writing furiously, and I am sure I had a manic gleam in my eye. A student stopped me, but not through any direct intention on his her part.
Why did she talk to me? What have I done to engender this much trust in a student? I'm just her drama teacher, after all. Well, I did do a pretty convincing reading of Lady Macbeth last week. Thank you voice coach.
But why me? Couldn't she have talked to a parent, or school counselor, or pastor, or someone?
Should I even be changing her gender in my mind? I would have loved if someone had done it for me, so I guess I will have to.
She is a slight little thing. I have noticed her in my classes since the beginning of the year. She was always quiet, except when she was on stage.
Why do I have to always be controversial? I let people pick their own roles, and I have had some female Hamlets and Male Juliets a lot this year. Parents have been complaining. Parents should
Actually, it has been just her and the other girls playing the female roles. I hadn't noticed it. Maybe I am not as observant as I once thought.
She wanted to know if she could try out for Catherine in the fall musical. It is Pippin, so I might be able to convince everyone that it is part of the farce of the show.
At least until they see her on stage.
I told her that it would go to the best girl who tried out for the role. I was going to say person, but I wasn't really focusing on that at the moment. I was thinking of how well she had played all of the female roles she had tried in my class.
That is when she told me that she is just as much of a girl as anyone else. This was more than just someone who was an accomplished actor. She thought herself an actress.
My heart broke for her in that moment.
Life for me was tough, but it would be much more so with her. Or would it?
We talked for an hour. I always leave my door open since
I wrote about that before. I don't need to relive THAT again.
(Transcriber's note: There were water stains on this page which I take to have been tears)
We talked about her cross dressing. I gave her some pointers, which I'm sure I shouldn't have done. We talked about makeup that she had stolen. She had a lipstick some eye shadow.
We went to the cabinet. I looked at her skin tone. Tried a bit on her skin. I gave her some of the makeup from the cabinet. I would replace it later. I convinced her to come to me if she needed more. I didn't want her stealing again. None of my clothing would fit her, or I would have given her some. She said she is stealing that too.
Next week I am running some lessons on makeup. Stage makeup of course, but I can get some general makeup techniques in there. All of the girls could use the help.
Talk shifted to Halloween. She had the perfect costume idea, but no clue how to get it done. She was afraid of going into a costume shop.
I thought for a moment and asked her if I could talk to her parents. She looked scared. She mumbled something about her dad not understanding. I told her I was just going to ask permission for her costume. I told her I could make it for her. She gave me a quick hug which made me uncomfortable. I couldn't have a repeat
She still looked scared, but she gave a timid nod.
I smiled at her, and called her home number. Her dad answered. I told him who I was, and what I did, and told him, simply and matter of factly, what his daughter (I used her boy name) wanted to be for Halloween. He laughed at that, and said he thought it was a really good idea.
I asked him why he thought so.
He said something that shocked me, but I don't think I let it show.
He told me that he had known that his son was trying to act like his daughter. Her mannerisms and choice in reading sort of tipped him off to begin with, but it was when his friend, who managed the local Sears, called him and told him that Andrew (her name) was caught shoplifting some clothing and makeup that he knew for sure. He had set up a tab with his friend after that, and all of his daughter's thefts had been deducted from that tab.
The last thing he said made me understand him a bit, "I think it's a great idea. Either he will look a fool, and the ridicule of his friends will knock these ideas out of his head, or he will pass and they will begin to accept him for who he thinks he is."
I smiled at that. I told her to come back after school and we could get started. I would need to pick one of the other students to measure her. I hate the fact that it is
I forgot to tell her father about the musical. I will have time for that later. He has a really nice sounding None of that, Grace, I don't need another heartache in my life right now, and he's probably a married man. Am I insane talking about myself in the third person, and with my female name?
First bell. The day begins
(Transcriber's note: I need to scan her break lines and use it as an image. They really capture a bit of her.)
That was probably the longest day I have ever had. I feel excitement for the first time in a while. I feel like last Christmas, knowing that I would be opening myself as a present to the world. Before
I won't let that get me down. Nothing is going to get me down.
I haven't made a ball gown since college. Yeah, I made all of the costumes for a couple of productions. I'm awesome.
I talked to Julie in my fifth period set design class and she agreed to stay after school. She drives herself so I knew she would still be able to get home after without
She is measuring Andrew as I write this, and both of them are giggling about it. I wonder
I will not interfere in the lives of others. Especially when they can manage well enough on their own.
(Transcriber's note: There is an ink splatter on the page here. Talking to the writer, she told me that she loved the feel of a fountain pen on paper, and so she always writes her diary with a fountain pen.)
I'm shocked. I knew that they were getting along, but they've concocted something that will might just get Andrew through this in one piece. She asked him to the Halloween dance, and they will be in matching gowns.
After Andrew left, we talked cloth and color. I think that Julie has twigged to me a bit, but hopefully she just thinks I'm gay. The alternative
I don't know that being gay will be better than transitioning, but who knows in this day and age. Especially since my Laney left me last week. Crap.
I will not let this get me down.
We finally decided that having the gowns in the same pattern, but different colors, would be the best. Andrew really wanted a pale yellow, so we decided to do Julie's in blue. They wanted to be noticed. I still had my old wig in storage. I would have to get it out and see if it was still good
Julie has the measurements of Andrew's head. She is smaller than I am. I would have a custom wig made for her. Real human hair. It's expensive, but I can match it to her current hair color.
Julie had cut a lock of his hair.
She is giving me a weird look as I write while we talk. I will pick it up later.
(Transcriber's note: curlicue. I need a better scanner.)
I am home, and I have taken off the bandages. I let my chest breathe and look at my small breasts. They are mine and I am happy they are still there. It was only a shallow cut I made this morning, and I hope it doesn't scar.
Julie's mom went through chemotherapy. She lost her hair and they had given her a wig matched to her hair color and length for Christmas.
I never knew this about Julie. She was always such an upbeat and bright student. She ran the tech crew last year, and I saw no reason to change that for this year. She seems so together, but she cried a bit when talking about the difficulties her mom was going through with her cancer treatment. The doctors are afraid that she is going to die.
I won't let this get me down, because
Julie is
I think that Julie and Andrew can help each other cope with the problems that life loves to dish out. They'll probably just be good friends, but an old maid can hope.
I still think of myself as a woman after months trying to fight it.
I am a woman, and the world better watch out, because I will not let them beat it out of me. I will change this world one student at a time.
I am off to bed. I need to get a new shrink. One student in her time of need has helped me more than the last three months with this quack.
I think I will get my nightgowns out of storage tomorrow.
Her Diary - 1980: November 1st
Copyright © 2010 Faeriemage
All Rights Reserved.
|
How come I can't just write this?
How come I can't clarify my thoughts enough to tell this story?
I blame Andrew. No, not my student. His father.
Andrew Lee.
Just writing his name gives me a thrill. I need to get a new new shrink.
He kissed me tonight. I felt mys
It was a quick peck on the cheek, but I wish it had been more.
Damn that man, how can he do
Ok, calm cool and collected. I am a mature woman and refuse to act like a teenager.
I got Mrs. Carruther's permission to go as her to the Halloween dance. So, I would be the Principal for Halloween. I figured that would lessen the pressure on Andrew and Julie. The dress turned out beautiful by the way. Julie is probably a much better seamstress than I am. The dresses I will accept the compliments Julie gave me. She loved Andrew's dress.
We ended up with a more daisy yellow than the pale yellow that she originally wanted, but the two primary colors went well together.
I was watching Julie take the lead on the second dance when never more to be damned Dr. Lee walked over. Why did he choose to chaper
Take a deep breath, Grace. He's not here. Why do I want him to be?
"If I'd know you look that good in a dress, there's no way I would have accepted you as a client."
"I think I'm going to have to get another psychologist, Dr. Lee."
"I was only kidding, Grace." From one breath to the next, he both insulted me, saying that no relationship was ever possible, and accepted me as a woman. I hate I need I want Why can't real life be as easy as a romance novel?
Boy sees girl.
Boy loves girl.
Boy and girl are married after two hundred pages of angst.
Why can't I just be that girl?
Once again the esteemed Dr. Andrew Lee knocks me from my path.
I think I said something about that being the reason that I couldn't see him anymore, in a professional manner I mean. Oh, I know what I meant. We talked while watching his son dance. Something came to me that had been bothering me since Tuesday.
I asked him why he had talked about his daughter like he had, when he was reported to be one of the best for people like me. for people who for women who take the long way to for the transgendered.
He smiled a beautiful little smile that melted my and said, "I was reacting as his father, and not his doctor. I decided long ago that I would never counsel my own son."
That was when we noticed that Julie and Andrew were missing. We let the other chaperons know we would be stepping out for a moment, and got a knowing wink from Larry Winters. I think I mentioned him before. He's the metal shop teacher. and I saw him with a visible panty line last week. It makes me wonder if I'm the only normal one in this school.
I have a laugh at my own expense over that comment.
We left the auditorium, but we hadn't yet really begun to worry yet. Just outside the door, we found Julie. Her dress had been torn from the neck to the waste, and she was just getting off the ground. I used a couple of the safety pins I'd put into my pocket for last minute adjustments to fix it as best I could. At least she has halfway decent. There was no way she could wear a bra At least Dr. Lee was here
(Transcriber's note: A paragraph was written here that she had taken great pains to destroy. I doubt I would be able to determine what it was without forensic tools. She used enough ink that it seeped through the page and ruined the next page as well.)
I really need to let that go. It is bringing me down. Julie would never do that to me
Apparently a couple of the football players had approached them at the dance and asked "the new girl" to dance. Julie tried to put them off, but they insisted that Andrew speak for herself. She really needs to pick a more feminine name.
They got a little angry when they found out who she was. They'd said something about "inducting" her to the "real mysteries of womanhood". They covered her mouth and dragged her outside. Julie rushed after them.
One of the two boys had torn Julie's dress when she tried to pull Andrew away from them.
I began to worry. I don't know why the principal of a high school wears 4" heals to school every day, but that made it part of my costume. I took them off. I'd need a new pair of
Dr. Lee grabbed my hand and pulled me after him. "We need to split up." I would have loved to keep
He knew I was right. We went opposite directions around the school. I was about half-way around when I heard him shout. I ran as fast as I could across the grass toward the football field at the back of the school.
I saw a form in the grass that Dr. Lee was standing over. My heart was in my throat as I tried to run that little bit faster. I think I was screaming her name, but I can't clearly remember now. All I really remembered thinking; please let her be all right. If only I'd worn pants
When I got there I saw that it was one of the football players. Dr. Lee was standing on his chest to keep him from getting up and demanding to know where his daughter was. The moron made the mistake He called her a derogatory term. I couldn't stop Dr. Lee before he kicked the boy in the rib. I'm not even sure I really wanted to
"He took her under the bleachers like any other slut!"
I was able to stop him this time. I felt so dirty standing up for this piece of pond sc
My mother gave me a crash course on being a Lady between Christmas and returning to school. She told me a lot of things that I can't remember any more. One thing she told me, however, is that a lady is beyond reproach. A lady never lets her personal feelings prevent her from doing what she knows to be right. I know I need to forgive the boy for what he and his friend did. I know this in the depths of my soul. It is so hard for me this close to what their actions cost.
We ran over there, his hand on mine again. Even in this moment of absolute pain I couldn't help but feel the joy in what was ultimately a casual contact. When we approached, the other boy quickly got up and pulled his pants back up. Andrew was lying on her side in the fetal position. While Dr. Lee tackled the boy, I pulled her dress back down to cover her. She grabbed onto me and cried. I couldn't get her to tell me what had happened, and the boy had hit his head when he was tackled, so we couldn't get anything from him.
We heard the sound of sirens in the distance. "I'm sorry, Daddy. I've been stealing from Sears. I wanted to tell you, but I was afraid of what you'd think of me. I'm sorry that I did this. I don't want you to be upset with me Daddy."
We tried to consol her, but she was hysterical and unintelligible after that. The police came and tried to arrest Dr. Lee. When I tried to tell them that his daughter needed him, one of the officers said, "What, the fag in a dress? He got what he deserved."
I have to admit that I didn't live up to my mother's expectations of a lady in that moment. I carefully extracted myself from Andrew's arms and walked over to the officer that had spoken.
I wanted to punch him and knock the smile off his face. I ripped into him. I tore a thick bloody strip from his hide, going first up one side, and then down the other. I explained to him reality, and that if he couldn't uphold the law then he shouldn't be an officer of it. I told him that his commanding officer would be getting my full report and that he'd better consider well any actions and comments that he made from that point forward.
"You'd better back down, Ma'am and let me do my job." He'd put his hand to his gun, and his partner yanked him back and dragged him about twenty feet away. I caught the words "bigoted" and "moronic" but that's about it. At the end of it, the officer whom I'd just dressed down threw his badge and gun at the feet of his former partner and walked away.
The other officer came back, and tried to question Andrew, but she was still hysterical. The other boy was just beginning to get up, and so the officer put handcuffs on him and placed him under arrest.
He said he was innocent and that "the little fag" wanted him to take "him" out here. They'd just been getting into it when the psycho had tackled him and almost killed him. It amazes me what people will lie about to avoid being arrested, like a football player admitting
That was beneath me.
Andrew got up off the grass, adjusted her dress, walked over to the boy, and slapped him across the face.
"How dare you suggest that I would lower my standards such to have sex with you."
The officer turned to Andrew, after picking the boy up out of the dirt and brushing him off, and said, "It looks like this hump and my ex-partner were wrong about you, Miss. A boy would have punched him."
I don't know how true that statement actually, was, but it broke a lot of the tension, and made Andrew smile for the first time since they'd dragged her out of the dance. "Daddy, he didn't have time to do more than pull up my dress. He didn't rape me."
The officer spoke up. "Then I guess it is attempted rape."
I know that some of the things I've written here aren't 100% accurate. I don't remember the exact words. These are close enough. I rode in the back of Dr. Lee's car, since Andrew wouldn't let me go. Dr Lee carried her into the house, as she'd fallen asleep on the way over. He didn't want to leave her alone, so he let me stay in the guest bedroom. Oh, how I wish he would come in here and take me
It is now about two in the morning. We had to give our statements to the officer after he put the boy in the back of his car. Julie had called the police after we'd run off after Andrew. They hugged and cried a bit. When Julie's dad came to drive her home, Andrew latched onto me and wouldn't let go.
I know, I am a bit flustered. I keep going over the same segments. I can feel the pull of him through the walls He still has some of her old clothing in the closet and drawers in this room. His wife's I mean. He hasn't spoken about her, but I think she is dead. The room almost feels like a shrine to her memory. Everything that was her is in here.
I wonder again why he wants me to stay here in this room.
He kissed me on the threshold. I considered for a moment turning my head He kissed me on the cheek and told me that there were 'night clothes' as he put it in the dresser. I found one of her nightgowns in a color I liked and put it on. I took off the horrendous blond wig, and got my own wig out of my purse. I still don't know why I brought it. It was a little mussed, so I brushed it out with her brushes. and I cleaned off my makeup with her
(Transcriber's note: Her penmanship is considerably more jagged and there are some rips in the paper for the next section. There are occasional water stains as well)
He called me Clare.
I can't believe he called me Clare. His dead wife's name was Clare. I can hear him trying to talk to me from the other side of the door. I told him to go away, and I do it again while writing this. I locked the door this time.
He called me Clare.
Am I supposed to be flattered? He thinks I remind him of his ex-wife? Oh, so she had hair the color of mine, and a smile like mine. Likely story. He can rot out there for all I care. I don't care how many times he calls me Grace. He tells me he's sorry. Maybe I will I will be strong. The stupid little boy
He called me CLARE!!!!
I might have been able to forgive him for doing it once, maybe, but three times? And the first time after he kissed me? I don't mean that peck on the cheek from earlier. I mean a full blown, on the lips, tongue included, mind blowing kiss. I think I might have
I held him to me afterward, a smile on my lips until he whispered that hated name.
He called me Clare.
I slapped him and turned away. He said it again, "Clare, let me explain, I meant Grace. I mean Grace. Let me explain!"
I shoved him out of the room, and he said it again.
He called me Clare.
Crap, is that him crying?
(Transcriber's note: another beautiful example of a calligraphy curlicue)
Against my better judgment, I let him in. He told me that they'd had a strained relationship before she died. He'd heard me moving around, and his half asleep mind had thought it was Clare packing for the trip again. He wanted to go to her and tell her not to go on the trip.
Apparently this was her favorite night gown.
How could he Can't he see I love him
I can't do this. I don't even have a new shrink. He is a
I can still feel his lips pressed against mine. I want to I need him in my life.
He makes me feel more feminine than anyone else has. I see how he treats his daughter. I know he truly cares for her. I wish he could
I only
(Transcriber's note: The next section is too blurred to get more than a word here or there. She tells me it was a very emotional night for her and she simply broke down at this point. It picks up on the next page)
I have to be strong for myself. I have to be strong for his daughter. I've changed out of her clothing, and back into the suit. It's really uncomfortable to lie down in, but I can't do this anymore. It hurts too much seeing how he looks at me in her clothing, knowing that he can never be mine.
I'll ask for a ride home in the morning, and hopefully I can never see him again. Clare, why did you have to be so perfect for him, that no one could meet your ideal, least of all me?
(Transcriber's note: Another break)
I've changed my outfit I don't know how many times. I keep putting on and removing my makeup. I feel like I have butterflies in my stomach the size of the Goodyear blimp. He asked me on a date. He asked me on a date. Me!
I want to laugh cry and scream and shout and. . .I hate myself for writing this.
He knows who I am, and is under no illusions. There is no way that he is gay like that damned
I came in my guy clothing on Tuesday. I was Mr. Kelley, not Ms. Kelley. He saw me then, yet he accepts me now. Please God don't let him be gay.
I need to be calm. He sees me as a woman. Crap, he sees me as his wife's doppelganger.
I must be positive. I must be calm cool and collected.
I feel like a teenager waiting for her first date to arrive. How come Dan never made me feel this way. That damned weasel. If I ever
Let him like me. I hope this date goes I want I need to get laid!
My mom would be so upset with me right now. I can't tell her about all of this yet. She'll tell me I'm putting the cart before the horse right now, but I really need I want
Please let him kiss me again like when he dropped me off this morning.
What's wrong with me? Why am I like this? It's not so much that I need the physical contact, which is nice. I like the way he makes me feel small. He makes me feel petite. He is over a foot taller than I am. Have I mentioned that before? Crap.
Changed shoes again. Thought a nice four inch heel would help me to be closer to his height. I won't be able to run, if needed, but hopefully
Doorbell. Wish me luck!
(Transcriber's note: Lipstick kiss on the page in a pretty shade of dusky pink)
It's late, so I'll have to be quick about it. I am tired from the past two days. No, I didn't get laid, and I wonder now why I was so keyed up earlier. Might be the new hormones that I was prescribed. I'm definitely going to need a new shrink.
It seems that Andrew has a thing for doorways. Three times he's kissed me through them. Of course the last two times completely curled my toes.
I called my Mom earlier and the first words out of her mouth were, "So, you've finally found the one, huh?"
I don't know how she does it. It seems that she just always seems to know when big things happen in my life. She already knew that Dan had dumped me, but I already told you that story.
We talked for almost four hours about Andrew and his daughter. My Mom wanted me to be careful, since it would be all too easy to fall into the shoes of his wife. I told her that it wouldn't be to bad if I did, and she got cross with me. She used my full name. Grace Marie Kelley. Did I ever mention that she gave me a middle name a few months ago? She said no child of hers would be caught dead without a middle name. She never stopped calling me Grace, even when I was pretending not to be Grace.
I don't know what I would ever do without Mom.
I am calm, cool, and collected now.
We went out to eat, just the two of us, and then he took me back to his place. Andrew his daughter and I played some board games. It was the best date I have ever been on. Marie and I had a private conversation. She told me that she wanted to be called Marie, and I told her that Marie was my middle name. We laughed about that. She told me that she liked me better than her father's other girlfriends.
She looked happy to be in her girl clothing around her father. He's told her about the tab he had, and that she should use it for whatever she needs to be the girl she feels she is. She apparently went shopping while we were on our date.
He called me Grace all night long. At one point we even danced to the radio in his front room. Marie snapped our picture, and we had a fight over the camera. Then I insisted I get a picture of her. I don't know what I'm going to do about Marie on Monday. I'm the only drama teacher in the school. Can I keep my personal and professional persona's different?
I think that Marie might be angling to be a bridesmaid sometime soon. How do I tell her that it's likely to be more than a year before Carts and Horses, Grace.
I love you, Mom.
Jared Milton was not the best looking, fastest, smartest, strongest, or any other 'est' you could ascribe to a person. Neither was he the worst. He was…average. Not so much in appearance, since many would have considered him to be a bit above average, but in most everything else about him. His height matched perfectly with the average worldwide height for men. His weight fit perfectly in the center of acceptable weight. He'd never been pulled over for speeding, because he never drove more than the speed limit.
His room was painted white and had nothing on the walls. Clothing was in the laundry hamper his mom put there, but the rest of the room was cluttered. Not quite messy, and not quite clean. He never fought with his parents, but then again he never had reason to.
He smoked, once, and almost drank twice. He did not carry around a condom in his wallet, even though his father had given him one, since he never thought he'd have the opportunity to have sex. He never went to a school dance, not for lack of trying, but because he always seemed to ask the girl after she'd already said yes to another guy. After the fourth of fifth rejection of this sort, he even tried asking a girl to the Halloween dance for the next year just after the current on ended. She was a lesbian.
He got a B+ average in school, which was in the middle of the pack at his high school. He had one year left before he went to the local community college with his friends.
I know what you're probably thinking, but you'd be wrong. Being an outcast would have made him special, and that just isn't the case. He had a good group of friends, mostly like him. People who kept their heads down, weren't really popular, and weren't the targets of ridicule.
He went on a few dates, but none of them ever really seemed to go anywhere. He got a few hugs, and one or two swift pecks on the cheek.
All in all, Jared was that most elusive of all things in this world: Normal.
Well, normal in all but one regard.
You see, unlike his friends, Jared had somehow made it through seventeen years ten months and twenty days completely unsullied by the modern world.
He would sit in the lunchroom as people went on about things they saw on the Internet, or people they'd been with, and it would all just pass over his head. He actually still thought that when someone said that they'd slept with so-and-so, well, there was dreaming going on.
Melons were fruit to Jared. A Freudian slip would have to be some sort of undergarment, you know, worn with period dresses or something. Spankings were punishments given to children.
As usual, Jared drove himself to school that morning. He stopped on red. Slowed down, usually, on yellow, and drove on green. He waved to his neighbors and smiled at anyone who looked his way.
Everything was pleasant for him.
Until it wasn't.
"Jared, I'd like for you to take a left turn at the next light."
The person who climbed into his passenger seat as he was idling at an intersection was most decidedly not average looking. He had black hair and a rakish goatee. His eyes were a piercing blue that seemed to see into your soul with a glance. His clothing was rough, almost handmade looking, and a deep burgundy. An amulet hung around his neck on a silver chain.
"I'm not planning on being late to school today, so if you'd climb back out the way you came in, I need to turn right to get to school."
"Jared, going to school today would be a bad idea."
"And I'm supposed to believe someone who just got into my car at an intersection has my best interest in mind?"
"I don't really care whether you believe me or not."
"Ok. Please leave now."
Jared turned right and continued on to school. The gentleman had made no other threatening moves toward him, so Jared made no moves to comply. He left the man in his car, which he didn't lock for once. It seemed counter intuitive for the moment.
He went to school and nothing happened. His classes progressed as normal, and he made his way to the cafeteria for lunch. There again, nothing happened. He ate his food, drank his milk, and was heading toward his next class when he decided to take a quick stop off in the restroom.
There were a couple of students he didn't know standing around at the sinks, so Jared made his way to the furthest stall. He locked the door, missing the sound of the outer door being locked. After concluding his business we went out to wash his hands.
"Jared, we'd like for you to come with us."
These people were not as menacing as the other guy had been. They looked like students. They were good looking guys who seemed to be the sort of people that would be popular wherever they went.
"Where to?"
"We'd like to show you something we're preparing for your birthday."
Jared's birthday was on the 31st of October, which was just over a month away. He'd never had anyone, other than his parents, remember when his birthday was, and this intrigued him.
"For my birthday? This isn't a joke is it?"
"No joke," one of them said, and Jared slumped down. The man standing behind him pocketed the syringe again.
"You sure took your time about it, Tom," the one closest to the door said.
"Well, he seemed about ready to come with us willingly, Andy."
"It doesn't matter, you two, this way is faster. You stay with the body while I run to the office to get someone to call an 'ambulance.'"
"Sure thing, Hans."
The one named Hans ran from the bathroom to the office, a look of panic on his face. "A student collapsed in the bathroom. I don't know what's wrong. You've got to do something."
The secretaries were shocked by the outburst, and it was actually a student waiting to see the principal who called 911. Hans was gone before anyone recovered enough to ask him who he was. He collected his two friends from the facilities and left the school.
Jared lay on the floor for twenty minutes or so before the EMTs arrived. They didn't check for breathing or pulse, just tru8ssed him up on the backboard and carted him out to their ambulance. They also didn't drive to the hospital.
They pulled off the road into a cornfield where they ditched the ambulance and moved Jared into a van. Then, to make sure that there would be no clues to who they were, they torched the ambulance.
Through it all, Jared slept. Hans rejoined them outside a cave and directed them to a small furnished room deep inside. It wasn't the sort of place you'd ever peg as a cave, at least not from the inside. They'd covered the walls with tapestries and the floors with rugs. Candles lit the expanses and added an intimacy to the entire scene that would otherwise have been absent.
Jared began to stir, but Hans only smiled.
"Should I jab him again?"
"Just tie him to the bed. He can be awake for the next part."
The bed was in the middle of the room, suspended from the ceiling by a chain made of rope. They had isolated it from everything around it to the best of their ability. In ages past they would have simply rested it on a column of air, but they were short on power now. Belief in their order was low, and willing sacrifices were rare. The stories had become muddled, making people misunderstand the term sacrifice. That and the fact that innocence was also rare in the modern world.
There were candles at each of the sixteen cardinal points of the compass. Each of them had been burning for exactly seventeen hours and forty minutes. The candles were normal, as their significance lay more in their use, than their composition.
They were unpigmented, however, and white as paraffin.
Sixteen hooded figures strode into the room and took places at each of the sixteen candles. Each bore an aromatic herb in his hand from jasmine to lavender to thyme to sage. They stood there, patiently, holding the herbs a foot above the flames. At the beginning of the eighteenth hour they simultaneously dropped their herbs into the candles' flames.
The light changed in the room, going from the yellow of the candles to the softest pink of a new dawn.
Jared's back arched. He made no sound as he was bathed in that light, and made no movement after that sudden arching of his back. The sixteen figures stepped past the ring of candles at this point, careful not to tough any of them, and pulled out knives made of silver and chased in gold.
Jared's eyes were clear and he opened his mouth to scream but no sound came out. The pink glow shone off the knives as the figures drew closer and closer. Each of the sixteen lay a hand upon Jared's body and he shuddered at their touch. His eyes grew wild as they drew back their knives and as they began to move he shut them tight.
They sound of ripping cloth was loud in the room and in an instant Jared was naked on that bed. Starting at the figure at the head of the bed, the figure to the north, they filed out of the room, leaving Jared in solitude.
He could still feel the light entering him in the almost pain that had caused his reaction before. He felt it in his throat and gut. The light slowly began to intensify, and the look of fear came back to Jared's eyes. He tried to move, to get away from that light, but it was no use. Even as the candles finally burned out, the light became more and more intense, and the frantically writhing Jared continued in his gyrations. His mouth began to move, but no sound came out.
Somebody, please. Save me, he mouthed over and over until his body gave up and he passed out.
The room was dark, and the sounds of movement could be heard.
"Careful. You've been out for a couple of days."
There was a croaking sound from the darkness and a chuckle.
"We couldn't hook you up to an IV, so you're a bit dehydrated. Come, get a drink. Let me get a light for you."
A light flared in the darkness. Just a single candle, but after the absolute pitch black of before, it was enough to see by. Tom carefully helped Jared to drink from a metal cup, which he spat out.
"Are you trying to poison me?"
"We'd never do that, Jared."
"That was foul, whatever it was."
"It was the sixteenth centuries answer to Gatorade. I know it tastes nasty, but it's about the only thing we're sure won't affect the ceremony."
"What ceremony?"
"You'll see. Don't you worry your pretty little head over it."
Tom held the cup again to Jared's lips, and he drank the rest of it. His thirst outweighed the foul taste. Tom looked appraisingly at Jared's body after the boy slumped back down unconscious. There were definitely the buds for breasts on the boys chest, and a slight widening of the hips.
"Tom, has he drunk it then?"
"Yes, Hans. I'm still amazed that this even works."
"It's magic, Tom. Of course it works."
"Hans, until three years ago I didn't believe in magic."
Hans laughed and guided the other man out of the room. They left the candle to burn out on it's own. Jared's eyes opened as soon as they were gone. He tried to get out of bed, to run away from these madmen, but his body collapsed into sleep before he'd gotten more than halfway across the room.
The candle was already burning when Jared's eyes opened again. He was again in the bed, covered from the waist down by a blanket. Tom offered the glass again, and Jared drank. He was so thirsty that any thought of holding out for an untainted glass were pushed aside. He looked down at himself and screamed.
"What are you doing to me?"
The barest bulge of breasts had begun to form. His ribs shown plainly on his chest, where the new grown breasts did not cover, and his waist seemed to have shrunken in relation his wider hips. He did not have a truly feminine form, but it was moving in that direction. His voice shocked him as well. It was slightly higher pitched than he remembered it.
"Relax, Jared. You will be perfectly healthy when we are done here."
"Let me out of here you freak. Let me…out…of…"
Jared collapsed on the bed, and began to softly snore.
"Got the dose right this time, I see," Hans said from the doorway.
"Yes, Hans, I did. Didn't want a repeat of last time. She could have hurt herself."
"Not a she yet."
"Well, not a 'he' anymore either. His penis disappeared a couple of days ago."
"Is that why you covered him up."
"Yes. The sight makes me a bit uncomfortable."
Hans laughed, not unkindly, and patted Tom on the back as they left, "You are a better man than me, Tom. I would have looked and gotten off on it."
Tom colored, but it was hardly noticeable in the candlelight.
The sound of fighting woke Jared, and the thirst was again overpowering. The man from the car burst into the room took one look at Jared's naked body and swore.
"We're too late. Sorry about this, Jared, but I told you that trusting me was the best option."
"You knew about this?" Jared asked in a voice that was higher than before, but not quite feminine.
"Yes, but I figured they would try it closer to your birthday."
"What's so special about my birthday?"
"You turn eighteen. Here, put this on. I figured you would still be…well…your old size."
Jared pulled on the jeans and tee shirt with difficulty. They were the right lengths, but the chest and butt were too tight. The man turned away, consciously not looking at Jared.
"Am I that hideous?"
"No, quite the opposite."
"Um, I thought you said these were in my size. I can't get the pants to zip."
The man turned toward Jared, caught a glimpse of hair peaking out of the opening, and immediately reddened and turned away.
"Damn. Next time I remember underwear."
Jared looked down and colored. Just because he was innocent didn't mean that he was completely oblivious.
"Sorry. I didn't mean to…well…this is kind of weird."
"We don't have much time. Hurry."
Jared ran after the mysterious figure as he made his way out of the cave. There was a sports car outside the entrance, and Jared ran over to it.
"If you can, crouch down on the floor."
Jared climbed into the passenger seat and kept as low as he could while the man whipped the car around d and drove like a maniac. Bursts of light exploded silently all around them, and Jared would have been worried about his hearing had not the sound of the engine confirmed that at least that was still working.
A feeling, both familiar and different, began to form in the pit of Jared's stomach. "I think I need to pee."
"Hold it."
"I'm trying."
"Cross your legs, then."
Jared did as he was told, sure that it wouldn't do anything for him. The pressure didn't go away, but it felt a little less insistent. He moved onto the seat to make it a little more comfortable.
A figure zipped by inches from his head.
"I told you to keep down."
"Yeah, I needed to get up."
There were motorcycles around them zooming in and out of traffic. Every once in a while, one of them would gesture toward the car and another of the silent explosions would light up the night.
"Well, since you're up, buckle in, and hold on tight."
The car sped up, leaving the motorcycles behind. Jared looked at the driver in amazement. He seemed to be concentrating fully on the road and the other drivers. They moved in and out of traffic with an ease that belied the speed they were traveling. Jared glanced at the odometer and let out a little shriek.
"Are you crazy? We can't be going 200 miles per hour on the freeway."
"I think you meant 'shouldn't' and you would be right except for the people following us."
"Who are they, anyway?"
"Shut up, please. Focusing on not getting us killed," he said as he pulled only the shoulder of the road, missing the semi truck that was in their former lane by mere inches.
Jared just sat there, wide eyed, and held into the seat for dear life.
Somewhere in the middle of the mixture of adrenaline crash and lack of proper food for too many days took their toll and Jared fell asleep. As soon as his conscious control left, his legs relaxed.
"Damn it," the driver said. The smell was almost worse. He swore again. The car would have to be ditched, and the clothing would have to be burned.
He pulled out a cell phone and made a call.
"They put a phero-tracker in her water apparently. Yes, I said her. They already started the process, probably the day they took her. Likely be fully complete in only another couple of hours. No, she's just skin and bones, so they were likely waiting to feed her until it was all over."
He told the person where they were and they agreed upon a meeting place just off the freeway.
He opened the windows and pulled off the freeway at the next off ramp. The car would be used to lure the dogs away and into the wrong direction.
The cold air was enough to bring Jared back to her senses.
"What's happening. Oh, no. Did I…"
"Yes, you wet the bed. Looks like we need to change your clothing and the car."
Jared blushed and looked out the other window. "What's happening to me?"
"I'll explain it all when we get to the hotel for the night. Over dinner."
Jared's stomach growled and she blushed again.
"Sounds like you could use a good meal," the driver said as he laughed.
"What's your name?"
"Samuel."
"Nice to meet you Sam."
"No, It's Samuel."
"Oh." Jared was a silent for a moment or two, as if trying to find something to say.
"Thank you."
"You're welcome."
They pulled over into an abandoned parking lot and waited for a man in a BMW to drive up.
"Samuel, glad to see you in one piece. Is this her?"
"Jared, Michael. Michael, Jared."
Michael coughed at the name.
"You're going to need a new name now, you realize?"
"Huh?"
"Did you bring the clothes?" Samuel asked, trying to change the subject.
"Sure. A pair of workout clothes or a dress is all I could get on this short notice."
"But…these are girls clothing," Jared protested. The light summer dress almost needed no explanation. The top of the workout attire was hot pink in a spaghetti strap. The bottom looked like most pants she'd seen, but there was something off about the cut that she couldn't quite put her finger on.
"Well, you can't stay in your current clothing."
"Only the pants are wet. Why not let me keep the tee shirt. I'd feel weird in that top."
"Sorry. Need to change both. Nature of the beast." With that the two men turned around and went a short way away to allow Jared to change.
"She doesn't know?"
"She never thought to look, I think. They found a real naive one this year. A true innocent. And her birthday is the day before."
"Halloween? You're kidding."
"Nope. I…"
He was about to say more, but Jared walked up. Samuel began to give her a quick once over, and then focused his eyes on her face. It was cold out there and she wasn't wearing a bra.
"Michael, get in touch with some of the other guys and get me some undergarments."
"What size?" he asked, looking at the offending area. Leering really. Jared was completely oblivious of the attention.
"Well, you're the one measuring her with your eyes, you figure it out."
Samuel lead her over to the beemer and helped her into the passenger seat. The change of clothing would have to do until they were able to get her into a shower. He didn't have the heart to tell her that she'd have to wear the dress after that. It was obvious that she preferred the more masculine, if only in concept, clothing.
They pulled into the underground parking lot of one of the hotels downstairs and parked the car. Samuel guided them to the elevator and they got in. Jared was amazed at the opulence of what he'd seen already.
It was only then that he noticed that the button for the top floor had been pressed.
"The penthouse? Who are you guys?"
"Would you accept, 'No one to be trifled with'?"
Jared snorted, which came out a lot more feminine than it would have even a couple of hours ago. The rate of change, as was expected, was accelerating. Her voice had settled into an almost sensual tone which sent shivers down Samuel's spine. Her face had shifted subtly and softened.
Her hands would always be a bit large, but that was the problem with the spell. It could enhance bone structure, but not diminish it in any way. Like her hips, widened again since he'd first retrieved her from the cave.
Her body had eaten itself to fuel the changes, and she was just shy of skin and bones.
She began to examine herself in the mirrored surface of the elevator doors. Her hand rubbed over her jaw and played with her hair a bit.
"How long did they have me there? They must have shaved my face, but I can't even feel any stubble there. And my hair…I've never been able to get it to grow much past my ears."
Her hair cascaded down to the small of her back. It was a wonder that she hadn't noticed already, as it would have had to get caught in her clothing already.
She was, in a word, beautiful. A little skinny for Samuel's tastes, but something like that was easily remedied.
He'd been so lost in thought that he never answered her question.
"You were there just over two weeks. That means we just have to keep you safe for another three weeks."
"What happens in three weeks?"
"Halloween. If we can get through that night then you'll be fine."
"What happens on Halloween?"
"A discussion for another time. We're here."
The door opened on a short private hallway that brought them to the door to their suite. Her house had been smaller than the penthouse they now entered. It took up the entire top floor of the hotel, wrapping around the centrally placed elevator. There was a grand piano off to one side of the entrance, which Jared wondered at. It wouldn't have fit in the elevator or through the door to the suite.
"This place is amazing."
"Go, get showered. Leave your clothing outside the door so I can take care of it."
"What do you mean?"
"It's been tainted. They'll be able to track us by the smell of your urine."
At the mention of urine, Jared realized that she needed to use the facilities again. She quickly stripped and walked across the room to the bathroom. Samuel colored and looked away.
As soon as the door to the bathroom was closed, he shook his head and swore. There was a smile on his face. "That woman would tempt the resolve of a saint, and I'm no saint."
As soon as she was in the bathroom, Jared reached for her penis only to be met with nothing. She frantically searched for just a moment before realizing the truth.
She screamed.
Samuel burst through the door, his gun at the ready. He colored immediately upon seeing her touch herself. He turned around.
"Damn it, Jared. What is it?"
"My penis is gone."
"Yes, they turned you into a girl."
Jared's eyes rolled back up into her head and she began to collapse. Samuel caught her and got her into the shower before her bladder could release again. The smell was less than the previous time, but still obviously there. Trying not to spend too much time eyeing her body, he sprayed her down with the shower head, and then dried her off.
He carried her to the bed and got her between the covers. Then, he went to take a shower of his own. This one would be ice cold.
He'd never realized it before, but there was something compelling about absolute innocence in an adult. Almost adult, he amended.
Jared had no clue how sexy she was.
Samuel went to the other side of the suite and lay down on his own bed. He was tormented by the knowledge that she was still a minor, and more so by the fact that she was so absolutely innocent to the ways of the world.
He took some cleansing breaths and fell asleep.
He awoke to another scream. He was out of bed and across the suite before his brain even registered what he was doing.
Jared was sitting up in bed and screaming at something behind him. He turned and saw a full length mirror, realizing that she was probably truly looking at herself for the first time since the transformation.
"I'm…I'm…that's…"
"Yes, you're a girl now, Jared."
Jared began laughing hysterically. "Jared's a boy's name. Not a boy any longer."
"Take a deep breath and calm yourself."
Jared took a deep breath, and her eyes widened. She did it again. Samuel smiled, thinking he knew exactly the thoughts that were running through the young girl's mind.
"That's really me, isn't it? I have…breasts."
Jared moved her hand up to her chest, watching her reflection do the same. She pinched, hard, and winced in pain.
"Yep, their mine. How do women handle this weight all the time."
"Usually they wear bras."
Jared colored at the mention of the forbidden undergarment. Samuel looked puzzled for a moment or two and then left the girl examining herself in the mirror. A couple of minutes later, a voice called from the room.
"Where's the other clothing?"
"I had to burn it."
"You what?"
"I burned it. The smell had gotten into them as well, and I had to get rid of it the only way I had available. For some reason it sticks to cloth a lot better than skin."
"But…but…A dress?"
"Jared, look in that mirror and tell me what you see?"
"A girl, but…"
"And do girls wear dresses?"
"Sure, but…"
"Then put on the dress. Your nakedness really bothers me."
A still blushing Jared emerged from the room a few moments later. The dress seemed to fit her new form perfectly and it accentuated the curves she had. "So, what do you think? Does this make my butt look big?"
Samuel's mouth dropped open, and Jared began to giggle.
"That wasn't funny."
"I thought it was."
"You know what a guy does when a girl asks him that question? He looks at her butt."
Jared colored a pretty shade of crimson at this and turned her butt away from the speaker. Samuel laughed at her, and after a moment or two she joined in.
"So, how long does this thing last? This hallucination or whatever it is."
"What hallucination?"
"Um, well," Jared gestured toward her body, and all thought of humor left Samuel.
"Jared, this isn't a hallucination or a dream. You are really a girl."
The color drained from her face, and she began to fall forward. Samuel stepped forward and caught her again. He eased her to the ground, just as her eyes fluttered open. She was staring at his mouth, and so he hurried and backed up.
"What happened to me?"
She began to rise, but Samuel motioned for her to stay where she was.
"Stay there for a bit. I ordered us some room service while you were out before. It should be here soon."
Jared leaned against the couch and looked over at her benefactor. "What happened?"
"Well, the short answer is there was a shortage of appropriately aged female virgins, so they decided to make their own."
"Wait, so some group of lunatics did some surgery or other on me in order to kill me for a pagan ritual?"
"No, nothing so crass. They used magic."
"Oh, is that all? Magic? Do I look like a moron to you. Everyone knows…" Jared stopped talking and looked on in wonder as Samuel began to levitate above the floor.
"What does everyone know?"
Jared began backing toward the door. "Just stay away from me."
"Wait, Jared…"
"You could be with them. You probably are. How could I have been so stupid as to trust someone like you. It's all obvious now."
"Jared…"
"You 'saved' me so that I would stay with you willingly for some reason, then when I'm not looking BAM you get me from behind with a knife."
"Jared, be reasonable. If I'd wanted to kill you, you'd be dead already."
"That's what you want me to think, but you already told me that Halloween is the time that you would kill me. I may be blonde, but I'm not stupid."
Samuel chuckled.
"What's so funny?"
"You're not blond?"
"But, I used to be. What color…" She pulled some of her now auburn locks over her shoulder to look at them.
"Wait. Just a few minutes ago I know for sure that my hair was blonde."
"Final stages of the spell. It's an old Celtic one, so it tends to change hair and eye color at the end to fit the perfect color imagined by the spell's creators."
"But red?"
"You don't look bad, you know."
"I'm a girl, Samuel. I look horrible."
The doorbell rang and Samuel went over and answered it. He talked with someone out of Jared's line of sight and then pushed a cart over to where she was sitting. "I'm not sure what you wanted, so I have a tray full of food here for you to start on."
She started on the fruit and moved onto a hamburger and then a salad. It was only after he brought over the second cart that she began to realize just how much she'd eaten.
"Um…"
"Don't worry about it. Those are spell calories. Your body uses them up almost before they even reach your stomach."
"Now there's a diet for you."
"Yeah, you just need to get turned into a girl for it to work."
Jared snorted her cute little snort at this and then dug into the second cart. She was most of the way done with that one before she started to feel full. Then it was only moments before she stopped eating completely. She climbed up on the couch and leaned back, spreading her legs and lounging in the deep cushions.
Samuel reddened and looked away.
"You realize that you're still not wearing any underwear?"
"What does that…oh." Her dress had ridden up to her navel with a combination of how she was sitting and scooting around on the couch to find a comfortable position. She sat up, pulled down her dress, and put her knees together, not necessarily in that order, or really any order in particular.
"Sorry, Sammy."
"Samuel."
"Why so formal?"
"Because lessening my name lessens me. Names have power."
"Really, so if I got everyone to start calling you S, then you'd basically loose all your power?"
"Something like that," he said with a smile.
Something seemed to occur to her as he smiled, "how come everyone doesn't know about this magic stuff."
"Well, like many things this world, like singing, it takes an aptitude to do it well, and a lot of training to get it right."
"So could I learn it?"
"I doubt it."
"Why not?"
"Cause you're a girl."
"That's very chauvinist of you. Besides, I wasn't born a girl."
"Doesn't matter to the magic. Well, I should say my magic. You'd have to find yourself a witch or a sorceress. I'm just an average run of the mill wizard."
"So…chances are it would be a witch who could change me back?"
"There is no changing back, Jared. Not that I've ever heard of."
"Yes, but you're only a wizard."
Samuel shook his head sadly. "You don't think you're the first one we've saved, do you?"
The sadness in Samuel's voice got to Jared and she began to cry. Samuel sat down beside her and took her in his arms, and she let loose all of the anguish that she felt at losing her identity. She sobbed into his chest, a lost soul with only this small piece of driftwood to cling onto.
Eventually she cried herself out and fell asleep again. Samuel carried her to the bed and again put her between the covers.
His phone rang, so he closed the door behind him so that he could talk freely.
"No, don't worry about it. Everything is working according to plan. We just have a few more things to take care of and then we can bring this all to a close."
Jared's eyes got wide as she listened from the doorway. She'd fallen asleep, but the movement woke her when he put her in bed. All of her fears seemed to be coming true. Silently she made her way back to the bed and lay down, waiting for the lights to go out. Then, she slowly counted to one hundred before she got up and began to move around the living area. She quickly found the keys to the car, and was out the door and into the elevator.
The entire ride to the basement she kept expecting the doors to open and men to rush in on her. Men in hoods who would take her somewhere and kill her.
She fumbled the keys into the ignition and finally, after a few false starts, got the car driving. She was driving too fast for the conditions, just trying to get her bearings, to find her way home. Her parents would know what to do, like they always did.
Her stomach sank through the souls of her feet when the red and blue flashing lights began.
"No no no no. This can't be happening. Can't This has to be a nightmare."
She considered trying to outrun the officer, but thought better of it and pulled over.
"License and registration."
"I don't have it on me. They kidnapped me and I'm only now getting away. You've got to help me officer."
"Who are you, miss?"
"Jared Milton."
The last few hours had been a blur as the officer put her in the back of his squad car and took her down to the precinct. They took her finger prints and put her into a holding cell with other women awaiting whatever they wait for on a Friday evening. Someone to bring bail. Someone to let them know they care. Someone to take them to the county lockup for the evening. One by one the other women were moved out of the cell until only Jared remained.
"What's the holdup, Steve?"
"According to her prints, She is Jared Milton."
"You're kidding, right? There's got to be some mistake. Or maybe she's one of those tranny prostitutes or something."
"According to the EMT we had in here, there's no sign of surgery."
"Some of these surgeons are good. Give me a couple of minutes with her and I'll know for sure."
"That's sick, Scolletti."
"Not like you never thought the same thing, Burns."
"Never. I really am a happy married man, Scolletti. And make sure the captain never hears you say that."
"Hears him say what, Burns?"
Captain Patty Blake did not like to hear her detectives keeping secrets from her. Especially this late on a Friday night. She could feel the tension mounting in the office even though the full moon, and Halloween, were still two weeks away. Alone either one was a terrible night to be a cop. Together? The only thing worse would be if the two were joined by a Friday the thirteenth. Luckily that was impossible.
"Well, um, you see…"
"I can answer for myself, Burns. I suggested that he let me in the cell with Jared and I'd verify his story fast enough."
"Go home, Scolletti."
"What?"
"This will be the last time I tell you."
"But captain, I was just joking."
"The next time you joke about raping anyone, let alone someone in custody, I'll have your badge."
Scolletti stormed out of the squad room leaving Burns and Blake alone. It's not that they were the only ones on duty, just that they were the only ones in the building at that moment.
"So, what do you make of this all, Burns?"
"He…she…has to be lying. Right? I mean she has to have gone through surgery of some sort. Really good surgery, sure, but surgery. Then she had a psychotic break and is convinced that she never wanted any of this. We should just send her over to Willshire and call it a day."
"But what about the fact that there is a missing persons report on Jared Milton, listing him as a boy. The picture is similar, but in no way the same, as the person in that cell."
"You think we should actually talk to the parents then?"
Captain Blake sat there for a moment, thinking, and then nodded once. "Let's call Jared's parents and get them down here. They might be able to tell us what's going on. Tell them we've found a lead on their son, and would like to get some more information from them."
"Maybe this is a twin thing? Right? I mean, she could be a twin that has convinced herself that she is Jared?"
"A twin there's no record of?"
They both sat there silently for a couple of moments and then Captain Blake got up and went back to her office. Burns called the parents and explained the situation, at least as much of it as he wanted to share over the phone, and they said they'd be right over.
When he was done, he walked over to the window and stood staring out into the darkness. The steady tick of the electric clock on the wall was his only company at that moment, and for some reason it didn't comfort him.
Tick, tick, tick. Over and over. On and on. The seconds continued to leak out of the world. Each one left a hole that could never be filled. Each one took a little more of his life away.
He pulled out his cell phone and dialed his wife.
"Hey, Lacey."
"Billy?"
"Yeah, just thought I'd give you a call and see how you're doing."
"Fine. Well, pregnant, but fine otherwise."
"You're the one who wanted to be pregnant, dearest."
"You're the one who made me this way. I blame it all on you."
"From what I recall…"
"Oh, shut up."
Burns chuckled, and his wife gave a little giggle.
"You going to be home soon? I'd really love one of your massages about now."
"And you want me to rub your feet as well, I assume."
"That would be heavenly."
"Love you."
"Love you too."
Burns turned toward the figures who were walking into the squad room.
"Can I help you?"
Light exploded all around him, silently tearing him into pieces and splashing his blood over the desks surrounding him. Captain Blake had a moment more to prepare and began returning fire. She took down two of the figures before she too became nothing more than color in her office.
Hans stood there surveying the damage.
"When we get the girl back, and complete this ritual, we won't need to hide any more. We will have the power we need to again take our place as the rulers of this pitiful world."
He walked regally into the holding area and found Jared cowering in a corner.
"The dress suits you, my dear. If I didn't need to wait until Halloween, I'd take you here and now."
"Aren't you going to kill me?"
"Kill you? Who told you that? No, we're just going to have sex with you."
"Huh?"
"You kill an innocent, and their innocence calls at you from the dust. Some beings could live with that. Truly evil beings they were. Your kind called them dragons. Us, we derive our power from the destruction of innocence."
The import of their words slowly sank into Jared, and the blood drained from her face. She began to get a bit wobbly in the knees as Hans began to laugh. At a touch the lock on the cell melted and he gestured the two who'd come with him through the opening.
Just as they got to her, Jared sank to the floor, avoiding their grasping hands. They began to bend down toward her, but she'd been faking this time. She reached out and grabbed a handful of each of the men's pants and twisted.
They screamed out in pain and doubled over on the floor. She wiped her hands on her dress with a look of disgust on her face.
She stood and walked over to Hans and slugged him.
He began to laugh at her.
"You stupid girl. Don't you realize that you don't have the strength for that? Your body is still short on food, and used up most of your muscle mass in the change. It's amazing that you can walk, let alone try to fight me."
He grabbed her by the arm and dragged her out into the squad room. He left the other two writhing on the ground. It was their own fault she tricked them after all.
Hans' head exploded the moment that they entered the room. The bang of the gun seemed to echo in the room, dazing Jared. Brain and blood peppered her face and hair, and was soaking into her clothing. She took one look down at herself and began to scream.
Three more shots rang out, and three more people dropped to the ground.
"Are you ok, miss?"
Jared looked at Scolletti without any recognition. It would be better to say she was just staring in his direction. Her expression was slack. She began to scream again.
Scolletti slapped her.
"Miss, we need to get out of here. I've called in backup, as I don't know who else is in the building, but we need to get somewhere safe."
He guided her out of the squad room and out to the lot. He opened the passenger side door of his squat car, and then got in himself on the other side. When they started moving again, Jared stopped screaming, but she still wasn't exactly there. She had a vacant expression, and her eyes simply didn't meet anything in her surroundings. A couple of other patrol cars, and a SWAT van arrived as they sat there, and Scolletti left to join the rest of the police.
While she was sitting there alone, a car drove up. Her parents car. She got out and ran over to them as they began to get out and looked around them bewildered.
"Mom? Dad?"
They looked at her without any comprehension. "Who are you?"
"It's me, Jared."
"You're not our son, young lady," her Dad said.
"You have to believe me. I'm Jared."
Her mom looked at her closely, but there was no recognition in her eyes. The bad light, and the blood, and other things, still on Jared's face, seemed to be making any of the slight similarities hard for either of them to see.
Jared began to frantically relate her tale, needed her parents to believe her. When she was done they both looked at her in disgust.
"Our son has been gone for three weeks, and you have the gall to tell us that you're him? You're probably just looking for money or a handout or something. Get away from us. We never want to see you again."
Jared sank to the ground and began to sob. Her parents got back into their car and drove away. She didn't resist when she was lifted up into the back of an ambulance and strapped down.
Nothing mattered any more. She'd thought that she would be able to just go back to her life after this, maybe just as a girl, but that was shattered by her parent's statements. They would never want her. They wanted Jared back.
"Well, they're not getting Jared back. Jared is dead. There's only me left." She began to giggle, and then laugh. She wanted to cry, but all she did was laugh.
The edifice that was Willshire Mental Hospital loomed above the ambulance and its occupants. They wheeled the stretcher out of the back and into the entrance.
Samuel met them as they entered.
"She was spouting some nonsense about being changed into a girl, and then collapsed into hysterical laughter. She said something about Jared, a missing boy, being dead. We tried to get her to speak about that, but she's completely unresponsive."
"Don't worry about it. I'll take care of her."
The girl looked up and saw the face of Samuel.
"Don't leave me here! He's one of the people who wants to rape me on Halloween. You have to let me out of here."
Samuel motioned to one of the orderlies and he injected a sedative into her arm. She relaxed against her restraints and fell unconscious.
"We've got it from here. Thanks for your help."
"No problem, Doctor Jensen."
Samuel went upstairs to the top of the building, and to a door that seemed to lead out into open air. The window beside it suggested so anyway.
He pulled an ornate key out of his pocket and unlocked the door. Through the doorway wasn't the outside of the building, but a long low room with thick wooden timbers overhead.
"Welcome, Samuel. So, you have Jared back again?"
"I'm not sure she is Jared any more. Sure, she still has the same memories, but she said in the ambulance that Jared was dead, Sir"
The person at the head of the table stroked his long white beard, thinking about the ramifications of all of this, "that's not good. The only hope we had of keeping her from willingly going to them on Halloween was that she still insisted on being Jared."
"Someone called her parents. She was rejected by them."
"Hmm. That might be the key, Samuel. Can you get them in here?"
"I'm sure that I can."
"Well, let's run some tests, then, and get them to realize that this is their son."
"Right away, Michael."
"That really is our son?"
Samuel showed them the sheet with the test on it, "the DNA tells us that he…she…is your son."
"How, how did this happen."
Samuel lied, of course, as he'd been given permission. "We don’t really know. We're thinking surgery of some sort, but she's already recovered. No soreness or sutures. Nothing to indicate how they did it. An MRI shows that she even has a uterus and ovaries, although no one knows if they are functional."
"I need to see her."
"It might not be a good idea…"
Jared's mom looked at Samuel, ferocity gleamed in her eyes, "I will see my son, no matter what he currently looks like."
Samuel smiled at her back, and then hurriedly opened the door.
"Jared?"
"Jared doesn't live here anymore. Just me. I don't know who I am, but I'm not Jared. Jared is dead. They killed Jared and put me where he used to be."
"Honey, we know you're ours. I'm sorry. We didn't know."
The girl looked at her mother with a sad expression on her face.
"Jared's dead, mom. I can't ever be Jared anymore."
"Then be Angela."
"Angela?"
"Yes, Angela. I think you are as beautiful as a little angel, and that is the only name that could really fit you."
"But I need to be a devil. They want to take me and rape me momma. They want to take away my purity. If I give it away to someone else, then I'll be safe. If someone else…"
"Baby, no one will hurt you. You're safe now."
"It's just sex, momma. It can't hurt. Then I won't be a virgin anymore and they won't want to sacrifice me. If I'd been able to rectify my predicament before, I wouldn't be in this mess now."
"You're…and Jared…never?"
"No, mom. I never had sex." Angela colored upon saying the word. She seemed to be coming back to herself, and the wild light in her eyes was beginning to fade.
"I'm so proud of you. I was sixteen when I got pregnant with you. The only thing that kept me going was the hope that I'd have a little girl. I was going to raise her better than my parents raised me. She would know about the sanctity of her body, and that she didn't need to give it to the first quarterback that made eyes at her."
"Dad was a quarterback."
"My point exactly."
The two of them laughed at this.
"Don't get me wrong. I love your father. I've loved him from the moment that we met, although he thinks we met a year later than we did. It was hard work getting him to notice me as an under developed freshman."
"Mom, I really didn't need to hear this." Angela was blushing furiously.
"You are so innocent, my little girl. I never really noticed this before when you were Jared. Of course I always assumed that Jared…well…I'm the one who told your dad to give you a condom."
Angela's mouth dropped open, and she turned completely red. Her mom laughed at her, and finally Angela smiled.
"So, you about ready to get out of here? You've already missed a month of school, and we need to figure out what we're going to do with your transcripts."
"Mom! I've been turned into a girl, and all you can think about is getting me back into school?"
"Well, we'll have to get you some clothing first, of course."
At the mention of clothing, Angela blushed. "Does that mean I have to wear a bra?"
"Of course it does, you lady."
"No dresses though. I don't want to wear any dresses."
"You don't have to, Angela. It's a girl's prerogative to wear what she wants, most of the time. Most of the place. Some places they have a problem with a proper tom boy, but most of the time, most of the world over, it is fine for you to wear what you want."
"Good. I want shorts and tee shirts then."
"You never wore shorts before…"
"Have you seen my legs? They're completely hairless and just gorgeous."
"You aren't shaving them?"
"Not once."
"I'm jealous, I'll tell you that."
Angela giggled. She'd never had her mother jealous of any part of her body before, and she really did like the way her legs looked.
Her mom left the room and went back to talk to Samuel.
"When can we take her home?"
"We'd like to keep her here for another week for observation, but you should be able to get her on the 31st."
"That's still four days from now."
"We want to be careful."
"Ok, but we were hoping to get her before that. The 31st is her birthday."
"Then we could throw a party for her here…"
"No, we'll do something for her at home, after we get her out of here."
Angela looked out the window at the manicured lawns and carefully shaped trees. She was getting out of here today. She tugged again at the straps of the bra, uncomfortable to be wearing such a weird piece of clothing. The mere thought of it no longer made her blush, she just wished that she didn't have to wear one.
Her parents were coming to get her today.
She smiled at the thought. In just a few short hours…
She doubled over and fell to the ground in a fetal position. Then the lights went out.
There were screams of fear and pain coming from outside her room, and Samuel burst into the room.
"What's happening to me?"
"Your body is ready. It's telling you that the transformation is finally complete. We need to get out of here, though, since we've just run out of time. They're here to get you."
"I still don't trust you!"
"I never did anything to you."
"Both sides in this just want one thing! Me. Why does everyone want me?"
"Because you'll be the mother of the next generation."
"I'm not going to be anyone's mother."
"Not yet, maybe, but eventually."
"Never."
"Just come. We need to get out of here."
The light flashed all around them, but none of it touched them. They still needed her in one piece it seemed.
They ran out through the door when a shot rang out. Blood blossomed on Samuel's chest and he collapsed to the ground. Red bubbles flecked his lips as he screamed, "Run, Angela. Get out of here."
Another shot sounded and he collapsed to the ground.
A figured walked up to her as she sat there, unsure what to do. She needed to get the bullets out of him if he were going to survive, but she had no tools to do it with. She put her hand on his chest, but hands grabbed her from behind and dragged her back.
"They told me if I helped them, that I'd get you," Scolletti said. I kissed her roughly on the mouth and then laughed as she spit out the taste of him.
"You don't have to like it. I'll take your ass any way I can get it. I know you'll like it, though. I know you were flashing me intentionally at the station. You wanted me even then."
Hooded figured converged on them and he dragged her toward a van. She'd had enough.
"Leave me ALONE!"
She pulled out of their grasp, and ran back to the building. Someone there should be able to help her. Anyone…
Samuel's body was missing. In its place was a figure glowing with light. "Your time here is done!" The figure commanded. The hooded figures rushed away, except for one. He dropped the hood revealing the face of Hans.
"But…you're dead," Angela said, her voice shaky.
"You think a bit of brass and lead can kill me? I'm an immortal wizard."
"You're a devil, and you know it."
"Me…but I'm only Haures….I meant Haures…" His eyes began to burn with hatred.
"I've snipped your lying tongue, devil. Now, take your imps and flee."
The light streaming in through her window woke Angela. She looked around her in wonder. It was her room, still furnished like she had in the past. White walls. Slight clutter. The closet had the new clothes that her mother had threatened.
"Oh, you're awake."
There he stood, Samuel. Not the terrible angel that she had last seen from the night before but the man who had first sat in her car. He wore the same burgundy clothing. He had the same styled haircut and goatee. He even had the silver amulet, that for the first time she realized was an angel, with the chain connected to the wing tips.
"Samuel? What happened? How are we back in my room?"
"I used a bit of my power and brought you here. I put you to sleep so that you could get some much needed rest before...before what happens next. So, are you ready to go back?"
"What? To…go back? To where?"
"We had to keep you in the form of a girl until the very end, Jared. The other's needed to believe that they still had you. They might have been able to find a replacement."
"But they were devils. They have power…"
"Where do you think they get their power? They are corruption, and gain power from corruption of innocence."
"So what do you gain power from?"
"You. And people like you. So, are you ready now to go back, Jared?"
"My name isn't Jared."
"Oh really?" Samuel asked with a smile, "What's your name?"
"My name is Angela."
Samuel laughed, smiling at her response.
"I was never really a success as a boy. I seemed to always bge a step behind, or a moment too late. I was out of sync. I figured that if I failed so badly as a guy, that I couldn't be that bad as a girl. I might as well give it a try."
"You realize that we only have a small window of opportunity in which we can still change you back? After today, you'll be stuck like this. There will be no turning back and you'll be a woman for the rest of your life."
This seemed to spark something in Angela, a memory of something said previously, "If you're an angel, how could you lie to me?"
"I'm not an angel, not the way you under stand them, and neither are our opponents demons. Through the ages people without power have named us this, or other things both flattering and not. Those like me, who gain their power for the presence of innocence and beauty, are called angels. Those who get their power from the corruption of virtue, they are demons. They thought that corrupting that cop, getting him to act on his impulses, would bring them enough power to be able to take us on in our stronghold."
Angela giggled a bit at this.
"No, they didn't gain enough power. And you were considerable more pure than even they could have hoped."
"What did those demons mean, when they said I'd be the mother of a whole new generation?"
"You are a complete woman, Angela. In all regards. If they had defiled you last night, it's a good possibility you would have become pregnant, and with it being All Hallow's Eve, a day of power for them, your child would have been the greatest of them. He would have ushured in a new era of darkness that we wouldn't soon recover from."
"I'm a complete woman?"
"You felt your first cramp yesterday. Not that it's yet your time, but you will have them every month."
Angela shuddered and paled slightly.
"Rethinking your decision?"
Angela took a deep breath, held it for a moment, and then shook her head as she exhaled, "No. I'm happy with my decision."
Nodding once, Samuel stood and moved toward the window.
"No wings?"
"No," he laughed, "I get to jump."
Angela blushed as she began to speak again, "you could, you know, stop by from time to time. Partake of my innocence..."
Samuel laughed a good hearted laugh, "I'm too old for you, and I know you didn't really mean it in the way that it sounded."
"A date here or there, then?"
"Maybe a date."
Angela sat staring out the window long after he'd left, wondering what her future would hold. There was a knock at the door, and her parents entered.
"Happy birthday, Angela."
Angela turned and smiled at them.
"You know what? Yes, it is. A very happy birthday."
Her parents laughed, and she just smiled. It was going to be a very happy day indeed.
A collection of stories about a special child named Jubal Marie Franks.
This story began as an attempt to provide a little bit of personal back story for a teenager named Jubal. The original story I wrote ended up disjointed at first, so I expanded the first chapter I'd written from 7500 words to well past 13000 words. And I didn't even revise anything in the last 3500 words of the original.
The additional 5500 words had all come as an expansion upon the early life of Jubal. How he became who he was when the 'real' story opened.
I realized yesterday that this was my story to tell, and I needed to tell all of it.
I apologize for the lack of a happy ending.
I also apologize for posting this just after sending my editor a copy. I will be making changes to it as she gets back to me ;)
"What happened to her?"
"Their car went through a railing and into a dry river bed. . ."
The doctor and EMT were interrupted by a nurse attaching a monitor to the obviously pregnant woman's belly "I've got fetal heartbeat."
"We need her in surgery now. We can either save the mother or child at this point, and the child seems to have a greater chance of survival."
"The child is your daughter's as much as it was our son's"
"We never agreed to the marriage of that freak of a girl you call your son to our baby girl. I would have stopped it if I could."
"Jim, even your money isn't enough to call a stop to a perfectly legal marriage."
"Legal? Legal?! . ."
"Jim, honey, keep it down." Samantha Hastings looked around at the mostly abandoned waiting room. Some of the other families waiting there looked over at the four of them, and then looked away embarrassed that they'd been caught looking.
"Samantha, I will not keep this down."
Jim Hastings was still fuming when a doctor walked into the waiting room.
"Mr. and Mrs. Hastings? I am sorry to inform you that your daughter did not make it out of surgery. We were able to save her child. . ."
"That child is no blood of ours. Let the Franks take their freak of an offspring."
The Hastings stood to leave. They sneered at the lighter skinned couple they were leaving behind.
The doctor was confused to say the least. "I donated the sperm that was used to artificially inseminate my daughter-in-law. Our son insisted, and she agreed."
At the doctor's questioning glance, Anthony Franks blushed.
"Our son was born our daughter. She. . .even after all these years I sometimes forget. . .he wanted to have a child that was genetically related to him. Our daughter-in-law's parents only found out what happened last week. They disowned them both."
"I'm sorry to hear that, Mr. Franks. Since the child is genetically yours, you do have legal custody."
"The child is our son's, doctor. His, or her, birth certificate should reflect this," Amelia Franks said.
"That is a good question."
"Isn't every child one or the other?"
"Yes, usually. About one in a thousand children, however, are what is termed intersexed."
"So, what your telling us is the child is both male and female?."
"Yes and no. Usually, the child will exhibit a greater degree of characteristics one way of the other. And they will always be genetically one or the other. In this case, however, it's a bit harder to tell. I'd like authorization to put the child through an MRI."
"Isn't that a bit extreme?"
"I si9mply don't know how to classify the child."
"Why classify the child at all? We can begin calling the child Him, and let him decide."
"It's not that easy. We would have to make surgical correction, so that he conformed with socially acceptable. . ."
"Absolutely not," Amelia was incensed, "We were told twenty years ago that our child would be happier if we made the exact same decision. So, we cut off his male genitals and turned him into a girl. We made the wrong decision then, we're not making that decision again. The child will not be altered!"
The doctor backed up a bit, his eyes widening.
"The child has a mental gender identity. It is already formed. We learned that the hard way last time. We tried to force our little boy into dresses, telling him that if he'd just give it a chance he'd feel so much better about himself.
"I will never do that to another child for as long as I live."
"What do you propose we do, then Mr. Franks?"
"We call the child Jubal, the name our son finally picked, and Marie for her sweet mother that she never got to know. Jubal Marie Franks. One name for his father. One name for his mother."
"This is highly irregular, Mr. Franks."
"Need I remind you that I am on the board of trustees for this hospital? Just do it, Doctor Grimes."
He had some big words already, and elsewhere was one of them. To most other people it sounded like he was saying el-were, but his parents knew what he meant. They smiled at him, and that made him happy. He said el-were whenever he could.
He especially liked daddy's tickles, but not right now. He wanted his mommy to give him a big hug.
He'd only gotten five or six this morning and he was way below his daily quota.
"Mommy hug! Mommy hug!" He yelled at the top of his lungs, knowing that his mommy would know just what he needed.
He wandered into the kitchen where his mommy and daddy were talking. They looked so serious. Not the normal smiles that they gave him.
"Mommy smile! Mommy hug!"
"But, Tony, he's only two years old. How can they do this?"
"Mommy hug?"
His mommy lifted him into her arms and just held him to her.
"It's a pre-school, Amelia. And it's private. They can make any decisions on who they allow in they want."
"But he didn't do anything wrong!"
"It's okay, mommy. Jubal sorry. Jubal sorry, okay?"
"My dearest little one, you did nothing wrong." Amelia teared up a bit.
"The impression that they gave me, was that it was our fault they weren't letting Jubal in."
"It's simple, then. We stop all donations to them."
"Amelia!"
"I'm serious, Tony. That is our vote for their policies when we offer them money. We've given them close to a hundred thousand dollars over the past ten years. If their policy is to discriminate based on gender, then I'm sorry, I no longer feel comfortable assisting them to stay in business."
"Mommy hug. Jubal sorry, Mommy."
"I'm sorry too, Jubal. I know that you aren't to blame. I love you, my dear sweet boy. I love you, my dear sweet girl. You have the right to choose who you will be, and no silly day school can change that.
The doll was wearing a pretty yellow and pink dress, which was a lot better than the business suit she'd originally come in. She was the head firefighter because Jubal thought the yellow dress looked better than the firefighter's rubberized jackets.
She was a little smaller than the firefighters, but even Jubal knew that girls were smaller than boys. She fit perfectly in the driver's seat of the fire engine that he also got for his birthday.
He'd gotten everything he wanted. A pretty doll and a fire engine. He'd received other toys and clothes as well, but they mostly sat in his toy box untouched.
Mommy let him wear a bow in his hair today, but he wore his shorts and tee shirt instead of a dress. As he'd told his Mommy: Dresses were for playing Tea, not for playing in the dirt.
A little girl, maybe five or six years old walked up to Jubal as he played.
"Whatcha doin'?"
"Playing firewoman."
"It's fireman, silly."
"No, see, I have a female head fireman, so it is firewoman."
"Girls aren't firemen. They're mommies and doctors and stuff."
"My Mommy said that a girl can be anything she wants. Boys too."
"Why is your pretty dolly a fireman?"
"Firewoman. It's because the dolly is me. I want to be a firewoman too."
"But you're a boy?"
"Nope. I'm a Jubal. Or a Marie."
"But those are boy clothes."
"And a pretty bow. Just like me, they are both."
"You can't be both, silly."
"Yes, huh. I can be both."
"But, you're one or the other."
"Nu-nuh. I am NOT! I'm a JUBAL! I get to choose!"
Amelia ran to him from her garden just inside the front gate, wondering what had happened. She noticed one of the children from the neighborhood talking to Jubal, who was crying and running toward her.
"Mommy, Mommy, this mean girl said that I can't be both. Tell her she's wrong!"
"My poor sweet girl. My poor boy. Mommy's got you. Shhh."
Amelia continued to comfort Jubal even as she turned toward the other girl. "What's your name, sweetheart?"
"Bethany."
"That's a pretty name, Bethany. How old are you?"
"Almost six."
"Almost six, huh. As old as that?" Amelia smiled at her. "Well, Bethany, Jubal Marie was right. He, or she, is both a boy and a girl right now. It isn't common, but it does happen. Jubal is special in that way. We want her, or him, to decide what is right for Jubal to be, and not what is right for everyone else."
"But, my mommy says that boys have a penis and girls have a vagina. It can't be both, can it?" Bethany had a confused look on her face.
Amelia smiled sweetly at the innocent little girl. "In Jubal's case, it can."
"If Jubal is a girl, then she can come play with me at my house. Mommy and Daddy don't think I should have boy friends."
"Would you like to go and play at Bethany's house, Jubal?"
"She wants girl me? Marie then, Mommy."
"Ok, Jubal, I mean Marie. Would you like to wear a dress over to Bethany's house then?"
"Yes, Mommy. My yellow one."
"Whatcha doin'? he asked, imitating her from earlier.
"Reading a book."
"What's reading?"
"I look at the words, and they tell me things."
"What's this word?"
"And."
"ooh. . .and this word?"
"a"
"and a. . .look, and has an 'a' in it." Light sparkled in Jubal's eyes. "There are 'a's all over the page. The a word is there?"
"No, when it is part of another word, it is called a letter."
"So, a is a letter and a word, but and is only a word?" Jubal had a look of concentration on his little face.
"Yep." Bethany giggled.
"Do more words."
"We did reading."
"So, Bethany read to you?"
"No, Jubal did reading. I readinged 'a' and 'and' and 'not' and NUREAU, but that's a nonsense word."
"Wow, Jubal, I'm impressed."
"Will you teach me more reading, Mommy?"
"Amelia."
"Hello, is this Mrs. Franks?"
"It is."
"You said Amelia? Hi, Amelia, This is Bethany's mom, Lauren."
"What can I do for you, Lauren?"
"Well, according to Bethany, your daughter Marie thinks she's a boy."
"No, you're mistaken."
"Are you calling my daughter a liar?"
"No, I'm just saying you misunderstood. I'm sorry, I was caught off guard. Let me start again. Jubal Marie is intersexed."
"Why did you give your child a girl and a boy name?"
"Because she has characteristics of both. That's what intersexed means."
"Why didn't you have the doctor just fix it then?"
"And which gender would you pick?"
"Does it matter? You raise a child properly and they'll never question their gender."
"I'm sorry, Lauren, but that's just not the case."
"You're not telling me that you think these tranny freaks are normal are you."
"Lauren, I'll ask you to watch your language, please. And no, I don't think they're normal, in the way that you're defining it. I do think that people sometimes feel trapped in the wrong sex."
"It's all just people trying to convince themselves that their deviance is. . ."
"Stop right there, Lauren. I believed like you did once upon a time. I had a child who I was sure was my daughter. I enrolled him in ballet and gymnastics. He was even a cheerleader in junior high for a little while. Not because he wanted it, but because I thought it would be good for him. Help him fit in with the 'other girls' so to speak. When he tried to commit suicide after cutting his breasts to ribbons, we got him the help he needed."
Lauren was quiet for a moment or two and then spoke again in a much quieter voice. "What happened to your son?"
"He got married to a beautiful woman we were happy to call daughter. Jubal is their child. I would never even consider putting my son's child through what I mistakenly thought was the right thing. . ."
"I never knew. I'm sorry. I thought that he was your child. . ."
"He calls me Mommy, and I let him. We figured it would be easier for everyone involved."
"I see where you're coming from, but I don't know if I'm comfortable letting my girl play with yours. We try not to let any boys over to the house."
"I think that's a little silly, don't you?"
"Look, I understand your trauma from the past, leave me to mine!"
Lauren slammed the phone down on the hook.
Amelia looked a bit bemused, but at least, maybe, she had gotten through to someone a little about her dear sweet girl, her dearest boy.
"What's that, Jubal, or is it Marie today?" Jubal was wearing one of her dresses, but had a pair of jeans on underneath.
"Marie today, Daddy."
"So, what do you want for Christmas?"
"I want books. Lotsa books. And ones with more words. The picture books I got for my birthday are too small. I want longer stories."
"You know that they will be harder to read, right?"
"I know, silly Daddy. But if it's not hard, then it's not worth it, right?"
"That's my girl!"
"Boy! daddy. I'm Marie today, but I'm a boy."
Jubal went off to play, and Tony looked up at Amelia. "Marie is a boy?"
"This is a new kick he's on. He told me earlier that it was hard for him to decide whether he wanted to be a girl or a boy, and thought maybe some of the difficulty was because he liked both of his names so much. So, to try and clarify, he's trying to be a Boy as Marie, and a Girl as Jubal."
"He said all that?"
"Well, you know, he used kid shorthand, but yes, that is what he said."
"I think we might be creating a monster," Tony said with a wide grin.
"I think he wants to be a boy, but is unsure how we will take it. We are so wishy-washy where that is concerned, trying not to influence him either way, that we are making him think if he decides that we will love him less."
"Let me handle it then, Love."
Tony went to find his son. He found the boy playing with his dolls in the fire truck again. He smiled at that.
"Jubal Marie, could I talk to you for a second?"
"Sure, Daddy."
"You know your Mom and I love you, right?"
"Yes Daddy. Marie being a boy isn't wrong is it?"
"No, honey, it isn't wrong. Do you like being a boy or a girl more?"
"It is more fun being a boy. We get to play in the dirt, and you work on the engine which is fun, but I know not to get too close."
"That's not all there is to being a boy, you know."
"It's not?"
"Nope. Boys and Girls have a lot that they both can do. The one thing they really don't share, however, is that Boys are Daddies and Girls are Mommies."
"Oh. . .so girls can play in the dirt and boys can wear pretty clothes?"
"Yes, honey, they can."
"Oh, then how can I decide?"
A couple of tears came to his eyes at that, but Tony didn't cry easily. He just hugged his child to him.
"I didn't say something wrong did I?"
"Of course not, sweetie. Do you want to be a daddy or a mommy more when you grow up?"
Jubal looked thoughtful for a couple of minutes, and then looked up at his daddy. "I think I want to be a Daddy when I grow up. I love Mommy, but I wouldn't want to be Mommy. I can decide different later?"
"Yes, you can change your mind later. You only have to make your final decision when you are twelve."
"That is so long from now."
"Yes, that is a ways away, my son."
"I'm a SON! Wahoo!!!"
Tony laughed at his sons antics and Amelia spoke up from the doorway, "Yes you are, my dearest boy."
He wanted to master all of them.
The first one wasn't much better than the Seuss books he already had. Sure there were more words, but they were mostly the same words. He wanted new words.
He wanted to know everything.
'Maybe, they use the same words so that the new words make sense.
That thought made reading the old words easier. Another thought popped into his mind, and he smiled.
Jubal went tromping around in his nightgown. He still refused to wear pajamas. He liked the feel of nightgowns better.
"Mommy? Mommy!"
"In the kitchen, sweetheart."
"Is there a word book?"
"A word book?"
"You know, one that has lots of new words in it, and old words so you can understand."
She looked confused for a moment, and then a light went off. "You mean a dictionary?"
"What is dictionry?"
"Let me show you."
She went into the study and got the oversized dictionary off the shelf. Jubal opened it up to the first page and his eyes got wide.
"This is so much better than a word book. This is. . .easy! They just tell you what the words mean like you and Daddy tell me when I ask."
Amelia laughed and smiled, "Yes, dearest boy, they just tell you the meanings."
Jubal sat down and began to read the dictionary.
"Honey, you don't just read the dictionary."
Jubal looked up worried, "Why not? Is it wrong?"
"Usually you use it to look up words you don't understand."
Jubal was thoughtful for a moment. "But, isn't is easier to simply read the dictionary first? There are so many words I don't understand."
Amelia laughed again, and gave him a hug. "Of course you can read the dictionary, if you want to."
"Thanks, Mommy. I will."
"Well, Okay."
Jubal took the dictionary to the couch and began to read. He was confused about the wierd symbols after each of the bold words.
"Mommy, what are these letters? They look different from the ones I am used to, and I can't sound them out."
"Oh, those are there for pronunciation. So you can sound the new word out easier."
"Ok, so what sounds do they make."
"I'm not sure," Amelia flipped through the book a little till she found the pronunciation guide. "Here you go. Here are the explanations for all the symbols."
"What does Pah-ho-netic mean?"
"That's phonetic, honey. It means it is spelled the way it sounds."
Jubal looked through he chart and realized something. "There is only one letter for each sound, Mommy. How come we don't spell things with these letters?"
Amelia laughed at that, she couldn't help it. "It would be a lot easier, wouldn't it, honey."
Jubal laughed a bit, unsure what was funny, "Yes, Mommy."
"Sometimes people just don't do things the easy way, honey."
"Ok, well, I'm going to learn the phonetic letter so it is easier for me. I do things the easy way."
"Ok, sweetie. Have fun."
"Yes, Mommy.
He knew that Christmas was in December, and this year, since reading April, he'd kept better track of which months were which. Thirty days was just so many to keep track of thought. He had a calendar that he colored on to keep track. He made a little picture on each new day.
June Fifteenth. He knew that his birthday hadn't happened yet this year, so it wasn't in January, or February. March was a nice month, but not his. April, his favorite month wasn't his birthday either.
And May, the shortest month name, wasn't his. It might be later in June, but. . .
"Mommy? When is my birthday?"
"Not for months and months yet, Jubal."
"But when? I'd like to put in on my calendar."
"Ok, sweetie, let me show you."
"No, I can do it. Just tell me the date."
"Ok, Mr. bossy pants. It is October 13th." Amelia smiled as she watched her son turn through the pages of the calendar. He counted to himself as he did it.
"One. . .two. . .three. . .FOUR! October! It is only four months away. That is so close, we need to start planning, Mommy. I want a big party."
"Honey, that's more than fifteen weeks away."
"Oh," Jubal's face fell. "But we can have a big party on my birthday?" There was hope in his eyes.
"We can have a big birthday, Jubal."
She looked into the shade for a moment and realized that Jubal wasn't with the others in the maze. He was crying, and hiding in a corner of the garden by the house.
"What's wrong, Jubal?"
"I didn't get any new books. I just got toys, and all boy toys. I wanted at least a new Barbie."
"Sweetie, we didn't give you any new books, because you are already reading the ones in the study."
"But, they're yours and Dad's. I want my books to read."
"Ok sweetie, and we'll get you a new Barbie too. Why don't you go run and play with the other kids?"
"I don't know how, and they won't explain it to me. They called me stupid."
"Honey, they just don't know how smart you are. Watch what they do. Read their actions like you would a new word in a book."
"You mean I should look for the context?"
"Exactly," Amelia said with a smile.
"Ok, I'll figure it out. Thanks, Mommy."
"Go run and play, Jubal"
Amelia smiled at him. She felt the creaking in her bones, and worried how she would be able to continue raising a young child, when she was only getting older. She'd been almost thirty when she'd had her son, and he'd been thirty five when he died.
Seventy was entirely too young to be feeling this old.
Her breathing was labored when she got back to her chair. She would just rest her eyes for a moment here in the shade. She could hear Jubal joining in with the game with the other children.
She was so tired. So sleepy.
Just a short nap, and she'd be ready to run and play with her beautiful boy. . .
Tony heard the desperation in his son's voice. He'd been working in the study, trying to finish out his last case. Judges had a tendency to be older, but he was beginning to feel it. It was time for him to retire and spend more time with his son.
Those thoughts stuck with him as he missed the top step on the winding staircase.
He was staring up looking at the frantic face of his son. Something was wrong with his back. He couldn't reach out his hand to touch his son's face. "Call 911, Jubal. They can help."
Jubal nodded and ran away. Tony knew it was too late for him as he felt his consciousness slipping.
"Grow up strong, My son. Be beautiful, My daughter." He whispered these words. His only regret was that Jubal would never hear them.
"My name is Joey."
"Fine, Joey. You'd think that a big black woman like you would be a Laticia or Maticia or some kind of 'Tiicia."
"Nancy, I would appreciate if you'd keep the racial slurs to a minimum."
"Sorry, I just joking."
"It wasn't funny. How bad is it? Not another girl being put out as a prostitute by her step-father/pimp is it?"
"Nope, kid being raised by the grandparent. Grandmother died of a blood clot in the lungs. Grandfather fell down the stairs trying to help."
"The kid lost both parents in one day? How old?"
"Today is the kid's fifth birthday."
"So, boy or girl this time?"
"Well, there is the other part of the scenario. The child is intersexed. The officers tell me that he calls himself a boy, but the doctor who checked him out. . .shocked to say the least. We tracked down the family's doctor, and found out that the grandparents wanted the kid to decide when he turns twelve."
"Why do you give me all the tough cases?"
"Because you're the new girl around here."
Joey just stood and shook her head. "Alright, give me the file and I'll see what I can do."
The sun shone on the rows of headstones, illuminating but not comforting. He wished that the sky were grey and it were raining. the sky should be crying like he was. The sun shone and threw irony over the scene.
The smell of dirt pervaded the air. The only other people with him were Joey, big comfortable Joey, and a Priest. Joey had told him that the Will had said that his parents wanted to have a church funeral, but he didn't know exactly what that meant. He didn't care either. He just wanted his parents back.
"Get up! Mommy, Get up! Please. They're going to burry you, Mommy. Daddy, tell her. Daddy, wake up and tell Mommy I don't like this game anymore."
He pulled his hand out of the social worker's grasp and ran over to the casket. He tried to open it up, but it was locked.
"Please, Mommy. I'll do better I promise. I'm sorry I'm not fast enough. I'lkl learn to run faster. And read. You want me to read. I'll read. I'll do anything, Mommy."
The priest looked sadly over to the social worker, who simply nodded. The priest turned the key in first one, and then the other, motor and the caskets slowly lowered into the ground.
"MOMMY!!!!"
Joey dragged Jubal away from the gravesite.
"Doesn't the child have any other family?" asked the priest.
"None. The only blood relation refuses to accept the child, saying that he is a freak of nature. They hung up on me the first time I called, and refuse to pick up when I call back."
"What hope is there for the child then?"
"He's only five, Father. It's really likely that he will get adopted."
"I will pray for him."
"That's all anyone can ask of you, Father."
"We're aware, Joey. My wife and I can't have any children of our own. We'd been hoping to adopt an infant, but the first time we were here, something about little Jubal reached out and grabbed onto us."
"What my husband means to say is we fell in love with him at first sight. One of the other social workers told us that he was intersexed, so we decided to research a bit before making a decision. We just wanted to ask a couple of questions before we started working toward taking Jubal home with us. Why didn't the doctor just resolve the problem when he was an infant?"
"The grandparents want Jubal to be able to decide. They provided a trust for him that will pay all expenses that might accrue. He has until his twelfth birthday."
"That long? Wont there be problems with the schools?"
"If there are, money is also put aside for any legal situations that may come up. Jubal is likely to want to be a boy at that point, but he is a bit ambiguous in certain areas."
"Ambiguous?"
"He occasionally likes to wear dresses, and he has a couple of Barbies."
"Well, I always wanted to play dolls with my daughter, so I guess we get the best of both worlds with Jubal."
"Honey, let's go talk to Jubal and see if he wants to go home with us."
Joey watched the couple as they walked into the play room where Jubal currently sat. She knew there would be trouble ahead for the little boy, but at least for the moment, he might actually find some happiness with the Carsons.
Like she told the priest almost a month ago, praying was all that could be asked of anyone right now.
I would like to publicly thank everyone who sent me notes of encouragement. It has been a rough day for me, mostly of my own creation. That you all for your support.
A NOTE ABOUT GRAMMAR SCHOOL: This may or may not be accurate to today's world, but this grade school environment Jubal attends is based loosely on my own. We had a single teacher who taught us English, science, math, and social studies. Most of the time it was just English and Math. The two Ss were on a more periodic basis; every other day for a couple of hours I think.
Computer science, art, music, and gym were with other teachers, in other rooms. They were even less frequent than science and social studies.
Without further ado, I give you Jubal.
ADDENDUM: I realized only after I was working on the next story, that one of the names in here was wrong. Silly author. Made the changes to obscure Harold's boss' name until later.
Jubal did not fit into any of his rows or columns. He was not a boy. She was not a girl. It still brought a smile to his face thinking of those blue eyes when he'd told the child that they had a place for him in their lives.
As they walked up to the boy he tried to hide behind his raven locks.
"Would you like to come home with us, Jubal? Or do you prefer Marie?"
"Would I have to forget about my parents?" There were some tears in his eyes as he asked this
Sarah had kneeled down next to the boy and looked him in the eye. "Jubal, honey, we would never replace your parents. You would only be with us as long and you want to. I would love for you to stay with us, though."
"Would you love ME? Even if I'm a freak?"
"You are never a freak. Why would you believe that?"
"Mrs. Limon told me that Jesus hates me because I am an abomination. I don't want to be an abomination. Father Kenny told me that my parents went to heaven, and if they're there, I can't believe that Jesus is. They wouldn't let anyone hate me."
"Oh, dearest. Mrs. Limon doesn't know Jesus if she thinks that, and I am sure that he doesn't hate you. Jesus loved everyone, and I'm sure he's comforting your parents right now. He's keeping them company until you are old and grey and go to meet them."
"Really? You really think they're waiting for me?" A spark of hope ignited in his eyes. They would put sapphires to shame.
"Of course sweetie. I can't believe that this life is the end. And if the soul goes on, then the relationships that we form in this life must go on as well. My soul soars whenever I look at Mr. Carson. How can that end with this life."
"Is that true, Mr. Carson? Really?"
"I hope so, Jubal. I do."
"Harold, if you're done staring off into space, you can probably head home for the day. I know you finished the analysis for the Parkinson account yesterday. . .don't even try to deny it."
"Sir, I can explain."
"I know. You have a new child in the house. You've always done more work in three hours than most of the rest of these clowns do all week. That's why we're cutting their maximum hours, and putting you on salary."
"Sir, I don't know what to say."
"Say goodbye, and see you tomorrow."
"Goodbye, sir. I'll see you tomorrow."
"That's the spirit. Say hello to that new son of yours and your beautiful wife. One of these days I'm stealing both of them away from you."
Harold left as he grabbed his coat and headed for the door. He had usually clocked out as soon as his work was done. He'd never felt right about being paid not to work. That had been fine when it had just been the two of them and Sarah had still been working, but since Jubal had come to live with them? . .
Even so, he'd spent the time quadruple checking his numbers and facts, making one thousand percent sure that everything he was submitting was correct. He'd made no corrections, nor had the information needed any.
"Harold, what's wrong. I thought that you were going to stay the entire day today?"
"They put me on salary. That will likely mean they are going to start giving me more work, but in the short term I get to spend more time with you and Jubal."
"Mr. Carson, can we go to the library again?"
"We are able to go to the library, Jubal." Susan said.
He blushed lightly. "May we go to the library, Mr. Carson."
"I think that can be arranged. What happened to the books we got for you two days ago?"
"I finished the last one this morning after I went running."
"Running?"
"The last words Mommy said to me were to run and play, so I try and run every day for her. I know now it won't bring her back. She didn't leave because she was mad at me. It just makes me happier to do something she asked me."
Harold gave his wife a squeeze and a kiss before whispering to her, "tough morning?"
"No more than any with Jubal. The boy is just so smart. It's like having a ten year old with the emotions of a five year old. He is so articulate that sometimes I forget how little he really knows."
"I'm great at listening too," Jubal whispered up at them.
Harold and Susan laughed and Harold grabbed Jubal up into a flying hug. "That you are, my little man. You are a wonderful listener."
"Higher, Daddy, Higher."
Susan's eyes widened a bit, but Harold just complied with the request and tossed Jubal lightly into the air.
When Harold's arms grew tired, he lowered Jubal to the ground and tickled him until he said stop.
Susan sat down of the floor and looked Jubal in the eyes. "Why did you call Mr. Carson, 'Daddy'?"
A little fear crept into Jubal's eyes. "It wasn't wrong was it? I heard the two of you talking about adopting me, and that means you are going to be my Mommy and Daddy, so I tried it out to see how it works. I can stop if you want."
A couple of tears came to his eyes, and Susan wrapped him in her arms.
"It's never wrong to call your Mommy and Daddy by their real names."
"It isn't betraying my first Mommy and Daddy is it?"
"Never. They are still your first Mommy and Daddy. They will always love you."
"Okay. I love you, Mommy. Thanks for explaining everything to me. You are an even better teacher than my first Mommy."
Susan just hugged him and the tears began to flow from both of their eyes.
"I love you to, Jubal."
Harold wrapped them both in his arms, hugging them. "And i love you both."
Jubal accepted the hug for a few seconds and then began to squirm. "Can we go to the library now?"
Susan laughed as Harold replied, "yes, we can go to the library now, Jubal. Get your book bag."
"Yes, Ms. Bonny. But I finished the books already."
"All three? In just two days?"
"Yeah, they were too short."
Bonny Roland laughed at this. "They were fifteen pages each. But I guess our little man is just too old for little kids books. So, what type of stories do you want next? Snow White? War and Peace in the original Russian?"
"Silly, Ms Bonny. You know I don't read Russian yet. Do they have War and Peace in English?"
There was a bit of a shocked look on Bonny's face, she knew that Jubal was precocious, but. . .
Jubal smiled up at her, "Actually, I want to read The Boxcar Children. Mommy read it when she was a girl, and it sounded more fun than Little House on the Prairie or Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew."
"Okay, then. We have a copy right over here. This should keep you a couple of days all by itself."
She handed a copy over to him and his eyes got large. "It is so much thicker than my other books. Thank you, Ms. Bonny. Thank you a bunch."
"Thank your Mommy. She was the one who suggested it."
"Thank you, Mommy."
"You're welcome, dearest."
"That was Charleston Academy for Boys?"
"Yes, they told me that only boys are allowed to attend school there."
"And the last one said only girls, and the one before said that they had no openings. . .after we explained his condition."
"Maybe he'll just have to go to a public school. The private ones seem to discriminate against those of ambiguous gender."
"But, Harold. You know that a public school won't be able to handle a child as bright as Jubal."
"I don't know what else to do."
"Sir, I'm so sorry about the file. I'll fix it."
"It was only a minor error, already fixed, but you never make errors. What's wrong, son."
Harold looked down at his desk, staring at the photo of his wife standing with Jubal. He really did care for the boy. How could he take care of Jubal when no one else wanted to allow him.
"None of the schools I talked to in our price range would allow Jubal to attend."
"Why not?"
"Because he's intersexed."
"That's right. Ambiguous. I'd think that any of these establishments would love a guaranteed graduate, especially one who will likely be as famous as your Jubal. That boy is going places."
"You only spoke to him for a couple of minutes at the Christmas party if I recall."
"Listen to what you're saying. I had a conversation with a 5 year old, Harold. A full blown conversation. If I knew they came in that model I might have considered having some of my own."
"Thank you, sir. I'll tell Jubal you remember him."
"Harold. Stop worrying. I remember that you told me that there was a trust for the child when he turned twelve?"
"For costs that would be incurred resulting from surgery and other incidental expenses arising from his intersexed status."
"Is that something close to the exact wording?"
"Yes. One of the points of the will stipulated that any foster or adoptive parents read and sign a form stating they had no interest in Jubal's money, and that the full will needed to be read to them first."
"Interesting. You are a valued employee when your head is in the game. You closed accounts worth over ten million dollars to the firm last year. I'll have the legal team look into it, and see if we can't supplement your school budget from the trust. Failing that, I think that the firm can provide a scholarship for the boy."
"Really, sir? you would do that?"
"Harold, I consider you my own flesh and blood. Yes, I would be happy to do that for you."
"Harold, my legal team went over the wording of the will, and there is nothing we can do.
His boss held up a finger to forestall any arguments from him, "however, my accountants went over the regulations, and we can get a major tax break for offering a scholarship for your son."
His boss smirked at his own thought, "well, unless there is another intersexed child out there that is smarter than Jubal. For right now I think we will just offer the one scholarship, but. . .it just feels right to me somehow."
"Thank you so much, sir."
"You're welcome, Harold. More than welcome. I only ask one thing."
"What, sir?"
"Call me Brad."
"Sure thing, Brad."
Jubal frowned for a moment and then looked up at the woman standing over him, "where is this test supposed to place me?"
Her shock was evident, but she covered it quickly, "It will tell us which grade we should start you out in."
"Ok. Sounds fair to me. So, when we're done I get to go to school here?"
"Yes, Jubal. You get to go to school here. When I tell you to begin, open up your booklet and begin reading the questions. You'd want to fill out the answer on this bubble sheet. Only fill one letter per question. Some of them may seem like they're right, but only one of them will be correct."
"Mrs. Presman? I may be a child, but you don't have to treat me like one. When you told me to only answer one bubble per number, I got it. This test is supposed to place me in a grade level. I don't think you explaining it to me is a valid testing protocol."
She blinked a couple of times at Jubal and then smirked, "you may begin, then."
Jubal opened the book and began to read. It was as easy as he'd thought it would be. He zipped through the English section.
It was only in the last couple of pages that he began to get a little less confident. They began asking him to analyze this or that passage, and he wasn't sure of the criteria he was supposed to use to analyze it. It confused him a bit, and the questions they asked didn't help either.
He figured it must be something he hadn't learned yet, so he just moved on to the math section.
Math didn't come as easily to him as English did. Or maybe he just hadn't spent as much time working on it. He got plus and minus, and that multiply was just adding repeatedly, but divide didn't quite make sense to him, and he had no idea how to do math with letters in it.
He began to get down a bit, and then something occurred to him. This was a placement test. He was supposed to fail parts of it so they knew what to teach him. He left everything he really didn't know blank after that.
He really didn't know anything in the social studies section, and the science section looked really cool. The questions were interesting anyway, but he just didn't know the answers. He really hoped they gave him some science classes.
"First off, let me say that I am very impressed with Jubal. He is one of, if not the, brightest students in his age group I have ever had the pleasure of placing. His reading is well above a sixth grade level, and his comprehension is right up there as well."
"His Math scores place him in a third or fourth grade level, and his other classes are about where we would expect of a child his age."
"However, with his comprehension where it is, we can assume that he would do well in any class we put him into. We're going to put him with the third grade, at least to begin, and go from there. We will give him some 'remedial' science classes, as well as social studies. He will be coming in halfway through the year, so there may be a period of catchup he needs to do, but from what we've seen here it should be fine."
She turned her attention to Jubal, "Now, Jubal. If at any time you have a problem with the classes, you let me know, okay? I want this experience to be as good for you as it possibly can."
"Okay, if I have any complaints about the class, I talk to you. Thank you, Mrs. Presman."
"You're very welcome, Jubal. Welcome to Griffin Academy."
"He's such a shrimp!"
"I'm not a shrimp. I'm five."
There were some sounds of surprise in the classroom.
"Methink we hath a twit amongst us."
"It would actually be methinks, and have, as hath is an antiquated for of the third person singular of to have. I'm not aware of there being a similarly antiquated first person plural version of to have."
"You didn't say anything about twit, twit."
"I find myself unable to tell you whether or not you find me bothersome."
The class laughed and the boy blushed bright red. Something about the situation told Jubal that he was in trouble, but that could wait until later.
For right now he simply wanted to find a seat and learn something.
"Of course."
"I can't accept this worksheet. It's not in English."
"Of course it's in English. That is the English standard phonetic alphabet. I figured that you, as a teacher would be able to read it. I'm sorry that I assumed wrong. I guess that I'll have to rewrite it. Sorry, Mrs. Wilson."
"Wait, just a moment. . ." She looked at it a moment, before a smile spread on her face. "Why it is phonetic. I'd assumed. . .very impressive, Jubal. Where did you learn this?"
"My first parents let me read the Dictionary. At that point I didn't realize that no one else learned the phonetic alphabet as well as the standard alphabet. They were both new knowledge to me."
"You have such a vocabulary, Jubal."
"It comes from reading the dictionary, twice."
Mrs. Wilson laughed at this. "Well, go have fun at recess."
"Okay."
"What? I didn't forget some of my work, did I?"
"Nope. I'm going to pulverize you."
"Oh. Ok. Well, since I don't like pain." Jubal was running even before he finished talking. The older boy raced after him, but he was no match to the training that Jubal had already put his young body to. The other boy was huffing and puffing long before Jubal even wanted to slow down.
Jubal stopped and looked at the older boy. "Aw, I was just getting warmed up."
"You're dead, Jubal, as soon as I catch my breath."
"Why?"
"Because you made fun of me."
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. What can I do to make it up to you?"
The older boy blinked at him, opened his mouth, blinked, and then said, "Um, never mind. You really didn't want to make fun of me?"
"Why would I do that?"
"Because I'm almost eleven and still in third grade?"
"I'm five and in third grade."
"Yes exactly."
"But, you took the same placement test I did, right?"
"Yes. . ."
"So, we did the same on the test. That's so cool."
"You're weird, Jubal, but I kind of like you."
"I don't think I'm weird, but thanks anyway."
Something dawned on Jubal, and he looked concerned when he began talking again, "why did they put you in third grade? If you're older shouldn't you be further?"
"Now the kid gets it."
"What did Mrs. Presman say about your test scores?"
"I had difficulty retaining what I read."
"Oh, I don't know what to say. She told me that I was good there."
"Jubal, um, I know this is weird, but, could you sort of, um, tutor me? They told my parents that I was at grade level everywhere else, but without the ability to retain what I read. . ."
"I'm five. I've never tutored anyone before."
"Well, we could at least try."
"Okay. Let's go back to the classroom."
"So, when you're reading, you do what again?"
"I form a scene in my mind with the items from the text. You know, here where it says that the clearing in the woods as filled with little yellow flowers. You form the picture of some woods. You have the trees in your mind?"
When George nodded, Jubal continued. "Now, cut down some of the trees."
"I see stumps in the woods now."
"Remove the stumps, and add some flowers. Make sure they're yellow."
"Wow, I see it. I see the clearing."
"Okay, you try it on your own."
"Wow, I understand. All words do this?"
"Some things are a lot harder to do this with. You know, when people are talking to each other. But mostly there, I just remember it as a conversation. Imagine two people talking to each other."
"But, that's so simple."
"Yeah, the longer that the passage goes, the more difficult it gets."
"Hey, can we practice this every day before my test?"
Jubal looked sadly out the window, but then looked in George's face.
"I can run anytime. I'll help you during recess, George, okay?"
Mrs. Wilson backed out of the room with a look of wonder on her face.
"Yes, Jubal come in."
"I wanted to talk to you about my classes."
"Okay, I expected you sooner than this. You've been at the school almost a month now. Are they too hard for you?"
"Oh, no. The science classes are interesting, but a little easy. I'm not sure why we have to learn social studies, but I guess you must have a good reason. Those are too easy also. If I'd known it was simply reading about kids in other countries, I might have tried to see if I could guess on the test."
"Um, well. . ."
Mrs. Presman had to stop for a moment and let her brain shift gears. She'd been prepared to move Jubal back a grade or two, but forward? She'd already been a little worried about putting him with children that much older than himself in the first place.
"I think we need to offer something else entirely for you. You just don't fit into our normal categories. I think that we'll have to do something a little more personal for you."
"What does that mean?"
"We'll keep you with the class for the social activities like music, gym, and art, but we'll be putting you into a tutor environment for all of your other classes. How does that sound?"
"Will I get harder science?"
"Yes, Jubal. You will get harder science."
"Wahoo!!!!"
Mrs. Presman just smiled at his enthusiasm. Jubal's personality seemed to fill spaces that his small body didn't.
"You're acting like I won't be seeing you again. Won't I be back next week?"
"I'm sorry. I forget sometimes that you're so new to all of this. Tomorrow is the first day of summer vacation, Jubal."
"I know, but why does that mean you stop teaching me?"
"Because there's no more school until this fall."
"Oh. Okay. Well, see you in the fall then?"
"I'm not qualified to teach seventh grade. We might need to cover a little bit of work when you get back, but you were just too bright. You learned what I had for you too quickly."
"I'm gonna miss you, Mr. Evans."
"I'll miss you too, Jubal."
He walked into the room and George stopped him, "What's wrong, Jubal? You aren't getting picked on by Stacey again are you. I told you she just thinks you're cute."
"No, George. I'm just sad because the school year is over."
"You would, Jubal," the older boy said with a snort. "Oh, I took my new placement test last night. They're moving me to seventh grade next year. I'll miss you, but I really wanted to thank you for all the help you gave me."
Jubal began to smile. This was the best news he'd heard all day. "We'll be in the same grade again!"
"Jubal, if I didn't like you so much I'd really hate you right now."
He tried to hold a severe look on his face, but he couldn't. He broke out into an infectious laugh, and Jubal joined right in. Jubal still didn't get what a lot of things were about, but at least he had a friend.
I admit it, I am a Disney kid. I was raised on the stories of Walt and his successors. Some people hate the policies of the company, or feel that they show an unrealistic view of the world.
That is the point.
Much like many of the stories here at BC, they show an idealized version of the world, some place we wish that the world was more like.
Soapbox aside, it is also a fun place for children. More than any other amusement park I am aware of Disneyland is meant for children. Disneyworld and every other park is meant for adults, with something there to keep the kiddies busy.
The size, and colors, and feel of Disneyland speaks to the child in each and every one of us. Some people out there deny this child its rightful place.
But let the child have her, or his, day. They deserve to be kids for a little while.
"I have to admit, dear, that when you suggested us driving out here I was a bit skeptical. He is so smart that I thought he wouldn't 'get it'."
"Harold, he may be a smart five year old, but he's still a five year old. Kids have a special way of looking at the world, that colors all of their interactions. He still hasn't learned that Santa Claus is fake, or that a talking mouse can't really exist."
"Mommy, Daddy, did you see me? I just talked to Mickey Mouse!"
They walked slowly into the park as Jubal flitted from one thing to the next. To Harold's jaded eyes, the buildings seemed so tiny at first, and then he began to look at it the way Jubal was.
The color and the feeling he got reminded him of coming into this same park for the first when he had been only a little older than Jubal. It was years ago now, but he still felt the same pull. He remembered the wonder of it all.
A little chuckle escaped his lips.
"I know it's probably too cheesy, but could we maybe go to the Tiki Room?"
Susan smiled and held out her hand to Harold.
"Sure, we can hit the Tiki Room as long as you promise to take me through the Haunted Mansion afterwards."
"Then we do the Jungle Cruise for Jubal's sake if nothing else."
He smiled down at the child in his arms and realized that it didn't matter where Jubal fit in his organization of the world. He was Jubal Marie, and he was unique.
They got up from their seats, and Jubal sleepily stirred.
"Did I miss it?"
"Yes, but you can always see it tomorrow night if you want."
"Ok, Daddy."
He hopped down and got between his parents, taking each of their hands in one of his diminutive ones. They walked out through the entrance to Adventure Land onto Main Street USA, from which it was a short hop past the period seeming buildings to the front entrance.
They made a left after leaving the gate and completed their short half mile want to their hotel.
Harold smiled at his son as he changed into the nightgown. Jubal still refused pajamas.
Harold pulled back the comforter and sheet, and Jubal hopped up into bed. Jubal was asleep before Harold finished pulling the covers over him.
They were just getting out of the car after having parked in front of The Huntington Library and Botanical Gardens. The air was a bit muggy, but that was more because of the gallons of water being pumped over sub tropical plants than anything else.
Parking in front of The Huntington is relative, considering the acres of parking lot that stand outside it. They passed through the gatehouse into a land of wonder all its own. The gardens were organized by land type. From desert to tropical. From Zen to Tea. Jubal fell in love with the formal rose garden.
"Mommy, they're so pretty. I love the, all. They're so red, and smell so nice."
The dome made entirely out of roses was the most amazing thing he'd ever seen. He sat there looking up into the ceiling. It was a rose bush that had been bound and teased and pruned until it was a complete dome. He sat there on the stone benches and just looked at it. He found the spots where it had been pruned, but most of it was beyond his understanding.
"How do they do it, Mommy. How did they make the roses grow this way."
"With work and love, Jubal. They started with a few small plants. From there, they tied them to a frame and let them begin to grow. As they grew taller, they pruned off the branches that went in the wrong direction and tied down the ones that were almost the right direction."
"But, doesn't the bush hate being constrained?"
Susan smiled at the big word out of such a little mouth, "The bush doesn't know where it needs to go. That's what the gardener is there for. The gardener knows the direction that the bush needs to grow to maximize its potential."
"Look over there, Jubal. See that really tall rose bush over there?"
"That's a rose bush? where are the roses?"
"All of the plant's strength is going to make it taller. It no longer has the nutrients to make beautiful flowers."
"But the done is taller than that."
"Yes, you see, the gardener was able to help the rose bush. If he'd let it grow in any direction it wanted, then it would not have shown its full potential and be beautiful like the dome."
Jubal sat on the stone bench for a little while, a look of concentration on his little face. "Is that why you and Daddy want me to go to school? I need to be guided like the rose bush and not just left to learn things on my own?"
Susan tried not to let the surprise show on her face.
"Yes, that is an apt description, Jubal. Sometimes you're so smart you even amaze me."
The smile that split Jubal's face was incandescent.
When he was Jubal's age, he'd questioned his own father's insistence on visiting The Huntington. they could have spent another day at Disneyland, in his opinion.
Since then though, he grew to appreciate the art and gardens more.
As the sun slowly sank behind the horizon, Harold simply watch the deepening twilight with a bit of awe.
'Dad, I think you would have loved Jubal. He's so vibrant and full of life that he makes everything a joy. I miss you, Dad. Hug mom for me.
"Penny for your thoughts?" Susan asked from the other seat. It seemed she wasn't as asleep as she'd seemed at the time.
"Just thinking about my parents, a little sad that they didn't live long enough to meet Jubal."
"Harold, you know that I've never been one for religion much in general, but I do think that the spirit of people does linger in the places that they loved."
"Well, sometimes I think you're developing a hope in god."
"You mean how I act with Jubal? I know his grandparents wanted some religion in his life. I just feel the need to try and help along his belief."
Harold smiled at this. It was one of their long standing 'arguments'. She was an avowed Agnostic.
"Well, your secret is safe with me then."
He focused on the road after that as they quietly chatted about nothing at all.
"I will Daddy."
Jubal wandered around Harold's office a bit as Harold worked through a couple of files. Harold only had a couple of files for the new medical project to go over, and then they were off to the library again.
The boy read more than even he did.
"Have you got a minute, Harold?"
"Of course, Brad. What can I do for you?"
"I've been meaning to get back with you and ask how Jubal's been doing in school. And then you were off on vacation. . ."
"I know what you mean. It's been a really busy couple of months hasn't it? He has completed his sixth grade coursework for the most part. Just a couple more things and he will be moved over to the junior high building."
"So quickly?"
"You knew he was smart, sir." Harold said with a huge smile.
"I did, and I'm so glad that we got him into that school. Thanks for the information, Harold, and keep up the good work."
His wife had begun to despair in ever seeing the child again, and then there he was. She was. Whatever. If he believed in it, he'd think it was fate providing him with a present.
Jim still didn't think the little thing deserved any time, but his wife did.
She got that way every decade or so. He was SO glad she couldn't get pregnant any more.
"I'm not to be disturbed, Melanie. See to it."
Jim shut the door behind him and snorted at himself. Yes, what he'd told Harold all those months ago was correct. If he knew that kids could be as intelligent as Jubal, he might have actually wanted one of his own.
But never Jubal. How could Harold even stand that. . .that. . .non-gendered little. . .
His thoughts were interrupted by the door opening.
"I thought I said I was to be undisturbed."
"You're already that, daddy dearest. Disturbed I mean."
"Why are you here, Kyle?"
"I told you, it's Blaze now daddy dearest."
"Look, I let you have a little bit of leeway since you're my son, but I will not have you mimicking the homosexual behaviors of your peers."
"Relax, Dad. I was only doing it to tweak you. Besides, I'm bisexual. There's just too much variety out there for me to limit myself."
At Jim's expression Kyle began laughing, "Relax, Dad. You're just too damn easy."
Jim looked at his son's newly bleached hair, and the not so new eye piercing and sighed.
"How can you expect to take over the reigns of this company looking like that, Kyle?"
"Blaze, Dad. And who said I want to run Heredity?"
"It's in your blood, Boy."
"And if you actually succeed in your present scheme you're never retiring."
Jim smirked, "Leave it to you to boil things down to their most selfish. So, what is it I can do for my favorite sixteen year old in the world," Jim said with as much sarcasm as he could fit into the short sentence. "You didn't wrap another Bugatti around a pole did you? I'm not replacing another one."
"No, daddy-dearest, nothing so plebian. The girls want a night in San Fran and I want to treat them to it."
"Which girls are these?"
"No one you'd know, but I'm not sleeping with them." The look in his eyes added 'yet' to the end of it.
Jim smiled at this. He'd been a bit of the player in his day as well. He still was occasionally.
"Ok, so you want a car or money."
"Both. I'd like the Phantom and about a thousand."
"I'll only let you have the Phantom if Trent drives you."
"I wouldn't have it any other way."
He was a new kid at a school he'd been going to for a little over two years.
"Watch where you're going, Moron." A bigger kid bumped into him causing George to drop his book bag.
"Hey, that wasn't very nice."
Jubal helped George to pick up his bag. "Hey, George."
"Jubal! You're here!"
"Yep. I was able to get the last of my history and science classes done of the summer, so they let me come do the seventh grade thing."
George smiled at his young friend's turn of phrase.
"Hey, George." One of the girls in the hall had walked over to the two of them, but that's all she seemed to be able to say.
"Heya, Katie. Have you met Jubal?"
"Um, Hi, Jubal. Looking for your class? I they have grade school in the other building. I can show you if you like."
George blushed, "Katie, um."
"No thank you, Katie. I have a map to my classes here, but if you could tell me. Are we in the entranceway, or the back foyer. I couldn't tell from the outside of the building. They look so similar on the map."
"Katie, meet Jubal. The smartest kid in the school. Jubal meet Katie, the prettiest. . .um."
Katie blushed bright red, and looked at the ground.
"Sorry, Katie. I didn't mean to embarrass you."
"No, it's fine, George. You're kinda cute too."
She said this over her shoulder while she ran away, almost as if she wanted to avoid the repercussions of her actions.
"So, what do you have first?"
"Earth Science. This is a bit different than last year, huh. They have me changing classrooms every hour."
"That's junior high for you. Come on. I'll show you the science wing on my way to English."
Math was 1+1 and 5-8 and 215.
Math wasn't y=mx
How could it be?
"Jubal, you in here?" George called from the doorway.
Jubal sniffed out a, "Yeah."
"Your math teacher was worried, everyone's a little worried."
"I'm not smart enough!" Jubal wailed all the harder, and George wrapped him into a hug. He wanted to laugh and cry at the same time. Jubal was only six years old and complaining because he couldn't do Algebra.
Eventually, the humor of the situation got the better of him and he started laughing.
"Stop laughing, George! I mean it."
"Jubal, you're getting As in all of your other classes. You are a six year old in junior high. And you're afraid you aren't smart enough."
Jubal glowered at him for another minute or two, and then started laughing himself. He couldn't help it. It was pretty funny when he got his pride out of the way.
"Thanks, George."
"Don't mention it."
Jubal hugged his friend back, and George gave out a little cry of pain.
"George! You need to see the nurse. Luke beat you up again, didn't he?"
"It's nothing."
"It's not nothing. We're going now!"
George could have stopped this, but he let his young friend pull him along until they got to the nurses office. "Hello, Jubal. Hello, George. Were you escorting Jubal to my office again, George?"
"This time I'm escorting him. Luke York beat him up again."
The smile left the nurses pleasant face. "George is this true?" she asked.
"Yes, ma'am."
"How many times has he done this?"
"More than he should. I read the policy on bullies, Mrs. Quincy. George doesn't want the other kids to think he's a snitch. I'm telling you that it was Luke, even if George won't."
"George, honey, Jubal is right. We need to nip this in the bud, so to speak. Can you confirm that it was Luke who beat you up?"
George looked down at Jubal's innocent and hopeful face. He didn't know what kids could do to each other. Jubal didn't know that George had been taking beatings meant for Jubal. He did know one thing, however: Jubal was not going to be subjected to physical violence like this if he could do anything about it. Let the school come at him.
"Yes, ma'am. It was Luke."
Someone said as they tripped George in the hall.
"Stoolie, Stoolie!"
George's life was a living hell. One bully would be suspended in time for another to take his place. No one even looked Jubal's way, though, so that was good.
"Why do you let them do that to you?" Came a sweet voice from behind him.
George turned toward Katie with a smile, "because it gives you a reason to talk to me?"
She smiled and blushed at him.
Jubal slammed the door to his locker shut. "It's not fair!"
"What's not fair, Jubal."
"They moved me into another math class. I know I could get it. I just need more time."
George chuckled a bit, and Jubal's scowl melted.
"I heard they moved you to be the TA for my English class."
"Yeah, Mrs. Inahara had finally had enough of me correcting her, so now I get to correct her students papers. It's fun, though."
"Is that why I got an A on my last paper."
"Only because you deserved it. You obviously spend a good deal of time thinking out your arguments for the paper."
George smiled, and Katie gave him a playful slap on the arm. "That's great, George. Someday you might even be as smart as Jubal here."
"Hello, Jubal. How did you like this year?"
"It was good, but I wish I could get Algebra."
"I know, sweetie. Sometimes some things just take longer than normal. So, the school has a proposition for you."
"What's that, Mrs. Presman?"
"We know that you have taken all the classes you really wanted, but there are a couple of others that you don't really need algebra for, and we don't feel comfortable advancing you without algebra."
"I understand. You want to send me back to the grade school."
"Of course not. I'm going about this all wrong. Did you enjoy being Mrs. Inahara's TA?"
"That was fun. Apparently I'm the only TA in the school trusted to grade papers."
"And the other kids appreciated your notes to them. I love the thoughtful and kind way that you pointed out their mistakes."
"Mommy always tells me I should treat all of the other kids the way I'd like to be treated."
"And it shows, Jubal. Would you like to TA for some of the other English teachers as well next year?"
"Yes, yes, yes!! Oh, please, may I?"
"We'll put you with a math tutor, but until you are ready to move on there. . ."
"Ok, Mrs. Presman. See you next year!"
"See you next year, Jubal."
"Hello, George. Jubal's in back."
"Thanks, but my dad wanted me to ask you first. He's taking my brothers and me camping, and I wanted to know if Jubal wanted to come along."
"I have no problem with it. Just make sure you keep him safe, okay?"
"Sure thing, Mrs. Carson."
George went running off to find Jubal. Susan watched him leave and smiled. Jubal was growing up so fast, if not quite as fast as he wanted. Sometimes she wished that she could just keep him at this age forever.
George and Jubal packed up a small bag of his clothes and other things he might need, and Susan waved to him as he climbed into the back of George's car.
"Stay safe, Jubal."
"I will Mommy."
He lit another one as he waited for darkness to descend, and for the lights to go off in the house.
And a third cigarette while he waited for everyone to be nice and asleep. A smile crept across his face as he crushed the remnants of the last cigarette under his heel.
Showtime.
The fumes from the carpeting and the paint spread through the house quickly. The fire-alarms had been for show, and didn't alert the Carsons to their impending fate.
Anoxia got them before they woke, and they were dead before the fire consumed their bodies.
The rest of the house soon followed.
The first engine to respond god stuck in the mud about half a mile from the house. The second was delayed by a drunk driver in a semi cab.
The third's seals broke as soon as they began to release pressure on the water tank.
It was all the firefighters could do to keep the surrounding houses from joining in the pyre.
"Hi, Joey." Jubal was despondent and couldn't seem to find his normal smile.
"What's wrong, baby."
"I'm sad because Mommy didn't believe in Jesus."
"Oh honey. Jesus believes in us even when we don't believe in him. She was good people, and I'm sure that she's joined your grandparents by now."
"You really think so?"
"I know so. Smile, little one. There are some people here who would like to meet you."
"Hello, Jubal Marie. We've heard so much about you."
"Yes, we'd like you to come home with us."
"You think you'd like that, Jubal Marie." It almost seemed to Jubal like they were saying it hyphenated, like Anne-Marie or something. Like they were feminizing his name.
He shook off the feeling and smiled up at them. Sure, I think I'd like that.
They led him into the house and showed him a room festooned in pink and lace. "I hope you don't mind, but before we met you we were looking for a girl."
"Don't worry, Mrs. Johansen. I don't mind pink. My nightgown is pink."
She let a shark like smile slip as she looked over at Mr. Johansen. This could work out very well for them.
"So, Marie, why don't you start unpacking, and we'll just be downstairs."
They'd already left before Jubal realized that they'd used his girl name. He looked through the closet and dresser and realized that there was already a lot of clothing here in about his size. Girl's clothing. He smelled a bit of a rat at this, but not much. It's not like clothing changed who he was.
He chuckled at the thought and then he saw The Dress.
It might not be something special to anyone else, and in fact it was simply shoved into his closet like all the other dresses and top, but it was a perfect style, and he ached to try it on. It was a simple yellow sundress, but it was the same style that his grandfather had bought for him.
He pulled it out almost reverently, and tried it on. He'd missed this feeling. Missed his grandpa.
He sat down on the floor, showing the matching yellow bloomers that went underneath, and cried for people he would never see again. After a couple of minutes, he dried his tears and went downstairs.
"That's such a beautiful dress, Marie."
"Jubal. My name is Jubal."
"But it's Marie as well. think about it, Honey, your Grandparents named you with both a girl name and a boy name."
"Yeah, so I didn't need to change it if I chose to be a girl."
"Or if you choose to be a boy. You still have the choice, princess," said Mr. Johansen.
"But I like being a boy."
"You've just spent more time pretending to be a boy. How can you know if you really want to be a boy, unless you spend some time as a girl first. You've spent six and a half years as a boy, right?"
"Yeah. . ."
"Well, don't you think you should try to spend the same amount as a girl?"
"I guess so."
"See, I knew you'd understand, Marie."
Jubal gave a half smile and then she went upstairs. She still wasn't sure of whether or not they were right, but they were his parents now, and they would try to keep him going in the right direction.
"You've seen how she interacts with people, all sweetness and light. She's definitely more girl than boy right now, and we just need to feed into that self image. Then, when she turns twelve, she gets the less expensive surgery, and the rest is ours to do with as we see fit. Can you believe they put almost a quarter million dollars in that fund for her?"
"I know. I can almost see it now. Just five and a half more years, Frank. And that money will be all ours."
"Hey, sweetie. I love the color on you."
Jubal twirled so that his dress flared out. When he stopped he looked up at her and grinned. "It's just like the one my Grandpa bought for me. I love yellow. It's such a happy color."
"I'm glad to hear that. So, why the girl clothing, if I may ask?"
"I want to give being a girl a chance. I've spent so much time focusing on being a boy. If need to give being a girl a chance so I know for sure what I want in life."
"I'm not sure it works like that, but I applaud your courage, Jubal, or do I call you Marie when you look like this?"
"It's easier if you call me Marie."
"Ok, Marie."
There was something a little off about his smile. Something not quite. . .genuine?
Joey decided that she needed to have a deeper look into the backgrounds of Mr. and Mrs. Johansen. The doctor had checked Jubal out completely, so she knew it wasn't physical, whatever they were doing. And Jubal would seem happy enough to a third party.
But Joey knew him.
She wanted to protect that little boy from whatever the future held, even if that meant protecting him from his own 'parents'.
"Hey new gi. . .Jubal?"
"Hey George."
"What's with the dress?"
"My new parents decided I had to come to school as Marie this year."
"Damn, that sucks. They say why?"
"Yeah, because I haven't given being a girl enough of a go. You know, so I can make an informed decision when I'm twelve."
"Man, well, I guess they're your folks now, so not much you can do."
"Yeah, I know. Hey, most of it is in yellow, though. You know how hard it is to find boys clothes in yellow?"
"Jub. . .Marie, sometimes you ARE a girl."
Jubal stuck his tongue out at his friend and then went off to class.
"Hey, Katie. How goes?"
"Great. So, I wanted to let you know that not all the girls agree with Emily."
"I know. Emily is just jealous because I look better in a dress than she does."
"I know, right? She definitely looks better in pants."
"Yeah, but she doesn't want to admit that maybe she would be more comfortable as a boy."
"Huh?"
"Oh, yeah. The Johansens had me start talking to a therapist, and since I figure that my problems are my own, I talk about some of the kids at school, trying to figure them out. I mentioned Emily, and the shrink said that Emily might possibly be a boy in a girls body, but she couldn't make a final determination without talking to her directly."
"That happens?"
"Yeah. Apparently some boys feel like they should be girls and vice versa."
"Wow, that is so different."
"I know. It shocked me a bit, but I can see what she means. I don't feel like one of the girls when I wear a dress, anymore than you feel like one of the boys when you wear pants. It's in here that we feel who we are, and clothing doesn't change that."
"Sage Jubal speaks again. . .I mean Marie."
"I do prefer Jubal, Katie. Thanks."
He really wasn't a girl, and this who experiment of the Johansen's proved it to him. He marked off the date, April 6th and went downstairs to talk to them about it.
He heard shouting before he got to the living room.
"Shut UP! I need my cut now."
"Maxwell, calm down. We don't have it. It's still about five years before we will be able to get our hands on it."
"That's not good enough, Frank. Not even close."
"Maxie, baby. You need to calm down."
"CAN IT OLIVIA!"
"Max, you may be my baby brother. . ."
"I'm the one holding the gun. I'm the one who gets to decide who's going to calm down."
"Maxie."
"DON'T CALL ME MAXIE!!!!!"
The gun went off, and Jubal hear something heavy crumple to the floor. He hid around the corner.
"Maxwell, we can still work this all out."
"They're closing in on me, Frank. They know that the fire at the Carson's was arson. They KNOW damn it. I've been suspended awaiting a full investigation into my work."
"You're a fire inspector, Maxwell. You should have been able to make it go away."
"Somehow they figured out that the report was faked. They sent an outside inspector in."
"How did they discover it was arson. You told me. . ."
"That I made the house ignite on its own? Yeah. I did. I started an electrical fire in the living room. Anyone should have looked into the fire and seen what I wanted them to see. Which is a lot of nothing. Accident. . .stay back Frank."
"Maxwell, just hand me the gun. . ."
"I'm warning you!"
There was a scuffling noise, and the lamp went out after a crashing sound. Jubal huddled deeper into his corner in the hall, too afraid to move.
More heaving breathing, the sound of bodies slamming into objects, and then a flash and the gun went off again.
Jubal heard sirens outside, and he huddled in the darkness. Someone opened the front door.
"Throw down your weapon!"
"Eat me, Pig!"
There was more gunfire and the sound of running feet. He felt the arms of someone pick him up, and he struggled a bit. "The child is safe, we have two dead bodies in here. Someone get protective services, on the line."
"Jubal, Honey. I'm so sorry."
"It's okay, Joey. I'm not sad. They arranged for Maxwell to kill the Carsons."
His voice tore out her heart. There was no life in it at all. His little face was slack, and he just stared into the distance.
She folded him into a hug, but he didn't hug her back. He just sat there limply.
"I'm so sorry about the Carsons."
Jubal began to cry. "Why did this have to happen, Joey? Why did got let those people kill the Carsons? They were so good and decent."
"I don't know, Jubal."
"That's not good enough. If god doesn't believe in good people more than bad, then I can't believe in him right now."
"Jubal. . ."
"No more, you hear me god? I'm not believing in you anymore!"
Jubal cried himself to sleep in Joey's arms.
The other thing was that I don't like hurting children or killing puppies, and it really feels sometimes with this story that this is exactly what I'm doing.
So, I'm going to give Jubal a break for the next four or so years of his life. High school is hard enough without thrusting foster homes and other crap at him.
After he turns twelve, after he's had time to recover, when the crap hits the fan and Heredity Inc begins to really ruin his life, then I can revisit some of the themes that I was going to use here.
For now, we always know that there are storm clouds on the horizon, but this is definitely the calm before the storm.
One last thing, before I forget.
I realized that as Jubal grew older, I have been spending more time in each story, or I should say less. Each story covers a shorter period. This one ran from mid May through August.
As such, there is no way, at the current rate, I am covering 4 years in 5k words. So, instead of the 5 chapters initially planned before Jubal got to the age of twelve, there will be more. hoe many more? I don't know. But, I will have at least 4, and possibly double that.
We'll just have to see.
"Listen to yourself, Haley. This child needs love and support, not hopping from one home to the next."
"Have you seen what's gone on in his life? The loss he's had to suffer? That child is not recovering from this."
"Of course he is. He will recover as soon as he actually wants to. It might take some outside help, but he can recover."
Jubal sat there, not really listening to anything going on around him. His parents had been killed because of him. It was too much.
No, Marie. His parents had been killed because of Marie. When the Johansens had discovered that Jubal was Marie sometimes, they had the Carsons killed because they felt that Jubal needed to be Marie more than Jubal.
If he was never Marie again, then no one would know he could be Marie. If no one knows about Marie, no one else will die for her realization into the world.
That was the answer. He looked up and realized Joey was looking at him strangely. He didn't know what she'd just said to him, and he couldn't tell her that he wanted to kill Marie, or at least the part of her that was him.
He'd just have to show it through his actions.
"Jubal, baby are you there?"
He sat there looking at her. No more Marie.
"Jubal?"
No more Marie.
no more marie
Joey picked him up, and still he sat here staring off into space.
no more.
The decorations were a neutral white, and she lay Jubal down on the bed, as she went in search of a yellow bed spread. He hadn't moved an inch by the time she got back and she was beginning to get worried.
She put the yellow blanket around him and sat down next to him on the bed.
"Jubal, honey, I need you to say something to me."
"no more."
"No more what, baby."
"No more Marie."
"You don't want to be Marie anymore?"
Jubal nodded his head slowly, as if it took all his effort to make that slight movement.
"Then you don't have to, honey. You can be whomever you want to be."
She folded the boy into her arms and simply held him. They sat there until her back began to hurt, and sat there some more.
"Joey?"
"Yes, baby?"
"Can I call you Mommy?"
Joey was stunned for a second, her breath catching in her chest. She took a full breath and let it out.
"Jubal, honey, you know this is just temporary, right."
Jubal paused for the longest time, nodded and opened his mouth to speak, "but I don't want it to be temporary. You've been there since my Grandparents died and I'm tired of temporary."
"The Carsons adopted you, Jubal. They really loved you."
Jubal stopped speaking and Joey realized she'd gone a step too far. She took a deep breath in preparation to speak.
"I can do better, Joey. I can be better. I will do anything you want me to, just don't make me go anywhere else to live."
"For now. . ."
"Not 'for now', Joey! Forever."
"Jubal, would you be happier if I lied to you? I could tell you I'll let you stay here forever, but I can't do that. I can't adopt you. I'm not married. I work for protective services. There are so many things that prevent me. I probably can't even be your foster mom for very long."
"Probably not means probably can, Joey. Check it out, for me? Please."
"Ok, Jubal."
"While I'm here, can I call you Mommy?"
"I preferred Mama Joey with all my foster kids."
"Ok, I can live with that, Mama Joey."
"Jubal! Hi!"
Katie ran up and threw him in a hug, "I was so worried about you. We heard what happened to the Johansens. Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm okay." Gone was the easy smile, and the friendly attitude. Jubal was sinking into himself even as he tried to cling to Katie like a life raft.
"Hey, it's okay to hurt, Jubal. Nothing says that you have to do this alone, okay?"
Jubal nodded into her, and she led him off to his first class of the day.
He sat there looking at the papers, and some of the old feeling came back to him. He really enjoyed helping these other kids.
He mostly didn't feel like doing anything right now, but these kids depended on him. How could he be so selfish as to deny them the comfort and aid they needed.
He knew firsthand what it was like to lose comfort.
He graded the entire stack of papers before the end of the period. He needed more. He needed to do more.
The next class and the next class and the one after that. Before he knew it, he was to his last period of the day, and there he was in the library with Mr. Evans.
"Why can't I get this, Mr. Evans?"
"Jubal, you understand the math. When we walk through the logic of it, you can solve the problems."
"But letters can't be numbers."
"What if they could be?"
"No, English isn't math."
"Let's try this a different way."
"Okay. . ." Jubal sounded unsure, but he waited while Mr. Evans began to explain it to him.
"Look at this simple one here. 1+x=5."
"Okay, but like I said, that makes no sense. I know that it has to be 1+4=5, and the x is just wrong."
Mr. Evans smiled at the back of Jubal's head.
"Jubal, the x is always wrong, but let's just look at this for a moment. What did you do to get four?"
"Well, I knew that it had to be 1 less than 5, because I was adding 1 to something to get 5."
"Exactly."
"But x isn't four."
"Actually, you just proved it is?"
"What?"
"x, or y, or z, or q, or whatever means 'something'."
Jubal had a questioning look on his face.
"Like you said. 1 plus something equals 5."
"So, something is 4. . .and something is x. x is 4? x is 4!"
"Here is the thing about variables like x. . .they change from problem to problem."
"That is difficult, isn't it. If you don't always know what thye are, then why use them?"
"Because they represent numbers that you don't know."
Jubal blinked at that, and then a light sort of flashed behind his eyes. It was so simple, how come he hadn't realized this before.
"Why didn't you tell it to me this way before?"
"This isn't the first time we've had this conversation, Jubal. Frankly, I'm a bit surprised you even got it this time. Happy and relieved, but surprised."
"Why?"
"Algebra, and many other things in life, requires abstract thought. It is a brain development thing."
"I still don't understand why not."
"Sometimes you just have to accept things on faith, at least until you get to calculus and start learning the why."
"Can we do calculus next then?"
"No, you have a lot of other groundwork to cover, and you only just really began learning to solve for x."
"Maybe next week then?"
Mr. Evans smiled. "Maybe at that."
Joey chuckled at Jubal's enthusiasm.
She was taking fewer hours at the department so that she could be home when Jubal got here. She didn't mind too much. For right now she was refusing the stipend for a foster parent, but she did have enough for both their needs.
"Mama Joey?"
"Yes, Jubal."
"Do you love me?"
"Of course I love you, child. I wouldn't be doing this otherwise."
"Ok, if you love me, then I can tell you that I love you too."
Joey was trying to figure out baking bread for probably the thousandth time in her life. She'd never quite been able to get it to turn out right, and while waiting for Jubal to get home, she figured that it might be a good time, but the rock hard lump of dough on her counter was defying her efforts to kneed it.
That's better than running onto the floor like the last batch.
"Mama Joey?"
"Yes, Jubal."
"Can we get me some pajamas? I think I'm ready to move on from a night gown."
Joey looked at Jubal, who seemed nervous about something. His eyes pleaded with her, and she simply had to give in.
"Of course we can. What color would you like?"
"I want to see what they have available in the boy's section before I pick a color."
Joey cocked her head to look at him, and then slowly nodded. "Ok, Jubal. Let's go to the store and take a look."
"Hey, George, you're back too!"
"Huh?"
"I didn't see you yesterday."
"Oh, that, um, I got suspended for fighting."
"What? Why were you fighting? You know the school doesn't tolerate any fighting."
"One of the other kids said you were a faggot, so George knocked his lights out."
Katie liked Jubal, but she figured if he was going to be in the same class as they were, it was time to stop pulling punches.
"I'm sorry, George."
"It's okay, man. So, are you back as Jubal for good?"
"Yeah. The Johansens were forcing me to come as Marie. I didn't want to though."
"But you made such a cute girl," Katie said.
Both Jubal and George made faces of disgust, which sent Katie off in a fit of giggles.
"Well, at least you are back as Jubal now."
"And if I have anything to say about it, the rumor mill will start spreading that the girl clothes weren't your idea," Katie said.
One of the bigger Eight graders went to push Jubal, and George stepped in front of him. In the past year, George had grown into his attitude, and it showed as he stood there between the seven year old and the thirteen year old.
"Norm, I don't think attacking Jubal is such a great idea anymore."
"Yeah, Norm, did you see Bobby Jenkin's face last week? He had to be carted out of here in an ambulance."
"I heard he went to the morgue."
"Shut up you guys, I take Karate and I can take good old George here."
Norm dropped into what he assumed was a karate pose, and simply looked like something copied from a memory of a bad kung-fu film.
George looked at him questioningly, and the color drained our of Norm's face.
"On second thought, guys, George isn't worth it. I know I could kick his butt," with which Norm turned to walk away.
"Yeah, right," one of his cronies said, the sarcasm evident.
"You gotta stop doing this, George."
"I owe you, Jubal. I was like those kids. Angry. I didn't like learning, and I hated school. I took it out on kids like you. When you stopped and talked to me, instead of just running away, something clicked in me. And then you helped me to learn how to learn."
"George. . ."
"No, hear me out, Jubal. It's weird enough me saying this as it is. I feel like a girl or something. Anyway, just thanks, okay. And I protect you because I need it, not because you do. I owe you."
Jubal teared up a bit and was going to hug his friend, but George held him back. "Dude, guys don't hug each other. And you're seven and a half. You're old enough that you can be considered one of the guys."
Jubal nodded seriously, but then a questioning look came to his face, "Can guys still hug girls?"
"Sure, but only if they're your girlfriend or your mom or something. You have so much stuff to learn, Jubal."
"I'm know lots of stuff."
"I mean people stuff. Stuff not in any book. Look, just watch how I treat people. Learn from that. I'm a pretty decent guy."
"Most of the time," Katie said sneaking up behind George and throwing her arms around him from behind.
"Does that mean she's your girlfriend, George?"
They both blushed, and George was the first one to find his voice, "Nah, girls can hug whomever they want, whenever they want."
Katie lost a bit of her smile, and George hurried to add, "not that I wouldn't love to have Katie as my girlfriend. I just think I'm a bit young for dating, or at least my parents do."
"Ok, then I can live with that." Katie kissed him on the cheek, and he flushed bright red.
Mr. Evans had barely been able to keep up with teaching him the rudiments of Algebra, and was happy that he had nothing to do with the high-school. Sure, he'd miss Jubal, but so would most of the other staff in the Junior high, and all of the teachers he'd left behind in third.
"I don't know. It's hard to believe that last year I was going to Disneyland with my parents, and this year. . ."
"I know, Jubal. Some things like this are tough to deal with. Have you been speaking to a counselor?"
Jubal shook his head.
"You know, talking things out with someone can really help you to work through them. You may want to consider having Joey look into that for you."
"Okay."
"Well, this really is goodbye, Jubal. You know everything I can teach you. You'll have a great time in the high school next year."
"I hope so."
"Hello, Mrs. Presman. Why so formal this year?"
"Supposedly it shows more respect for the student."
"I much prefer you to call me Jubal, Mrs. Presman. It makes me feel more comfortable."
"Ok, Jubal. I can do that for you. So, I hear that you finally got algebra."
"Yep." Jubal said with a smile. It wasn't anywhere near to where it had been. The infectious joy was missing.
"Then I see no choice but to move you up to the high school next year. You will be the youngest one there, but not the only young student. A number of students come to us after homeschooling and are put into high school early."
"Okay. How early."
"The second youngest freshman is eleven, turning twelve next school year."
"Ok, so it's just like I'm used to. Being four to six years younger than everyone else."
"High school is a bit different, though. Be careful, okay?"
"I'll try."
In the morning he would get up early, before Mama Joey woke up, and begin running. He made a couple of laps around the block, just enough to start feeling awake and fatigued at the same time, and then he'd walk back to the house.
After breakfast he would run over to Georges house, and they would play x-box or do something else like that.
Today was a bit different.
"What is that?" Jubal said pointing to the weight bench that George was putting together.
"It's for lifting weights, to get stronger."
"Oh," Jubal replied, not understanding more than that.
"You run a lot, right?"
"Yeah."
"And as you continue to run, you are able to run further and longer that you could when you started, right?"
"Sure."
"Lifting weights is just like that. You train yourself with weights so you can lift more longer."
"Oh. okay. Can I lift with you?"
George's dad chose this time to come in.
"Sure, Jubal, just realize that we will only have you lifting a little bit. You still have a lot of growing to do before you can start packing on the muscle."
"Okay!" Jubal's smile almost made it's way back to infectious.
"You sure ask a lot of question, don't you?"
"Occupational hazard. Do you know what that means?"
"Dr. Rath, I may be seven, but I'm going to high school in the fall, so can we cut all the talking down and get to the real reason I'm here?"
Dr. Rath opened his eyes wide for a moment, then regained his composure and continued, "when Joey called me and told me that you were smart, I thought smart for a kid. Sorry, I shouldn't have assumed."
"It's alright, Dr. Rath. Happens to the best of us."
Dr. Rath was about to get a little upset, but then he realized he was being teased, by a seven year old.
"My, but aren't you the witty one."
"Yep, I've been called that, and much worse besides."
"So, tell me about Marie."
"Would you mind if we don't talk about that? Please?"
"Jubal, I know that some things are difficult to talk about, and well table this topic for now, but to get to the root of everything that's going on right now, we will need to talk about Marie sometime."
Jubal squirmed a bit, showing his physical age, so Dr. Rath tried a different approach, "okay, I see I'm making you uncomfortable, but I just want to let you know that this is your decision, and no one else's. You can't let what a few people have implied or suggested change what you believe in your heart to be true."
Jubal looked at Dr. Rath questioningly.
"I know that until you came to live with Joey, that you wore a nightgown every night. Probably because it's comfortable."
"How do you know?"
"Because Mrs. Rath tells me so. She even wanted me to try wearing one once. She thought I might understand some of my clients better."
"Did you? Wear a nightgown?"
"Ah, see that would be talking about me. We're here to talk about you. If you ask me my credentials, I will give them to you, like I do all my patients, even if that is only from personal experience."
"Okay, but some day you have to tell me."
"Curious about that, huh? Why do you think that is?"
"Well, um, because I miss wearing my nightgown. . ."
"Ah, and you feel if a grown man can wear a nightgown, then so can you?"
Jubal nodded silently.
"Jubal, you'll come to realize that this life is not a simple matter of mimicking the actions of others. Sometimes you have to stand out to be yourself."
"What do you mean?"
"How many eight year olds will there be in the high school?"
"One."
"So, are you going to go back to third grade to be with people your own age? Follow their example for dealing with school?"
"No, because I need to be in high school to learn more about the world."
"And social behavior is much the same. What someone else does, or doesn't do, may be the exact opposite of what is right for you."
"But, the other kids all seem to try to fit into proper groups. The girls act one way, and the boys another."
"Is that really the case? Think about it, Jubal. Do all of the girls act the same, as a mass?"
"Well, Emily has really short hair all the time, and she only ever wears pants. A lot of the other girls wear skirts."
"Can you think of other things that Emily does that aren't the same as what the girls do?"
"Yeah, she was always trying to get with the boy's teams in P.E. You know when all the P.E. classes got together on the same field."
"Why?"
"I don't know. Some of the guys said it was because she was boy crazy."
"Well, examine that. Does it fit the evidence?"
"What do you mean, Dr. Rath."
"So, she wanted to play with the boys to be closer to the boys. Did she get closer to the boys?"
"No. They were upset because she was better than half of them."
"So, she outperformed a lot of the boys?"
"Yeah."
"And the boys didn't like her for it?"
"Right."
"Well, if she wanted to be with the boys, then don't you think she would have performed less well?"
"But then she wouldn't be giving it her best effort."
"Yes, but she'd be achieving her other goal of getting with the boys."
A light dawned on Jubal, and he had a little smile on his face, "I see what you mean now. We can have conflicting goals. If she really wanted to get noticed by the boys, out doing them isn't the best way. Girls like Katie who wear skirts and stuff are the ones who get noticed."
"So, what other reason could she have for wanting to play on the boys teams."
"She was weightlifting."
"What?"
"Sorry, I don't mean she was 'weightlifting' weightlifting, I meant that she was pushing herself. Trying to improve. She was better than most of the girls, and so she wanted to be with the boys so that she had something heavier to work against. Like when I run an extra lap of the block."
"That is certainly a very big part of why she was doing that. Can you think of any other reason she might do that. Be with the boys."
"Because. . .she feels more comfortable with the boys than the girls?" Jubal said in a small voice.
"Yes, Jubal. That is likely a big part of it. She feels more comfortable with the boys."
"Does that mean she should be a boy instead?"
"Here we're getting ahead of ourselves, Jubal. There is so much that goes into gender identity, that a few small clues will never bring us to a full understanding. It is not a matter of black or white, yes or no, male or female."
"I don't understand."
"And it may be years before you do, but gender is not the same thing as sex. For most people they are either male, physically, or female."
"I know, but I've got a bit of both."
"Yes, you do, Jubal. A persons sex is physical and genetic. It is how they look and smell and develop."
"Boys and girls smell differently?"
Dr. Rath smiled, "most people spell differently, but there are commonalities between most men and most women, yes."
"Cool."
"Gender is not so limited as one or another, Jubal. Gender is about how we feel, and what we like. It is about perceptions as well. Things we define as 'female' tend to become the definition of female to us."
"Like wearing dresses, and being wives, and having long hair, and being able to hug anyone for any reason?"
Dr. Rath smiled at Jubal for this. "Yes, like being able to hug anyone for any reason. But determining what gender you more associate with isn't as simple as creating a tally sheet and marking down a check under female for your female traits and a check under male for your male ones, and then determining which one has more tick marks."
"Why not?"
"Because that would be too easy, and people like me would be out of a job."
Jubal laughed at that.
"More seriously, Jubal, Being male or female in front of the world is more about which one feels more right. It is an emotional thing more than a logical one."
"Oh." The smile left Jubal's face and he looked intently at the floor.
"But that's why people like me really exist. It is hard for us to untangle our emotions from each other. Talking about it helps. Especially with someone who has some understanding about how emotions shape us."
"Do you have that understanding, Dr. Rath."
"Sometimes I think so. Others. . .I'm not so sure. I can listen to you though. Just talk to me about what you want. I'm done teaching for the moment."
"Ok, Dr. Rath. I want to tell you about my first dolly."
"Did it go well, honey?"
"Really well, Mama Joey."
Jubal was silent for a moment, just standing there in the waiting room, looking really uneasy.
"Jubal honey, what is it?"
"Can I start wearing my night gown again?"
Joey smiled down at the boy and took him into a hug. "Of course you can, Jubal. Whatever you want."
"Then I still want to go to school as Jubal."
"Ok, sweetie. We can do that."
Surveillance was what he did. It was his life. Listening to people, when they didn't know he was listening? It gave him a small thrill. He preferred listening to girls, but he could live with the current target, especially since it seemed as if she was beginning to become more of a girl again.
Mr. Hastings would be pleased.
Lately, the take from the surveillance of his son had made Mr. Hastings more and more angry. Especially when he became aware that his son Aaron wasn't as heterosexual as he claimed.
Well, there were thing in the works that the man wasn't supposed to know about. Rumblings on the horizon. Things that would change the entire world.
After all, surveillance was his life.
He was happy with the world, even if he wasn't quite as happy as he used to be.
"Hey, shrimp!"
"I'm not a shrimp, I'm seven."
George laughed at their frequent greeting from the summer. He'd bulked up a bit, and had hopes of making the freshman football team, or maybe even the JV team.
Jubal was thinking of trying to run track even though he knew there was no way he was fast enough. Simply too small.
"Hey, George."
George's mouth hung open, and he couldn't speak.
"Dude, it's just Katie."
George went bright red, "Tell me that when you hit puberty, shrimp. You look very nice today, Katie."
It was her turn to blush, "I'm glad you like it."
"Hey, guys. The warning bell has already rung. I don't know about you two, but I don't want to be late on my first day of high school."
The two of them laughed and followed Jubal into the building.
"Has anyone else had that Jubal kid in class already?" Mrs. Finks sounded tired and exasperated.
9th grade honors English was supposed to be an easy course to teach. That is why she taught it every year. All those young, self conscious ,minds to fill with her folderol and whatnot.
Not Jubal. Never Jubal.
it felt as thought about the only thing he didn't cal her on was her name, which he assumed, rightly, that she knew.
It would have been ok if he'd been wrong, but no, he was right in every point, from pronunciation to grammar, that he'd called her on.
"He's a dear sweat boy. Very attentive in AP biology, and he seems to want to learn." Mr. Andrews was one of the more pleasant teachers in the science wing.
"He's taking AP Biology too? I figured he was smart, as he was a freshman in AP Chemistry, but dang." Mr. Nozawa commented.
"I worry about him in P.E. Some of the other boys noticed his physical peculiarity, so I'm having him change in my office for the rest of the year. Boy can sure run though." Mr. Brats was also the track coach.
"He questioned everything I had to say. . .and what physical peculiarity?"
"Oh, hadn't you heard? He's intersexed. What that means is he's a hermaphrodite apparently. Got both down there."
"What's he doing in a boys PE class then?!" Mrs. Finks was incensed.
"Would you want him in with the girls either?"
She considered it for a moment, and then shook her head. "It would be just as disruptive, but having a girl change in your office, even if it is Jubal. . ."
"Look, you know that the only place in my office that doesn't have a camera on it is my personal shower and changing area. I'm covered 24-7. I don't like it, but it's for my protection as well as the kids. I just make like a good little boy and stay in camera while he changes and there are no worries."
"You know, if he wasn't only seven years old, we'd be less likely to even be having this conversation. You would take less offense at a thirteen year old know it all than you are at an seven year old one."
Mrs. Finks got a strange look on her face, "How does that even work? I mean, how can he literally have both?"
"I haven't examined him, and I'm not his doctor so I would never do such a thing, but chances are, if he's not sterile, then he only has the gonads of one gender or the other. With a vaginal canal, likely that means he, or more likely she, has ovaries and no testes. Like I said, however, I don't know. There is so much about human sexual development that we still don't know." Mr. Andrews had been a GP before he retired to teach high school. A lot of his colleagues thought he was crazy and that he should have become a professor in a medical school. Then Dr. Andrews had said that he wanted to deal with people who were more mature.
Mrs. Finks was calming down, realizing that there was more to this child than she'd originally thought. Two AP classes and honors English. Maybe she should consider herself lucky to have him in her class.
George quickly let go of Katie's hand.
"Guys, I wouldn't be bothered even if you were making out at the table, just as long as you keep your clothes on while I'm around."
Katie blushed, and George sheepishly picked her hand back up.
" I take it you not really listening to your parent's advice about dating any more, George?"
"Well. . ."
"George and I are just hanging out at school."
"Even if you never go on an official date, if you're focusing your attention on one another you are courting, which in the more current vernacular is dating."
George laughed at this. "Dude, you know the way to suck the mystery out of everything."
"You know me, dispelling myths and rumors at every turn. And causing some of my own."
"What are you talking about?"
"Apparently I was born a girl, and I'm on serious testosterone shots which gives me a chubby."
"What are you talking about?"
"I was in P.E. this morning."
"And?" George asked.
Katie blushed, "You took off your underwear and bent over at some point didn't you?"
It was Jubal's turn to blush. "I wasn't even thinking. I accidentally dropped my underwear I was changing into on the floor, and I bent over instead of crouching down."
"I'm so sorry, Jubal."
"It's ok. I get to change in coaches office, and I'm more comfortable with a private shower anyway."
Katie blushed bright red and looked away from Jubal.
"Katie, what's up?"
Katie just shook her head.
"Come on, Katie, we're friends here, right?"
"Well, they have a point. I mean does your," she got really quiet when she said it, "penis even work?"
"Yes, my urethra goes all the way to the end of my penis."
Katie went scarlet and hid her face in her hands.
"I shouldn't have said anything."
"No, it's alright, Jubal. It's been really bothering me since you came to school as Marie. You just seemed so. . .natural and I wondered if maybe. . ."
Jubal smiled at this. "Maybe I am more Marie than Jubal. Who really knows? I'm just glad I have more than four years to decide which one I want to be."
"Just promise me that you two will stay my friends no matter what, Okay?"
"Jubal, or Marie, I'm always your friend." Katie said.
"Me too. I owe you too much otherwise."
"He look everyone, it's the amazing boy-girl. And it's even got a girlfriend AND a boyfriend."
George was what some would call an early bloomer. He was already six foot tall at thirteen and he weighed just under two-hundred pound. He'd been working out a lot over the summer and very little of his weight was due to fat.
He was looking the other freshman in the eye while sitting down. He decided to stand.
"I believe that you owe Jubal an apology. He prefers to be called a boy. The proper gender pronoun is he."
George had a secret love for choir. He had private voice lessons every Thursday. His voice coach often told him that he'd never need a microphone if he chose to sing a solo.
He proved it now.
The entire cafeteria quieted down, and all eyes turned to him. Realizing that he was the center of attention, the freshman began to slink away.
"Stop, did I say you could leave?"
The freshman froze in fear. He slowly shook his head.
"I think you owe Jubal an apology."
"But I saw its pussy!"
Jubal and Katie turned bright red, and George glowered.
"I've told you what the proper form of address is."
The freshman gained courage from somewhere as he looked around. He knew the policy for fighting as well as anyone else here. He might have to take a few hits, but George would be suspended.
He got a smile on his face, "what, pansy-boy? Maybe c@#$ 'n d%$#?"
A couple of the girls gasped, and some of the older boys started to get to their feet. A lot of people might have agreed that Jubal was weird, but the kid was obviously taunting George and even they didn't approve of his language at the moment.
"I need a couple of witnesses to this boys language to come with me please."
George picked the kid up by the back of his shirt and began walking down the hall toward the teacher's lounge. The kid would be lucky if he weighed even ninety pounds soaking wet. George carried him as if he were nothing.
"Put me down you oaf."
George walked right into the sanctum-sanctorum followed by five or six other students.
Coach Hensen looked away from the discussion of Jubal at the other end of the room to see the students enter.
"George, what are you doing? You know if you get suspended for bullying you can't join the team."
"Actually, sir, I was bringing this fellow frosh because he has something to confess."
The teens behind George nodded.
Coach Hensen turned toward the terrified boy.
"Well, spit it out."
George began to prompt, "Say, I was."
"I was. . ."
"hazing."
"hazing. . ."
"You know the rest."
"Jubal."
The teachers at the other end of he room had noticed the students at this point and wandered over to see what was happening.
"You were bullying?" Mr. Nozawa asked. He recognized the face from his other morning AP chemistry class.
The freshman nodded, but Mr. Nozawa looked at George. "This isn't some sort of prank, is it. Bullying a kid into confessing he's bullying someone else?"
One of the other teens stepped forward.
"No, Mr. Nozawa. The other five of us witnessed most of what went on. The freshman used some crude epithets referring to Jubal, and then tried to taunt the tall freshman into hitting him."
"Does everyone know who Jubal is already?" Mrs. Finks asked.
"Just the student body council."
"Oh, that's right, Piers, you're the student body president this year."
Piers, the one who'd been speaking simply smiled and gave a nod of his head.
"We'll take care of this. Why don't the rest of you head on back to class, or lunch, or wherever you were before this happened."
"Thank you, Mr. Andrews."
The boy, whose name was Lance Goeing, looked around him in fear. He'd thought to make an impression on some of the other kids and maybe get in with the popular crowd, but somehow he misread the situation. Jubal was a freak, and the popular kids were supposed to pick on him, right?
Mr. Nozawa glanced at his class roster quickly and then turned toward the boy, "Lance, you're in my AP chemistry class. Why did you do this? You must be smarter than this."
"I don't know."
"Lance we've got no choice in the matter," Mrs. Finks said, "we have to suspend you for a week."
"What!?"
"During orientation yesterday, they explained the policy on hazing, didn't they?"
"Yes."
"What is the policy?"
"First offense: one week suspension and banning from all extracurricular activities for the rest of the school year. Second offense: expulsion."
"So, you see what we have to do. I'm sorry, Lance, but you know the policy."
"But it's so stupid. bullying happens in high schools. A silly policy can't stop it!"
Coach Hensen look over at the boy, his anger only slightly held in check.
"Two years ago, this school believed what you did. Two years ago, hazing and bullying happened on a regular basis. Sure, they would suspend kids, but nothing ever really came of it because the kids who got suspended blamed the person they'd been bullying and it would get worse.
"Two years ago, my own daughter started coming to school here. She was afraid how people would treat her because she wasn't born my daughter.
"People found out, as people always do. There was harassment and name calling. Then, something seemed to change. The captain of the football team asked her to prom.
"She was so happy, and her mom and I were so proud. She had the most beautiful dress."
Coach Hansen began to cry remembering what had happened
Mrs. Finks finished it for him.
"They striped her naked and dumped her in front of the hotel where the prom was taking place. It's grand ballroom. She was mortified and crying and trying to get away, find some refuge. Likely to call her parents. She was hit by a car and killed instantly."
Lance was white, and shaking a bit. "Why did you tell me this?"
"Because you have to know. Hazing can't be permitted. For two years, we have had almost no bullying. For two years, the students have policed themselves. In two more years it will begin to go back to the way it was unless people remember the cost of a little harmless hazing," Coach Hansen spit out the word harmless like it was filthy.
Mrs. Finks looked sadly at the boys, but there was no leeway here. There could not be. "You will sit in the security room until your parents arrive to take you home."
"Eades, you're up next!"
At hearing his name called, Jubal and Katie yelled, "Go, George!"
They were doing running drills, checking the speed of each person going out for wide receiver. George was going out for whatever they felt he could do. He'd never really played football before, but he really wanted to belong to a team, and this one seemed to be what he was best fitted for.
"Go!"
And he was off and running. They had them running half the length of the football field, about 50 yards.
George had already stopped and turned around before the person he'd been running against showed up. The other guy was breathing a bit hard, but it wasn't enough to even really get George's heart rate up.
"Samuels, get over here."
"Right away, Coach."
"Eades, back here at the start."
Samuels was the state all-star pick wide receiver from last year. He was on the varsity team already, of course. Tryouts for last year's team were almost a formality.
"No holding back, either of you. . .Go."
George took off. He ran full out, but Samuels was just a bit faster. His smile faded at being put against the varsity player, because he'd failed to beat him.
"Dagnabit, Samuels, I told you to run full out!"
"I did, Coach. Honest. Eades here is too damn fast for me."
"Wha. . ? But you beat me across the line!"
"And you're a freshman. I should have been able to smoke you."
A smile began to grow on Georges face.
"You'll find out for sure when I post the cut, Eades. I've seen what I want to see. You can take your cheering section and go home. Good job."
Finally, he was one of the last ones there, and he began looking over the list. He got through the fifty unassigned players, and his name wasn't there.
Then it was the Freshman team, his name wasn't there, and his hope ratcheted up a notch. He almost skipped over the Sophomore team, but he looked through it anyway. Nope not there.
JV, he had to have made the JV team! He scanned the list, but didn't see his name there. He began to panic a bit and looked through it again. He wasn't there. What had he done wrong?
In despair he began looking over the varsity list. First string, nope. He knew the names there though. Second string, a little more sparse than first string, but likely some of the unassigned players would end up there. His name wasn't among them.
Second name on the third string list: George Eades
His jaw dropped. Sure, it was third string, but he was on the varsity football team. As a freshman.
"So, I take it you made the team?" Jubal had walked up to go to his P.E. class George stood there dumbfounded.
"I made varsity. Sure, I might not get to play much this year, but I made varsity."
"That's great, George. I'm so happy for you."
"I blame you for this."
"Me? Why me?"
"Remember when we started running at the beginning of the summer?"
"Yeah, you were so slow. You had no endurance, and I had to slow down to let you keep up." Jubal laughed at the memory.
"I wasn't going to be out done by a shrimp like you, especially if I wanted to be on the football team. I never told you, but I started running morning and evening three days a week, in addition to our run Saturday mornings."
"Really?"
George chuckled, "Yep. I needed to beat you, and so I looked into the best way to do that online. Sprinting, running with weights, you name it, I tried it. By the time I was done, I could smoke you easily, so I was able to let you run at the speed you wanted to."
"Yeah, I wondered about that. You improved so quickly. I just thought it was being a teenager and going through puberty."
They both laughed at this, and Jubal went into the locker room to change out for P.E.
George went to his economics class at the other end of the building.
Jubal and Katie sat next to each other under a blanket for warmth.
George had been moved to second string shortly after the begin of regular season play. One of their first string wide receivers had taken a brutal hit in the first game, and was down for the rest of the season if he ever wanted to play again. They'd moved the better of the two second string wide receivers to first, and George took the newly vacated spot.
He'd hadn't been put in, yet, though. Samuels was a machine, and Franklin was only slightly less.
He looked into the stands to where Jubal and his girlfriend sat huddled. If they thought the stands were cold. . .He was wearing two sweat shirts under his jersey which made him look bulkier than normal. Most of the other guys on the bench did too.
"Tell Helper than we're doing 46a this time. Let's add a little variety into the mix."
The 46s as the team called them were razzle-dazzle plays. Gimmicks. They were designed not so much to be effective, as to confuse the other team, and have them waiting for the other shoe to drop.
This one called for a lot of backfield movement, and a face to the left by both wide receivers. Then, just before the ball was passed, the left WR would pass behind the defenders and get into position of a pass that wasn't even thrown to him.
Yeah, it's one of those plays that only ever really work in the movies, but when you pull it off through sheer luck, the other team doesn't know what hit them.
Since it was first down, Coach Hansen thought it would be a good idea. Worst that could happen would be a fumble inside the defending twenty.
Best that could happen?
The audible was called, and the ball was into the quarterbacks hands. Samuels was off like a rocket and down field waiting for Franklin to catch up. The defenders converged on the two of them. Franklin shot forward as if going for the end zone, and Samuels stuck with him a couple of steps before doubling back and then running across to the other side of the field just as the ball left the quarter backs fingers.
Time seemed to slow down for George as he watched the ball seem to hover there in mid air for a moment or two before dropping right into Samuels hands.
No one saw the defender that crashed into Samuels like a freight train until it was too late. The sound of bone breaking could be heard across the field.
Coach Hensen was onto the field and racing after the ref.
The EMTs were close behind.
They strapped Samuels down to the back board and carried him off the field.
Coach Hensen ran over to where George was sitting.
"Kowalski is out sick. Eades, you're in for Samuels."
George wasn't responsible for a single touchdown the rest of the season, but he was responsible for three hundred yards worth of their passing statistic.
Mama Joey looked at him, "I know you're only eight, Jubal, but this is part of the experience of high school, and like it or not, you are part of high school. I don't expect you to date, and I'm kind of glad you aren't But you really should at least go stag to these dances. See what they're about. Be a part of high school, not just attending."
"Yeah, Jubal. Officially George and I are just attending the dance in the same group. With you there we aren't lying to George's parents."
George blushed a bit at this.
"I want you there, Jubal, and Amanda Phillips is going stag, that I know for sure."
"Who's Amanda Phillips?"
"The cutest little freshman you ever saw."
"She is adorable," Katie said, "and also the second youngest person in our class. She turns twelve in march."
"And Jubal has the sweetest little crush on her that of course EVERYONE knows about."
"Shut up, Guys!" Jubal said as he blushed scarlet.
"Well, if Amanda is going to be there."
Mama Joey didn't figure it would really go anywhere, but at least it would be an experience for Jubal, and he needed all of those he could get. He was already more social than most of the truly genius children she'd met through the course of her work, and she intended to make sure he stayed ahead of the curve.
"So, are we getting you a suit, or a dress, Jubal."
George was a bit surprised that it took Jubal a moment or two to answer. "I don't think I'm ready to try going out as Marie again just yet, so I'll go in a suit."
Katie smiled at him, "you mean Marie might come back and visit us at school again?" She was almost bouncing with anticipation.
Jubal blushed, and nodded slightly. "Probably not this school year, but maybe."
"Well, we have a couple of weeks before the dance, so we might as well get you fitted for a suit. I can at least give you that much."
Jubal threw his arms around the big black woman, "thank you, Mama Joey."
"Any time, baby."
Someone passing him in the hall would 'accidentally' bump his arm and send his books flying. Soap was put into his jock strap for gym. His locker was pried open.
He was so focused that he almost missed the foot thrown in front to trip him.
"That's enough! Leave him alone, guys. He deserves this about as much as I did at the beginning of the year."
Jubal's light piping voice cut through the hubbub of the students in the hall, and it quieted down a bit.
"You okay, Lance?"
Lance nodded mutely, seeing Jubal for the first time. Somehow he never noticed how refined the child's features were. He hadn't been lying earlier when he said that he saw it all, either.
In other words it wasn't hard for Lance to see Jubal as a girl, and he felt something in him click.
Jubal looked at the much older crowd who were staring at him.
"Guys, what you're doing is worse than what he did to me, because none of you will stand up for him. Stop it, please? He did something stupid at the beginning of the year. I forgave him even before George carted him off, don't you think you all can forgive him this long after?"
There were a few sheepish looks, and some ugly glances in Lance's direction, but all in all everything seemed to be moving on.
"Hey, Lance, I think it might be a good idea for you to eat lunch with us for the next couple of days."
Lance nodded mutely, still unsure where all of this was going.
It sort of started being called King George's round table. Even Jubal wouldn't accept that honor.
At one end, an opening was left to allow easy access to the seating in the center of the circle. George's seat was opposite the opening.
Jubal, Katie, and George were already seated when Lance sheepishly walked up to them.
"Lance, you made it!" Katie said as she jumped up and gave him a hug. "Here, sit next to me."
He smiled and sat. Slowly they dragged him into their conversation, and he promised to come sit with them again tomorrow.
"I think it's Katie who looks the best, Mama Joey."
"Yeah, I have to agree on that one," George added.
Katie blushed, and Mama Joey made sure to get a picture of her at that moment. She had a really pretty blush.
A car horn sounded from outside, and George glanced at his watch, "I think my dad is getting antsy."
"Have fun, kids."
Mama Joey took another couple of photographs as they walked out the door.
She headed up to the room they'd converted to a study to upload them to her computer.
Then they were off into the gym with the rest of the students.
Jubal went to sit down, but Amanda cane up to him. "Jubal, hi!"
"Hi, Amanda. So, you came after all."
"Yes, I came."
She stood there, a little nervously, glancing toward the dance floor.
George walked up behind Jubal and whispered in his ear. "She wants you to ask her to dance."
"Oh. . .OH! Amanda, would you like to dance?"
"I'd love to!"
And Jubal was off and dancing. Sure, he lacked a little coordination, but no more than any of the other young boys.
As soon as he escorted Amanda to a seat, another girl came up and started talking to her. He recognized the signals this time, and took her out to the dance floor. After that was another girl, and then Katie, and then Amanda again, and then another new girl.
Every dace he seemed to be out with someone new. Even a few of the senior girls danced with him. It was just a good time for everyone until the DJ announced the last dance of the evening.
Lance walked up to him. "Hey, Jubal."
"Hey, Lance."
"So, um, would you like to dance?"
Jubal was floored, and didn't know what to say. His heart fluttered, and he flushed.
Katie came to his rescue this time, whispering, "It's considered polite to say yes."
Jubal blushed even harder and all he could do was nod.
Lance led him out onto the dance floor, and the entire song passed by in a flash.
This time it was Lance who led him back to the side where Katie was massaging her tired feet. She'd worn heels.
"Thank you for dancing with me."
"You're welcome, Lance."
Amanda walked up just as Lance was walking out of earshot.
"I think someone has a crush on Lance."
Jubal blushed furiously, and everyone around laughed.
Jubal was confused by what he was feeling, and needed some time with his therapist to work through it.
Also, a thank you goes out to Eric for corrections in American football terminology and rules of play.
Food and drink he had in abundance, but that wasn't the sustenance he craved. Heredity gave him everything he craved.
People called him variously the voyeur or the spider or that creepy security guy in the basement.
He preferred the anglicized version of the first one: The watcher.
Sometimes he felt that a person's physical privacy was sacrosanct, so while he didn't always watch, he did always listen.
He'd had one of his hands, the pickpockets and other urchins he employed, place a bug in Jubal's bag weeks ago. The boy carried it everywhere, so that made listening easy.
That hadn't been possible with last night's dance, so he'd gone for full color cameras.
Now, to determine what he would tell Jim Hastings about Jubal, and also how he would break the news of his son's indiscretions with a certain well known male prostitute in San Fransisco.
If he made a big deal of it, then the watcher could simply imply that he know of the older Hastings own indiscretions.
"Hey, Jubal? Um, would you like to go to the Valentine's Day Dance with me?"
"Look, Thomas, I'm not even sure I'm going. If you're looking for a boy to take out, Louis asked me yesterday."
"Louis? You mean Louis Germain?"
Jubal smiled as the understanding dawned in the other boys eyes, "Yes,"
"Okay. . ." Thomas wandered off down the hall, not even paying attention to where he was going.
Katie began giggling next to him. "So, that's what? Four this week?"
Jubal blushed at this. Why had he become the focus of all of this. . .this. . .craziness.
"I think it's adorable how you've been playing matchmaker, though."
"I just wish that they would all stop asking me!"
"You're just the most public member of the community."
"What are you two talking about?"
"Another freshman asked him out to the dance."
"So sorry, man."
"It wouldn't be so back, George, if I could tell them I was going to the dance with someone else."
"Amanda turn you down?"
"Not exactly. . ."
Katie spoke up for him when he didn't continue, "She was asked the day before by Brian."
"Ouch, man, that sucks."
"It's fine, but there aren't realy any other girls I'd like to take. They all so. . .old."
George and Katie broke up into laughter about this, and Jubal joined after a moment or two. They split up and headed to their next classes.
"Yeah, there have been another five ask me since then."
"So, how is that making you feel?"
"I don't know. Embarrassed. It just doesn't feel right to me?"
"How about if you were at school as Marie? Would you have accepted their invitation then?"
Jubal sat there for a moment thinking about it, and smiled. "Maybe. Hard to say. I haven't been worrying about it in that way."
"Well, next time someone asks you, then mention you would be coming as Marie if you went with them. Many of the students remember you as Marie, right?"
Jubal looked a little unsure, but nodded.
"You don't have to do this, Jubal. You really are a little young yet to be worried about pairing up with anyone else. You just feel unprepared for any of this, don't you?"
Jubal nodded and then opened his mouth as if to speak. He sat there for a moment with his mouth open, and then got up and started walking around the room.
"I don't really like any of them. It's not that I think of them as boys or girls or anything. I don't think about them at all. I just want to be left alone. I want to spend time with my friends, and that's it."
"What if Lance asked you?"
Jubal stopped dead in his tracks. Having talked a lot about it with Dr. Rath, he was pretty sure that it wasn't love or infatuation or whatever. He liked Lance. He liked George and Katie too.
What Dr. Rath asked wasn't the same as if he'd asked if George had asked him though. There'd been a little flutter of his heart. It was almost as if he was a bit excited by the prospect.
Jubal blushed.
"How have your feelings for Lance changed, Jubal?"
"He's nice to me. I like that he is conscientious of me. I like the attention. I like it the way he talks to me, too."
"Jubal, I want you to remember something. Intellectually you are very advanced. Emotionally you are still eight."
"I know, Dr. Rath."
"Yes, I realize you know, but do you feel it? Let me explain this another way.
"You see the people around you pairing up. You see them getting into relationships, or in other words coupling."
Jubal nodded.
"Now, your feelings for Lance and Amanda. Are they a matter of you feeling something for them, or feeling like you're missing out on something everyone else has?"
A light dawned in that moment for Jubal. "Oh. That makes so much sense. I look at Katie and George and I want a relationship like that, because it seems to make them so happy. I know that they are older than me, but I don't feel inferior to them. I feel the equal of everyone in that school."
"So, what will you do if Lance asks you to the dance."
"Tell him I'm not ready for a relationship with anyone, but if he wants to go as a group of friends, that George and Katie and I are all going to be at the dance."
"That sounds very mature of you."
Jubal touched his head, "Up here I am very mature. It's the whole relationship thing I don't get."
"Hey, Lance. So, are you going to the Valentine's Dance with the three of us? George's parents still don't want him to date."
If anything it made Lance more nervous. "Um, Jubal, um, I was wondering if you'd go with me. . .like alone, with me."
"I'm so sorry, Lance. I'm only eight. I'm not ready for that sort of thing, and I still have no idea if I even like boys or girls, both or neither. I like you, Lance, but as a friend, okay?"
"You asked Amanda."
"Because I wanted someone else in our group. It is kind of lopsided. Two boys and two girls."
A gleam came to Lance's eye. "Well, if I come, then you have to come as Marie."
Jubal stopped dead and couldn't think of anything to say. He'd just been roped in by his little white lie to protect Lance's feelings.
"That sounds like a great idea, Marie," Katie exclaimed.
Jubal saw the smile on Katie's face, and George nodding right along with him.
"Fine, I'll go to the dance as Marie."
Katie squealed and dragged Jubal along behind her. She knew that the Home Ec teacher had the same lunch as they did, and this was a great time to get Jubal down there.
"Katie, nice to see you. Is this Jubal?"
"Yes, and he needs a dress for the Valentine's Dance."
Miss Emmett laughed at Katie's enthusiasm, but she didn't want to embarrass anyone. "So, Jubal, Katie wants a more teenage dress made for you. Is that something you'd like?"
"You don't need to talk down to me. I may be eight, but I'm not stupid."
"Oh ho, I see that rumors of your precociousness aren't exaggerated."
Jubal smiled at her attempt at humor. "So, basically what you want to do is make a dress for me that will be closer in style to the other girls, and not those my age."
"Well, Katie would be the one making the dress."
Jubal looked a little afraid at this suggestion, but Katie jumped in here, "It won't be my first dress, in fact, I made the outfit I'm wearing today."
"I'm suitably impressed. So, you really want me to go to Valentine's as Marie?"
"Please?"
"I'm not old enough for puppy-dog eyes to have any effect on me, Katie, and I'm still not sure if I'm the right gender either."
Katie giggled at this, and they got to taking measurements.
"I won't give you near that much. Just enough to make you look a little tiny bit more mature."
"But I WANT everyone to know I'm eight."
"Everyone does know. I just don't want you to look it."
With a sigh Jubal gave in and allowed her to put the lightest dusting of makeup on.
Marie was looking out from the mirror at him when it was done. A couple of tears came to Marie's eyes, and she realized she enjoyed how she looked like this.
No, she wasn't ready to tell anyone else, and not sure if it was really the right decision for her yet, but she felt right for the first time since her grandparents had passed.
She turned to Katie and gave her a hug. "Thank you for the makeup."
"You're welcome, Marie. Let's go show the boys how we look."
She smiled and waved at them, and a couple waved back. She'd insisted on flats, especially since they really didn't make any good looking heels in her size.
She was thankful for that, because she was asked to dance by about half the people there, and asked a good portion of the other half to dance as well.
It was a wonderful feeling to be such the center of the attention. Again, Lance asked her to dance the last slow dance of the evening.
She was just enjoying herself, when Lance began to pull her toward him.
She pulled back and walked to the chairs where Katie was saving her a place.
"Marie, wait."
"Jubal, Lance. I'm Jubal. I don't think of anyone that way, least of all you. You were a friend, but if that's all you're looking for I don't think I'll feel comfortable being that anymore."
"But. . ."
Katie stood between Jubal and Lance.
"Look, Lance. She, he, is not ready. She is way too young. If you really like her, then you'll have to give her years before she'd be anything resembling ready to date, and probably years more for anything else."
"But, I really like her."
Jubal was getting angry, "Lance, just leave, ok? You're only doing this because you saw me naked and are confusing lust with love. I don't want you to bother me again, please?"
"Jubal, please, let me try again. . ."
"Katie, I think I'm going to walk home. Tell George for me?"
Jubal was pissed off to say the least. He'd started the evening feeling so right about everything, and ended it feeling so wrong. Why did that stupid Lance have to ruin everything?
He walked home swiftly and ran up to his room before Mama Joey could stop him.
He flung himself on the yellow bedspread and began to cry.
"What's wrong, baby?"
"How come I'm so confused over who I am? I can see myself looking pretty, and I'm so sure that's me. And then Lance tries to kiss me and I'm sure it's not. It felt so wrong when he did that."
"Oh Jubal, honey. It might be that girl or boy yourself, you might just want to be with women. It also might be that you simply aren't looking for either."
"You've been talking to Dr. Rath again, huh?"
"All the time, baby. All the time."
Jubal lay on the bed, held by Mama Joey. He still didn't know where his life was going, but he knew that Lance wouldn't be a part of it.
He hadn't seen Lance since Valentine's
He'd already run this morning. He was considering going out running again when a boy on a motorcycle drove up. He had bleached blond hair and a number of ear piercings. He had a ring in his right eyebrow and a stud through his lower lip with a spike on it.
Jubal was even more curios about him when he walked up to the door.
"Hi, kid. I'm looking for Jubal. Is he around?"
Something seemed off about this guy, but Jubal didn't quite know what it is.
"Whatcho want him for?" One of the kids in the neighborhood thought that was the funniest thing to ask in the world. Jubal figured it would make him seem his age.
"I wanted to meet the person my dad keeps yammering on about. Trying to see if he's all that. You probably have no idea what I'm talking about do you, squirt."
Jubal just nodded at the guy, thinking more and more he might be insane. After all, who puts that much metal in their head willingly.
"Can I tell him you were here?"
The blond looked a little strangely at Jubal for a moment and then shook his head.
"Nah, I'll probably just try to come back another time."
Jubal decided right there he would not be home when that happened. Now to figure out something to do this summer that would keep him away from home.
"Yes, Jubal. And with the speed you're reading, it seems that this gets you new books faster."
In the two weeks since he'd started, he'd finished a full rack of the paperback books. Now to move on to the next rack.
"Reading at the library and running."
"What's wrong?"
"I've been avoiding this strange man. He came over to my house at the beginning of summer and said he was planning on coming back. Mama Joey said that he came back a couple of times."
"So, I've been meaning to ask. . ."
"It's not about Marie is it?"
"Yeah. Mostly I wanted to ask if you were angry at me for the dance. You'd never talk about it, and I was so happy to see you in that beautiful dress, and I only hoped that you didn't hate me, and. . ." Katie began to cry, and Jubal wrapped her in a hug.
"Katie, I don't hate you for the dress. It was the most beautiful dress I've ever worn, and I would feel honored to wear any dress of yours."
"But, you tore it!"
"I was mad, and I felt betrayed, and I wanted never to see Marie again. I was completely Marie at that dance, and because of it I betrayed myself again. Someone wanted to take advantage of me. It happens every time I become Marie. Someone takes advantage of me."
"Are you saying you have more control of your life as Jubal? I mean, Lance originally latched onto you as Jubal."
"Well. . ."
"Jubal, have you talked to your therapist about this?"
Jubal silently shoot his head.
"Jubal, honey, this isn't your fault. You are still a little kid. You have a lot less control than the rest of us over your life, and even we have no control right now. Why do you think that teens rebel? We have no control otherwise."
Jubal gave a weak little smile, and Katie hugged him back.
"Jubal, you are the smartest kid I know. But sometimes you're really dumb, you know that?"
Jubal began to cry tears of joy, "You say the sweetest things some times, Katie."
"Only sometimes?"
Having watched enough games to begin to really have a basic understanding of the game, he figured a twenty-one point lead and five minutes left on the clock meant that Griffin would be taking the state championship this year.
He went over all of the combinations he could, and nothing he added could get two turnovers and three touchdowns in five minutes.
Jubal hadn't yet heard of an onsides kick.
In American football, the team kicking the ball is not allowed to regain control of the ball unless certain restrictions are adhered to: The ball either travels ten yards or comes into contact with a member of the opposing team and the receiving team is not directly interfered with in the regaining of the ball.
In a moment of distraction, a pass was thrown by the Sampson High quarterback for a seventy five yard gain, and a touchdown. Instead of kicking the ball through the uprights for a single extra point, it was run in for two.
Difference of thirteen points.
The two plays cost only a minute and a half between them.
Three and a half minutes remain.
The kicker lines up and sends the ball low and straight into the helmet of the Griffin Academy special teams players. It arced back toward the Sampson High line, and was recovered for another fifteen second loss.
Jubal perked up in the stands. Sure, the other team had done this, but it was still kind of awesome.
Assuming the other team meant to do another long bomb, the Griffin team backed up to try for an interception, or at least a dead ball. It would have been stupid for the Sampson High team to run the ball, because the clock would keep running, and not stop as soon as the ball came to rest.
They needed all the time they could get, but they had some razzle-dazzle plays of their own.
This one they nicknamed the freight train.
It was a running play and it basically involved all of the linemen running in front of the quarterback clearing the way. It never would have worked if the Griffin team had not assumed the passing play.
They were ready for the two point conversion this time and that brought the game to a seven point difference.
A touchdown and extra point to tie and go into sudden death field goal kicking.
A touchdown and a two point conversion would mean that Sampson won the game outright.
That is if they could pull another onsides kick. They only had forty-five seconds left, but as seen already this can be an eternity in American football.
"Time!" Coach Hensen called to the ref.
"Samuels, Eades, I want the two of you out there with special teams. Get that ball. We can worry about what we're doing next after that, we have another time out to deal with that. Get me that ball boys!"
When George trotted out onto the field Jubal cheered. He had a little bit of hero worship by this point. Even at nine years old he was still much too small for any of the organized sports, but that didn't mean he couldn't live vicariously through his friend.
The cheerleaders were leading the crowd in cheers trying to throw off the kicking team.
Samuels was five yards back from the line in the middle. George was at the left end.
As soon as the kicker's foot touched the ball George was off. He put out his hands and the ball dropped right into them.
It had bounced off Samuel's head and George was right where it had come back down. He laid on the speed then and took off. The stunned special teams got a move on, especially Samuels, and started screening for George as he ran down the field.
The crowd was on their feet and the announcer was yelling into his mic, "He's at the forty. . .the thirty. . .the twenty. . .the ten. . .he seems to be down on the one yard line. . ."
At the last second, George had stopped and grounded the ball within inches of another touchdown. The play clock and the game clock were the same as they set up for the next play.
The ball was snapped and the quarterback just waited for time to run out as even the Sampson High team knew that they had lost.
"The game is over. Time is up. Griffin wins! Griffin has won the state championship!"
"You know that as soon as high school is over, you go back to being an unknown freshman in college."
"You really know how to dampen a man's spirits, don't ya, Jubal."
"Hey, someone has to be realistic."
They laughed about it, and Katie hugged the two of them. She still wore her cheerleading outfit as they still had basketball to cheer for, even if no one she knew was playing.
"Jubal, you realize that you're a king in this school just like I am, don't you?"
"Me, I'm just the nine year old sophomore."
"And the nicest guy in the school. And the best matchmaker as well."
"Hey, the first ones were luck of the draw."
"Sure, they might have been, but you haven't failed to pair people up from your pool since then."
"I just wish everyone would stop coming to me for romantic help. I don't even date!"
"I think that's part of the reason that people come to you. You don't have a pony in the race."
Jubal snorted at this, but grinned at his friends.
"So, who are we going to talk to today?"
"Amanda actually. I realized that it's really time I helped her. She asked me almost a month ago, and really didn't have the heart to tell her."
"What? You're giving up on her?"
"She's still way too old for me. And I know someone who would treat her right."
Katie realized what he was going to say, even though George was clueless.
"Are you sure?"
"It's not like I'm setting them up as the perfect couple. I've never been trying to do that. I set people up who have similar interests, and besides me, they both actually have a lot in common."
They arrived at Amanda's locker just as she was closing it. "Amanda! Glad I caught you."
"Hey, Jubal. You finally give in and admit you want to date me?"
"Sorry, you know I don't date, but I do know someone that fits you perfectly. I've already told him my choice, and he thought I was crazy. Give him a chance, Okay?"
Like usual, he'd plotted the distance and time properly, and stepped out of the way just as Lance came around the corner. He looked a little surprised to see Jubal there, but rushed forward before he lost his nerve.
"Amanda, um, I was wondering if you wanted to go to Winter Dance with me?"
"I'd love to, Lance!"
Jubal stepped back a little sad, but with a big smile on his face.
"You want to talk about it, Jubal?"
"It's okay. I'm simply in the wrong body. Apparently I should have been born four years before I actually was."
"Yeah, but then you wouldn't be the wonderfully smart younger brother of the entire school."
They laughed at this, and Jubal only looked back once to see Amanda and Lance talking.
He controlled his breathing, and made it to the bathroom before he began to cry.
George stood at the entrance to the boys bathroom while Katie went in to comfort him.
"Jubal, what's wrong honey?"
"It's not fair, Katie. I don't get a relationship of my own."
"I thought you didn't want a relationship."
"Of course I want a relationship, I just know I'm not ready for one. I'm like my own parent."
Katie giggled at this and held him until he was cried out.
"Jubal, you have to realize that you've had a much better run of it than most kids in your position, right?"
"I know, but it doesn't stop me missing what I can't have."
"I know. Hey, maybe next year we can set you up with a freshman?"
"Are you kidding? Seriously? The freshmen THIS year were immature enough. Can you imagine what they'll be like next year when we're juniors?"
They both laughed at this, even though Jubal began to wonder. He'd be turning ten. Maybe he'd almost be ready for something then. He certainly FELT more mature than he had when he started this whole thing.
"Jubal, there isn't a specific age at which you are ready for a relationship. I've had thirty-year-olds in here who still aren't emotionally ready."
"What do you think about me, doctor?"
"Do you feel like you are ready?"
"I still don't know. I don't know if I even want to be, yet. I do want to be with someone thought. I want to have a relationship like George and Katie do."
"Ah, but we haven't even answered whether or not you want to be Katie or George."
Jubal blushed, but nodded.
"May I make a suggestion, Jubal. I know I usually try and let you come to your own decisions, which is very hard for me with a child of your age, but I feel that this is important."
"Ok, Dr. Rath. What do you suggest?"
"Wait on a relationship until you know whether being Jubal or Marie is who you are. Don't let other's good intentions make up your mind for you. That won't define who you are supposed to be with, and leave that until you decide who you are.
"I say this for you as much as for whomever you decide to be with. They deserve the best you can give them, which means that you are whole in mind, body, and spirit."
"Don't you think that's kind if heavy for a nine year old, doc?"
"Sure, but then I'm talking to you and not just any nine year old."
They both smiled, and as usual Jubal shook Dr. Rath's hand as he left. the room.
Jubal was originally created for a specific universe on this site, but as there was so much to tell before the story that really fit with the universe I decided to start by posting without the universe tag.
This has the side effect of getting people interested in Jubal as a person, and potentially will cause some upset with me as a writer.
Sure, I may be putting too much stock in my own analytical skills as far as the comments go, but it seems to be the case.
That being said, I return to my first comment.
Initially I will be going with the story I intended, in the universe of my choice.
Please, do not give up on me however. Should you prefer to see Jubal in the more "real life" world he seems to be in, I will later return and write this alternate version of his life.
I realize this statement here might cause some distress, and as I have said that was never my intent. I really love Jubal Marie as a character. There is story enough here to keep things going in either place that (s)he finds her(him)self in.
Also, a note about the leaning toward light sci-fi in the end of this chapter. This does play into the overall story I am writing, but will not prevent a more down to earth Jubal alternative.
How bout I just get to the story now?
Since Griffin assigned that to the Home Ec department, and since Jubal had started taking Home Ec this year, he sort of found himself roped in.
Like any normal high school, Jubal was not the only male in the course, but he was the only one who actually fulfilled his duties on the committee.
They put him at the door taking tickets in a cupid outfit.
"Hey Amanda, Lance!"
"They put you on Ticket duty, huh?"
"Yep, I figure it'd better than pretty much anything else I could be doing."
They laughed at this and went in.
"Thomas! Louis! You came, and still together I see."
"This is our one year anniversary, of course we came. Thank you so much for what you did, Jubal!" Thomas said.
"Yes, Thank you."
And on and on as couples he'd put together in the last year said their thanks to him. He was emotionally worn out, but oh so happy when Theresa came up to him.
"Okay, Jubes. That's it. We're closing the ticket booth down, so you can go get yourself something to drink and relax in the dance."
"In this?"
"Of course not, silly. We have your suit in back, or, um, if you like. . ."
"You have a dress for me as well, don't you Theresa?"
"Well, since you haven't gotten any bigger, we made you a dress with the measurements from last year. In that pale yellow fabric you seemed to like so much. . ."
"Theresa, I know you mean well, but this is hard enough for me to decide."
She cocked an eyebrow at him and he sighed.
"I have another three years before I decide permanently whether I want to be a boy or a girl. I'm still so confused about it. I love wearing dresses and being pretty, but. . .you don't need all my arguments I make to myself."
Theresa looked a little down, and turned to leave, "Okay, well, I'll go put the dress away then."
"Theresa, you misunderstand. All I'm saying is don't push me," Jubal giggled. "I have to see the dress before I decide."
A smile lit up Theresa's face. "Well, let me show it to you then."
It was a confection. Gauzy white material over translucent yellow and light pink material over a yellow sheath. The proportions were very adult, but the size was completely Jubal.
"How did you? . ." Jubal felt like crying. From his own failed attempts at sewing, he knew how difficult it was to use the materials he was before him. And they'd been used in abundance. It was the dress he'd wanted to make, but simply lacked the skill.
"Katie mostly. She's a wizard at this stuff. I think she even practices at home."
Jubal had made his decision as soon as he saw the dress they'd made for him. He went into the bathroom and changed out of the short toga and oversized diaper of the cupid outfit into the beautiful dress.
She couldn't get the dress up herself, so Marie called out to Theresa for help. With two buttons in the back in place, she looked at herself in the mirror, and was glad to see Marie looking back at her.
"These as well," Theresa said and handed her a pair of long lace gloves. They seemed to be fitted to her, and went to her elbows.
"How. . .?"
"Remember when Katie measured your arm last week?"
"I'd wondered what in the world she was doing."
"Well, your public awaits, my queen."
"Very well, liege lady. We proceed to meet our public."
Marie followed Theresa out of the bathroom and was about to go mingle with the rest of the students, when Miss Emmett came up and got in front of the microphone.
"Students, may I have your attention please? While it is not traditional to do so, we decided that we wanted a Valentine's Queen, or King, this year. As you know, but as the person who was chosen does not, each of you have case your vote for the person who you feels most exemplifies the feeling of the holiday.
"As someone who helps others to recognize what they simply never saw. As Griffin Academy's own resident matchmaker. Your Valentine's Queen for this year is Jubal Marie Franks."
A tiara was placed upon her head, and the microphone was lowered so she could easily speak into it.
"I feel like one of those freaky child beauty pageant winner right now."
"You don't look like it, Jubal!" Someone shouted from the crowd.
A number of girls from Home Ec yelled toward the voice, "It's Marie!" and there was general laughter at this.
"I'd first like to thank Katie for this divine dress, and the one I was stupid enough to ruin last year. I'd like to thank the rest of the activities committee for helping to make this wonderful dance possible. . ."
George yelled from off to the right side, "Just thank everyone all at once and come dance!"
"Fine, George, I'll cut it short. Thanks Everyone!"
People asked Marie to dance this time, and she ended up dancing with everyone. It was so much more pleasant than last year, and she even got an apology from Lance.
"Look, Jubal, or I mean Marie, I'm sorry about my behavior from last year. I realize now that I just needed someone I connected to. Thank you so much for introducing me to Amanda. Just, Thank you."
"You're insane, you know that Benjamin?"
"Watcher. In here I'm the watcher, and you should very well know that since you're the one who employs me."
"Heredity Inc employs you. So, what is this you're watching?"
"Oh, it's my own cut and edit from last night's Valentine's Dance. I simply can't get enough of it. I really don't know what it is about Jubal, but he attracts the eye."
"You better not be getting any ideas regarding my grandson!"
"Or your granddaughter. Look at that dress, I mean, seriously. It makes her look so grown up."
"What are those freaks doing to him!?"
"Relax. You know that she, or he, has not made a final decision as to his, or her, gender right?"
"I always just assumed. . ."
"Many people do, but from my daily take of audio and video, it's obvious to me that Jubal Marie is still highly conflicted. Jubal is the preferred address in masculine clothing, and Marie in feminine. We have a regular Janus on our hands here. A real honest to god Janus."
"What are you talking about, Watcher?"
"Janus or Jana, depending on his or her gender aspect, was the roman god/ess of duality, transition, beginnings and endings. s/he was often depicted as having a male and a female face."
"What does that have to do with Jubal?"
"Jubal is who we see, at any time we see him. He is in transition, changing. A beginning and an ending unto himself."
"I think you've been in the basement too long."
The watcher chuckled at this, "So, what do you want, Mr. Hastings? Why the long trek down to my lair?"
"How accurate is your information regarding my son?"
"Would you like a transcript, audio, or video recording? Possibly a sworn statement by the prostitute in question?"
Anger suffused Mr. Hastings features. "No, that won't be necessary. Why did you present this to me?"
"Because you specifically asked me to report on your son's actions. That is what I did. I do not keep the truth from you, Mr. Hastings. I enjoy my job too much to want to jeopardize it."
"Fine, I'll deal with my son. Thank you for being honest."
"Anytime, Mr. Hastings. If I may?"
"What is it?"
"Why all this interest in the child?"
"Why, because if things keep going the way they have been, I might simply have to make him, or her, my heir. My son doesn't have the moral fiber to do it. He can't subsume his physical needs in something more productive."
"Very good, Mr. Hastings."
As soon as the man left, watcher had a good chuckle to himself. "Isn't that a bit of the pot calling the kettle black, Mr. Hastings. After all, I doubt the things you do with your mistress could be considered subsuming your needs in something more productive."
Watcher shuddered at some of the things he'd seen, "I mean, those acts are vile even by my standards."
"Why, Daddy. I didn't know you cared." Aaron had another piercing on his face, adding a second ring to his right eyebrow.
"Sit down, Aaron," he said quietly, and when Aaron didn't react, said, "Now!"
"I truly wish that your sister Marie had survived that accident over nine years ago. If she had I wouldn't be having this conversation now."
"I wish she had survived as well so I could get back to my life."
"Your life? You mean putting yourself at risk with faggots like yourself?"
The color drained from Aaron's face.
"Yes, I know about your little arrangement in San Francisco. Thought it would be far enough away for me not to notice?"
"Look, find yourself a little boyfriend for the side, but you damned well better stop tarnishing this company image or I will resolve this situation in a more severe manner. You will get married when I demand it, and you will have an heir you can prepare for this company. And no, you will not pay some other schmuck to impregnate your wife."
"Dad, you can't do this!"
"Watch ME! Your only other choice is to be disinherited."
"Well, there's the third option. You keep embarrassing me in public and I add a morality clause to your inheritance."
A file smoldered in the depths of Aaron's eyes as he looked at his father.
"Now, there's the little matter of college."
Aaron snorted at this.
"What college will take me after the mess my grades are in?"
"Any, actually. I've used some of my influence and had your transcript changed. You have one more year of high school to prove to me you can keep your grades there, and we get you into the school of my choice."
"That's not possible, I can't get a 4.0 or anything even close to it."
"It's that or the party stops abruptly."
"Yes, sir. Anything else you need, sir?" The fire flared, but Aaron enjoyed the perks of wealth and power too much to try to call the old man's bluff.
"She was alright. It wasn't the same as talking to you, though."
"It was unavoidable. Apparently I'm the only one amongst all my siblings who could take care of my mother in her last days."
"Well, it seems as we both have a little something in common now."
Dr. Rath smiled a sad little smile, and then sat a little straighter, "so, I hear you've been having fun at school."
Jubal smiled at this. "They made me the Queen of the Valentine's Dance for my matchmaking activities. And I've been modeling some of Katie's work at school."
"So, you've been going as Marie sometimes?"
"Some, yes. Not as much as Jubal, but everyone seems okay with it. It's like they think of me as two different people with the same body."
"How so?"
"Well, I get doors opened for me as Marie, which never happens for Jubal. The guys are more likely to joke around with me as Jubal, and I have a lot more girls hanging with me as Marie."
"Well, could it be that they aren't so much treating you as a different person as just a different gender?"
"Um, I don't know?"
Dr. Rath chuckled. "You are very intelligent, Jubal, but there are so many areas in which you haven't experienced enough to understand. Boys and girls are more different than you're giving them credit for.
"It's more than just the clothes or the expected role in a family. It's more than plumbing. Our society dictates that boys and girls act in a specific manner, and because of that we clump together.
"Girls are supposed to be more social, boys more competitive, girls more caring, boys more strong. That doesn't dictate how things are, just how they're supposed to be."
"Oh, I see, opening a door for a girl shows how you are able to protect her. Shows you are also willing to subjugate your strength to her."
Dr. Rath laughed at that, "You know, I've never thought of it that way, but you very well might be right."
"What?"
"We don't very often think about why we do certain things in certain orders. Most people just accept the gender roles as 'the way it is' without ever once trying to analyze them."
"So, I just look at things differently?"
"Or more especially with a fresh pair of eyes. You are so keen to learn everything you can, that you ask the questions everyone else just assumes they know the answers to. So, any plans for the summer?"
"Just running and hanging with my friends. Although it's getting a little more uncomfortable there. With George being sixteen now, and his parents being okay with him openly dating, it seems I have less time with him and Katie."
"Well, that's normal. Let them have their time together alone, and it will be worth it the times you spend as a group."
"Or won't I just be a third wheel?"
"Possibly, but that depends on the sort of people that George and Katie are."
"So, what else has been going on with you?"
"About the same as being a sophomore or a freshman, Katie."
"You're no fun, Jubal. Has anyone ever told you that before?"
"Only you, Katie. So, where's your limpet?"
"George has a football meeting, they're voting on something or other. He said he'd meet us in the lunchroom."
So, what are you up to?"
"I'm not up to anything."
"Oh, yes you are. I know that smirk."
"Okay, fine. Yes, I'm planning something. A lot of us are, actually."
"That sounds ominous."
"Not so ominous. You know how I haven't seen much of you since the beginning of the year, well would you like to change that?"
"I don't play these games well, Katie. What are you planning?"
"Ok, well, since you left Home Ec for French a lot of the girls are missing you, and talk of how to get you back in there for a little bit sprouted into a fashion show for the entire school."
"Um. . ."
"We want you, and some of the other girls we know, to try model dresses for us in the auditorium in an actual fashion show."
"I'll think about it, Katie. This has to be my decisions, and right now, if I said yes, I would only be doing it to make you happy."
She smiled, "Ok, Jubal. I'll let you think about it. Let's go to lunch."
They entered the cafeteria to a strange sight. The football players who normally re-arranged the room were milling about in confusion. The tables had all be locked down to the floor to prevent their being moved around. Strangely enough they were formed into large concentric circles just as the football players would have wanted it to be.
Their 'table' now took up the entire room.
Jubal tugged on Katie's hand and started heading over to their normal spot at the head of the circle, opposite the opening to get into the center.
Katie sat demurely while Jubal climbed up on top of the table.
"Hey, it's just the way you always wanted it, so stop milling about and join us!"
There was some chuckling from the football players and other students who were in the room. People retrieved their trays and began to sit in places they were comfortable in.
Katie gently pulled Jubal down off the table into a seat, "Take your own advice, your majesty."
They both giggled at this, until Jubal realized what he was doing and began to blush.
"Jubal, don't be embarrassed. Most of us have realized that you are more girl than boy by now."
"Just because that's the way I act doesn't mean that's the way I'm comfortable. I really can't decide one way or another, and I only have a little over two years left to decide."
Katie got a thoughtful expression on her face, "Maybe that's because you're asking the wrong question."
"Huh?"
"Which name do you prefer? Jubal or Marie?"
"I prefer Jubal. It just has always fit me more, I think. That doesn't make me a boy."
"No more than being called Marie makes you a girl."
"So, where are you going with this?"
"Ok, if you had to make a choice, would you prefer to be called pretty or handsome for the rest of your life?"
Jubal blushed a pretty shade of pink. "Pretty. I like being pretty."
"And how would you feel if you could never wear another dress?"
"Sad, because they make me look the prettiest."
"Now, do you like to be protected, or to protect?"
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Ok, so maybe that was a bad question. Opening doors or having them opened."
"Well, it makes me feel so special to have a door opened for me. I just open doors to try and let other girls. . .wow. I never realized that before."
Katie was smiling brightly. She'd heard what Jubal had said.
"So, you think it would be okay with everyone still calling me Jubal if I was. . .um. . .more girly?"
"Sweetie, most of us have come to expect strangeness from you. You'll have to change P.E. classes though if you want to make it official."
"Um, but won't that just be me going from one coach's office to the other's?"
"So, you'll just be with the rest of the girls, as you put it."
"Well, I guess I'd like that."
Jubal pursed her lips and thought for a moment, and then got a worried expression on her face. "You're sure people will be fine calling me Jubal and addressing me as a girl?"
"Jubal, I think Marie is a prettier name, but I'll call you whatever you like."
Jubal's giggle was infectious and Katie couldn't help but joining in with her.
"So, what are you to conspiring about?"
Katie looked from Jubal to George and back. At last she turned to George, "I'll let her tell you."
"Her? She's going to be Marie from now on?"
"No, I'm going to be Jubal but with a female gender."
"Okay, I have no idea how that works, but I'll support you in that. Oh, yeah, I have some news of my own."
"What?" Katie and Jubal said in unison.
"You're looking at the new captain of the varsity football team."
"Well, I hope you don't expect me to go out for head cheerleader this year, since I don't plan on trying out for the squad."
"Why not?" Jubal asked, "you seemed to like it."
"Yes, but I wanted to devote more time to my fashions. I'm having more fun being a seamstress and clothing designer."
"Well, it looks like changes abound today. Who decided to round up the whole cafeteria?"
"The administration. Apparently they gave in to the inevitable, since we were well over halfway there anyway."
Jubal looked out at the room, and realized that the arrangement allowed for people to be part of one large group, as opposed to several smaller ones. The distance between the tables was smaller than it had been with the other arrangement, and so people were all much closer together as well.
Jocks and cheerleaders were interspersed with nerds and outcasts. And they were talking to each other.
"Look what you've been able to accomplish, King George. Everyone is a single clique." Jubal said with a big smile.
"Me, oh no. I take no credit for this. This is all you. And if you remember it was actually your idea originally to have the tables in a hollow circle."
He stood on his chair and the entire cafeteria turned toward him.
"All hail Queen Jubal, purveyor of happiness and all around great girl!"
"Queen Jubal!" came the reply from the throats of her fellow students.
Speech!" called one joker from off to the side. and the rest of the cafeteria picked it up.
Speech, Speech, Speech, Speech."
Jubal giggled and stepped up onto the table. She made quieting gestures and the noise lowered to a low roar.
"I want to thank you all for elevating me to this position, and will only make onerous requests on the third Thursday of the month."
There was general laughter at this.
"Thank you for your friendship."
"We love you, Queen Jubal!" Jubal was pretty sure that Lance had been the one to shout that out.
"Thank you, Lance. I'm still not going out with you."
"Yeah, good that, cause I'd have to kill you," Amanda said from the same general vicinity.
Jubal sat back down in her chair and everyone began talking amongst themselves.
"You know I'm not giving up tee shirts or pants, right?" Jubal said to Katie as soon as she was planted.
"I would never imagine it. I think it will just make it easier for everyone else if they know that you are a girl permanently now."
Something occurred to her and Jubal lost her smile, "how do I tell Dr. Rath?"
"I'm sure he'll be happy for you."
"I hope so," she said, but she wasn't so sure.
"Yes, Jubal?"
"Could I get a pixie haircut?"
"Are you sure, Jubal? Or Marie?"
"Just Jubal, but I think I do feel more comfortable when people think of me as a girl. I'm not ready for pierced ears or anything, but I figure a new haircut. . ."
"That sounds like a good idea, as long as it's your choice."
"Yes, Mama Joey. It's my choice. I'm tired of being somewhere between. Plus, I really have been presenting as a boy more than anything. If I go all girl for the next couple of years, then I can more easily know if that is the choice I want to make."
"Ok, sounds like a plan, Jubal. But, if you're going girl, then why keep the name Jubal?"
"Because I like it better than Marie."
Mama Joey laughed at this and shook her head, "Leave it to you to make the practical descision."
"Well, this is definitely a new look for you, Marie."
"No, it's Jubal. I decided that I can keep the name Jubal even if I'm a girl. My grandparents gave it to me after all, so it's my choice what I'm called."
"So, I see you've decided then?"
"Yeah, it was something in the way I was thinking, even when I was in boy mode. I thought of the boys as them and the girls as us, well that's simplified but that's the general idea."
"You never mentioned this in our sessions. This isn't something other people are putting you up to?"
"I never mentioned it, because I'd never asked myself the right questions." Jubal said with a huge smile.
"Well, you're a little happier, but is that simply because you've finally made a decision?"
"Probably. The being in the middle was really grating on me. Now that I made a decision, that weight lifted so I can finally just be happy."
"Well, we still have two years before you make your final decision. That is time enough to see if this really is for you."
"I thought so too. Kind of like a real life test sort of."
"Yes, but without any of the hormones sometimes associated with it."
"Yep. There is something I wanted to ask, though, I don't seem, to be getting any bigger. I've worn the same sized dress for the past couple of years. I've gotten a little bit taller, but not by much."
"Hmmm. We may want to get you in to an endocrinologist. Something may be off in your normal hormone levels. There also might be something else in relation to your intersex that is causing this."
"Okay, doctor. and thanks."
He snorted at this. The holy grail of eternal youth. But would even this company be willing to test those on a child?
How cruel would that be to halt the aging of a precocious child when all she wants is to grow into her mind.
After the nurse was done, the doctor came in.
"Hello, Jubal, I'm Doctor Sprauc"
"So, are you the endocrinologist?"
"That's a big word. Yes I am." He put on one of those miles you reserve for trained monkeys and other people's children.
"Doctor, while I may look like a nine year old, and my in fact be nine years old, I am neither an idiot, nor am I uneducated."
Mama Joey smiled at this, but continued to sit quietly in the corner.
The doctor straightened up, looked appraisingly at Jubal, and then smiled for real, "When Dr. Rath told me that he had a gifted child coming to see me, I never imagined. My apologies. Dr. Rath tends to get a little excited where his transsexual clients are concerned."
"Ah, but I am not your standard transsexual, doctor. Of course not. He'd never be referring a nine year old for hormone replacement."
She smiled at him, letting her tone soften a bit. "I apologize for snapping at you. It's actually easier dealing with the teens at my school than most adults."
"You don't find yourself an outcast there?"
"Not really. I think it's mostly to do with certain school policies regarding harassment and hazing, but they're really a great group of kids."
"That really is quite amazing."
"Well, being as they're a private school, they can actually expel students. I don't think most public schools have that luxury."
"Too true. Well, getting back to the point of your visit, I will be running some tests regarding your levels of human growth hormone. It is possible, although remote, that you have a growth condition, but for right now, we may simply be jumping the gun. The main thing that concerns me is that you have been approximately around the 50th percentile of height for your age. In the past couple of years, you've dropped a bit below the line.
"Where you would normally be about 54 inches at this age, you are only 52 inches."
"Two inches doesn't seem very much."
"Not much, no. And we may simply be borrowing trouble. It's also a possibility that it's related to your intersex condition. I noticed that you never had your gonads tested to see if your male or female parts were active?"
"I think they wanted me to make a determination of my gender without influence. I might have tried to force myself one way or the other assuming it was 'right'."
"Well, then we'd better get you checked out. It will affect the direction your body chemistry will be going in, and suggest courses of treatment before you go through your surgery."
"Thank you doctor."
The tissue of the gonads alternated between ovarian and testicular. In short, the child had ovotestis.
A genetic test would be able to determine the 'true' sex of the child, but nothing else would. Well, time to write up his report, and let the child know.
It would have been nice to give better news though. He wasn't sure he would be able to tell most adults that they were sterile, let alone a child of nine.
Katie quietly climbed the stairs, not wanting to disturb her friend, but hoping she could do something to help.
Jubal was sitting on her bed holding one of the pillows to her chest. She just stared off into the middle distance, not doing anything else. Her eyes were puffy from crying, but she currently seemed all cried out.
Katie was about to try to back out again, not even sure she could handle this when Jubal spoke.
"I always assumed that I'd pick the 'right' gender. That my body would tell me which was the correct way for me to go, you know?"
Katie nodded and came to sit down next to her friend.
"I assumed that choosing to be a girl would let me have children. That I'd get the opportunity to be the mother than my grandparents promised me I could be."
"Jubal. . ."
"It's okay, Katie. At least I hope it will be."
"No, it's not okay. I know how I'd feel if I received the same news. Sure, there are some women that don't want children. But I'm not one of them. I love playing with my nieces and nephews. My sister just had her first and he is so tiny. The thought of having one of my own fills me with joy every time I look at the little guy."
Jubal began to cry again, and Katie wrapped her up in a hug. "I wanted to finally be normal, Katie. Sure, I'd still be freaky intelligent, but I wanted to be normal for once in my life. I wanted to be a real girl, not this in between freak that everyone humors."
"You are a real girl, Jubal. You always have been to me anyway. And normal is over rated."
"So says the person who's normal."
Katie pulled off her right shoe and pulled something out of it.
It was an insert that was about an inch and a half thick.
"I have to wear shoes all the time so I can use this. My right leg is shorter than my left, and has been for pretty much my whole life. I'm not normal, Jubal. Like I said, it's not all it's cracked up to be."
"Katie, I didn't mean. . .I'm sorry I'm being such a baby about this."
"Jubal, you're entitled to a cry or two. Besides, I came to tell you that we have a surprise for you back at school. Someone decided you just needed to keep yourself busy."
Jubal as highly embarrassed and she blushed crimson as soon as she saw it. She looked at the posters trying to determine exactly what was going on. How would this keep her busy?
Then she noticed the words that were written on each and every one: Queen Jubal for Student Body President.
"Oh, no. I'm not doing this."
"Come on, Jubal. You're a shoo-in."
"That's the problem. I don't want to be roped into organizing the reunions from now until the end of eternity."
"Oh come on, that's only every five or ten years. And besides, it'll be fun for you to be on the student council."
"For certain definitions of fun. You know, where it's defined as to total lack of the same?"
"Come on, Jubal. If you lose, then no worries. If you win, then you know people support you."
"Wait, you didn't tell everyone. . ."
"Of course not. That's your own private hell. We just want you to be in our public one for a while," Katie said with an evil grin.
"Thank you, Katie."
"For what?"
"Making me come back to school so I could campaign against myself."
"Jubal!!"
"Hey, you guys are running my election campaign, so I feel obligated to sabotage it."
Katie laughed at this, and the two of them headed further into the school to participate in teenaged life.
"We have a request from the Thoreau Society to avoid playing ultimate football in the south field, as the trees that were planted on Earth Day are still struggling. As we all know, these trees were planted in memoriam of the students who died in a drunk driving accident the Christmas before. Already, one of the trees has been trampled, and they would like us to protect the other two."
"And finally, the news you've all been waiting for, but are sure to know already, the winner of the election for next year's student body president is Jubal Marie Franks. Her council will consist of. . ."
Jubal had been spacing out as she walked down the hallway. There was a lot to do, even this year, as the heir presumptive to the title of student body president.
"Congratulations, Jubal. Looking god for such an old lady!"
"Way to go, Jubal!"
Jubal smiled a little smile, and said, "Thanks."
"It's all downhill from here, Jubal."
Jubal found Katie near their shared locker. "What's going on, Katie?"
"I don't know. You ready to head in for lunch?"
"Sure, why not."
They entered the cafeteria and were assaulted by a giant yellow sign with black lettering: "Happy Birthday Jubal. The big 1-0 never looked so good."
"Guys! I thought we discussed plastering me all over the school." She tried to look severe, but she was giggling too hard to pull it off.
"That was your picture, and you'll notice that there is no picture up there," George said as he walked up.
"Hey, sweetie," Katie said and planted a kiss on George's lips.
Jubal turned away blushing.
"If your highness would follow me, please, your throne awaits."
George placed Jubal's hand in the crook of his arm and regally proceeded to their normal place at the head of the cafeteria. For the first time she noticed one of the upholstered arm chairs from the counseling office.
George helped her to climb up onto the table and seated her in her chair.
Jubal sat regally in her chair, and surveyed the faces looking up at her. "As our first order of business as queen, we shall order the execution of everyone. Off with your heads!"
There was general laughter at this, and as soon as it died down a bit, Jubal continued, "However, I shall offer a stay of execution, provided that you never do this again?"
"We make no such promises, My queen!"
"Amanda, perform a tickle torture on your boyfriend."
"At once, my queen."
There was laughter and smiles from everyone, as Jubal sat in mock court.
"I think it worked, George," Katie said quietly.
"It was all you. And yeah, it did. I haven't seen her laughing and joking like this since. . .she got the news."
"I know. So, should we go ahead with plans for the fashion show?"
"You better, or I really will order your execution. Thank you for this."
Katie looked up into Jubal's eyes. Jubal was smiling down on her two best friends, and truly happy. Katie's initial spurt of fear over being overheard slowly relaxed and she smiled back.
Jubal and the other girls had practiced walking up and down it almost constantly over the past month, and Jubal even found herself even strutting a bit off the catwalk.
One more day of this and everything could go back to normal. One more day of this and she could go back to her life. . .she hoped.
They opened the curtain just a bit where Jubal and the other models would come out. "Our first offering for you this evening is a lovely cream and white dress in satin and lace."
That was her queue and Jubal was off and down the strip of plywood and two by fours.
As soon as she stepped into the lighting the audience went away. She could hear them still, and see the occasional flash from a camera, but she was in her own world. She walked out to the end of the runway confidently, posed for a moment, and then turned and walked back and off stage through the space in the curtain.
She rushed over to the rack of clothing, dropped the dress she was wearing and put on the next one. She was glad that it was nothing but the other models and a couple of female teachers up on the stage. She might have felt too self-conscious changing otherwise. As it was some of the other models were blushing furiously as they changed.
Jubal hurried over to her place in the line for her next entrance and waited as the girls went out one by one. Before she knew it, she was next in line waiting for her queue.
"Our next dress. . ."
And she was off strutting her stuff down the runway a second time. She struck a different pose this time and she was off to the back and out through the curtain again.
Another change and waiting again. She noticed that the other girls were getting less self-conscious as it went on, and they were beginning to enjoy themselves.
They even began to giggle quietly as they joked amongst themselves.
Things were going so well. After this she only had one more change. Out, pose, back in and change, and she was waiting for her fourth and final trip down the runway.
This was a slightly longer gown, almost formal. She'd successfully navigated most of the way down the runway when her descending foot trapped a bit of the dress. She tripped as she was almost to the end of the runway.
There was a gasp from the audience, but she caught herself before tumbling off the end.
She hopped back up and gave a little girl 'did I do that?' pose before kicking up her heel and continuing down the runway.
She was blushing furiously by the time she got off stage.
Katie came over to her and hugged her. "That almost looked planned, Jubal. It was really cute."
"But I messed up your dress. I tore the hem completely off."
"That's alright. I like that one the least anyway."
Jubal giggled with Katie over this and the two of them got lined up across the back of the stage for final look with the designers.
"Ladies and Gentleman, the Griffin Academy High School designers and models.
As each of their names were announced, they each took a bow, and then it was over.
"I am never doing that again, Katie."
"Oh, we'll see." She said with a knowing smile. It was obvious that Jubal had fun up there, right up until her little tumble. Given the right opportunity, she might one day find herself up there again.
The game was a foregone conclusion as halftime approached, and Katie and Jubal got a bit bored. Griffin was already four touchdowns ahead when they put in their third string team. They got their fifth touchdown at that point.
There was a definite chill in the air, and a light frost on the ground. They went under the stands where it was enclosed and a bit warmer to talk. As soon as they got there, they began to hear something going on. It sounded a little bit like something hitting a wet bag of sand.
"That's what you get for pretending you're something you're not, faggot."
Jubal and Katie rushed over and saw three boys standing around kicking a girl on the ground. "Hey, leave her alone!"
Jubal rushed over, forgetting that she wasn't the most intimidating of people.
The boys started as if to run, and then saw who it was. "Hey boys, looks like we may get the faggot what a real girl does when a guy asks her nicely."
"Jubal, I don't think this is a good idea, Katie whispered at her."
"How 'bout it, ladies? Want to show this faggot how a real girl has a good time?"
They turned to run, and Jubal piled on the speed. She'd quickly outdistanced her friend when she heard a call of 'got you!' behind her.
"Jubal, go get help!"
With tears in her eyes, Jubal continued running, looking for anyone who could help them. She ran out into the stands and started yelling. "Help me! I think some boys are trying to rape my friend Katie!"
George had been going slowly insane watching the game unfold when he heard Jubal crying out behind him.
"Katie?"
"George," Coach Hensen yelled, "what are you waiting for, take the first string line and go and help her! Move it!"
"You heard Coach!"
More than just the linemen and George charged off the field. They lifted each other into the stands and ran after the receding figure of Jubal.
"Come on, guys, are we going to let a girl out run us?"
There were chuckles and the team piled on more speed. They caught up to, and then passed, Jubal. They rounded a corner in the corridor and one of the boys was beginning to lower himself onto Katie, completely oblivious of what was happening behind him.
George hit him with a flying tackle and began to beat the living tar out of him. A couple of the other players held his friends off while a number of them tried to pull him off the would be assailant.
"George, stop it! You're going to kill him. I'm alright. I'm alright."
Katie began to cry and George just went limp. He turn to her and folded her into his arms.
While holding Katie, Gorge turned to survey the damage he'd caused to the little punk. He was thinking happy thoughts to himself when Jubal's voice broke in on his reverie.
"She's not breathing!"
"Anyone got a cell phone on them?"
They dialed 911 and waited for the EMT's and police to arrive.
The girls face was a wreck, and Jubal didn't know what to do. They'd taken a course in CPR last year, but what did you do when you were afraid her neck might be broken?
A few moments later, one of the EMTs that had been attending the game rushed up to the group of teens, pushing his way in.
"Make a hole!"
The EMT rushed to the girl's side, and began checking for pulse, adjusted her head a bit, carefully, and began CPR.
"I need someone to help with compressions."
Katie pushed George forward, and he knelt to help.
They continued for five minutes until the rest of the EMTs arrived, swapping positions, and occasionally one or another of the football players would take a turn.
"We have a weak pulse, good, let's get her boarded and to the hospital.
Even though they didn't know her, the team, Jubal, and Katie sat in the waiting room, wondering what would happen. A doctor came out into the waiting room and looked surprised to see the team. Not seeing anyone else, the doctor turned to leave, but Jubal jumped up.
"Could you tell us any news regarding the girl we brought in here?"
"I'm sorry, but if you're not her family. . ."
"You don't have to spell out her condition, but if you could just tell us if she's going to be alright?"
"I really can't I'm so sorry, kids. Rules are rules."
A woman ran into the ER. She looked as though she'd been crying, and was not completely put together.
"Doctor, I'm looking for my son, I mean my daughter. I was told she was brought in here? Is she alright?"
"Are you Ms. Daius?"
"Yes, I'm Emily Daius. How is Rowan? How is my daughter?"
"Your. . .daughter has been severely beaten. Luckily she has no broken bones, but. . ."
"Tell me doctor."
"I don't think it's appropriate. . ." The doctor looked at the students in the waiting room.
"Who are all of these people?"
"We were responsible for saving your daughter's life after some boys tried to kill her."
"Just tell us doctor."
"Your daughter was struck repeatedly in the genitals with a blunt object, likely a boot or shoe. The soft tissue damage will heal, but. . ."
Ms. Daius began to collapse, and a couple of the lineman caught her and lowered her into a seat.
The doctor looked at them apologetically and then and then mumbled something about going back to see his patient and left.
"My poor child. What have they done to you."
"Ms. Daius?"
Jubal was wearing a skirt and leggings today, and looked very much like a preteen girl.
"How can I help you little one?"
"I'm sure that everything's not bad. Your daughter is alive, right?"
"Yes, she's alive, and I guess this is what she wanted. To be a girl. But now? I always thought my son would come back to me. That he would grow out of this and give me grand children eventually."
"Oh, I didn't really understand."
"I know, it's such a big concept for a child."
Jubal snorted, "No, not that. I didn't understand that she was transsexual. It makes sense now the things the boys were yelling at her. Well, now we have something in common, your daughter and I. Neither one of us will be able to have children."
Shock was painted on Ms. Daius' face, "you're a transsexual?"
Jubal giggled, "nothing so simple as that, but I am sterile. It's taken this moment for me to realize that even in this I am more normal than I thought. There are lots of people unable to have children. Your daughter and I are only two of them.
"Just give her love, Ms. Daius. There are so many different options for people who can't have children naturally. I had a wonderful set of adoptive parents, and I'm sure that if she wants, adoption is a route open to her."
"Had?"
"It's a long story. Are you sure you have the time?"
"Only if you want to tell it."
The team gathered around to listen as Jubal related his story. Some of them had heard parts of it. Some had lived through most of it, but none had heard it from Jubal's perspective.
When she finished, even some of the football players had tears in their eyes. When they noticed, they began a round of friendly punches, manning up as it were.
"Thank you so much for telling me, young lady. Have you ever considered becoming an author?"
"Oh, I only have one story to tell. Maybe when I've lived more I'll have more than just my own story."
"Well, your story is more than enough living for most people I know, and even in the short version you've told me, it has worth. I know this isn't something you've thought about, but I'd love to publish your autobiography if you tell it in print half as well as you just told it to me."
Ms. Daius handed Jubal a card. It read Beverly Daius, editor, Terra Firma Press.
"Can I think about it, Ms. Daius?"
"Yes, as long as you call me Beverly. I'm going to head up and see how my daughter is doing. Thank you so much for the comfort you've given me."
"All I did was tell you my story."
"That was enough, Jubal. You are a beautiful girl, and you've come through the trials of your life so much better than many other people I know."
"I've made mistakes, though. I'm not perfect. Putting me up as some sort of example would be a disservice to all the other people out there who have gone through so much more than I have."
"Jubal, one thing I would suggest is that you learn how to accept a compliment. And just write your story."
"Fine, I'll write it. I'm sure when I finish you'll realize even you don't want to publish it."
"Jubal, you are a special girl. Don't sell yourself short."
Jubal and Katie giggled as Ms. Daius went through the double doors into the rest of the hospital.
Maybe sometime he'd write his own story, but for now living in the stories of others contented him. Such a nice ending. So much had happened this year, and since he began to watch Jubal. There was more to this story, He was sure, but not for now.
For now he sealed up the DVD in a case for his own personal collection and then began to go through the footage deciding what he would provide to Mr. Hastings.
After that he would be deleting the rest of the video he'd taken. He debated including the rest of the footage from her junior and senior years, and then decided against it. The first story was done, and Mr. Hastings didn't need any of that.
Mr. Hastings needed whatever he, the watcher, provided him.
And this story, for the moment, was done.
He smiled into the darkness and caressed Jubal's still face on the monitor. He stopped the playback at the moment when she had stood to accept her diploma. The smile on her face was all the light he needed.
"Yes, for now, Jubal, your story is done. We'll see where it takes the two of us in the future."
The principle slid a step stool in front of the podium before stepping out of the way so that Jubal to take her place to give her address. In the past couple of months she'd taken to wearing light makeup to emphasize her feminine features and it was perfect today.
She took a deep breath and looked out over the audience.
"Many of these addresses are made by idealistic youth trying to prove their right to be recognized as the most intelligent person in the room. Some few actually show insight into the human condition, or make us think about more than where we want to go for lunch as soon as this interminable prattling is over."
After some scattered laughter, she continued.
"I am not an idealistic youth, but neither do I consider myself wise. I am simply myself, Jubal Marie Franks. Each of us here has a name. We have loved ones friends. We have hopes and dreams, fears and worries.
"High school was naught but a moment in any of our lives, and we continue our lives even now. We met people and grew in both knowledge and friendship."
"Some of us grew more than others!"
"Thank you, Lance. Amanda, it is times like these I wish you and Lance were still together so you could silence him."
There was some laughter at this.
"We had love, and heartbreak. And we will love and lose again, if we're lucky.
"I look out on you and realize that this is not the end, or even the beginning of the end. It is only the end of the beginning.
"We stand before you, our parents and siblings, ready to go on to the rest of our lives. We will be the lawyers and the doctors. The rising stars and the burn outs. The dancers and the football players.
"Some of us you won't ever hear about again. Some of us you will wish that you'd never heard of in the first place."
There was more laughter at this one.
"This is not a pep speech, nor is it a prediction. This is our life, we few, we proud. Our moment for ourselves and those we choose to share it with. Be true to yourselves my fellow students and seek joy. Live your lives in happiness and fulfillment."
Jubal stepped down to general applause, though whether that was to her being done or for her words, she didn't know. It didn't matter to her. She was happy with her words and ready for the next chapter in her life.
She realized that in thinking this she was simply stalling from the inevitable task of deleting the last five hundred words she'd written and beginning to tell the story again.
"You coming down for breakfast any time today, baby."
"Yes, Mama Joey. I'm coming down now."
Jubal straightened her clothing and then headed down for breakfast.
"Why look at you. That isn't your normal wear for a school day. What's the occasion?"
"Other than being the first day of my senior year, and my first day officially as student body president?"
"Yes other than that. You're more excited than normal to be going to school this year. You're. . .there's a boy isn't there!"
Jubal began to blush and play with her hair a bit. She'd considered bleaching it a couple of times, but most people had gotten used to the black on her, and she thought they might miss it if she came with another color.
Especially certain people who had been commenting on it this summer.
"There's a specific boy."
"Mama, leave it, okay? Yes, I like a boy."
"You like George."
Jubal's blush deepened to crimson and she hit her face in her hair. She nodded slightly and Mama Joey began to laugh.
"It's not funny, Mama."
"It's hilarious, baby. George has been your friend for a very long time."
"Only six years, Mama."
"When you're only ten, well almost eleven, that is a long time. Does he know?"
"I think he still sees me as the awkward little boy he first met in third grade."
"Jubal, no one who looks at you is going to think you were a boy."
"But, Mama. All the other girls are. . .well. . .endowed."
"All the other girls are seventeen or eighteen."
"Okay, so I'm a little younger than they are."
"You're a little younger than George is."
Jubal took a deep breath and sighed, "I know. and logically I know this won't work out. He'd have to wait about six years before anything can happen, and I have a pretty good idea how boys are."
"How do you know that? Because I was comforting both Amanda AND Katie after their breakups this summer."
"So that was it. I thought we were having unscheduled torrential flooding."
"I care deeply for both of them, but it really put a damper on writing."
"You still trying your hand at that?"
"I sent the first couple of chapters as a test to Beverly, and she said they show potential. She also said I need to not try as hard. I need to be natural about it. Write it like I'm telling a story. I try, but it never quite comes out the way I want it to."
"Tell. . .why didn't I think of this before. Follow me, baby."
Jubal followed Mama Joey down the hall. She'd known that there was a storage space under the stairs, but in the three plus years she'd been here, Mama Joey had never looked in there.
"This stuff used to belong to my husband."
"I never knew you were married."
"There's a lot about me you never knew. Not that I wanted to keep it from you, just that it never came up. We've been worrying so much about you."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. I've loved having you in this house. It's never dull, that's for sure. Ah, here it is."
She handed Jubal an old micro cassette recorder.
"He was a lawyer, my husband. Bought me this house his first year out of law school. He made noises a couple of times about moving us into a bigger place, but I wouldn't have it. This place has always been big enough for me."
"When did he die?"
"Oh, long before you were born, honey. Anyway, he used to record all of his client meetings on this, and then transcribe them later. I figured that it might help if you told your story to the recorder, and then did the same."
Jubal looked a little skeptical, but at Mama Joey's hopeful expression she relented and smiled.
"I'll try it out, Mama. Can't be any worse than my current writing."
Mama Joey hugged her. "I know it will work for you."
Jubal looked at the clock on the wall and started, pulling from the hug. "I've got to go, Mama."
"Then shoo. Be off with you. Go knock him dead."
"I'll try not to kill him too much."
She rushed upstairs to get her book bag and then rushed out the door. She usually ran to school, as Griffin Academy was only a couple of miles away. Today, she was more conscious of the way she looked so she went at a more sedate speed.
When she got to school, she smoothed the white dress over her knees, and adjusted the brocade vest. She took a step toward the door only to be run over by a blue and green blur.
"Hey, watch where you're going."
"Sorry, Frosh. I needed the door more than you did?"
"Frosh? Excuse me?"
"Freshman. You'll get used to it, baby."
And then he was off through the doors and racing through the halls of the school.
"I wasn't asking for clarification, you jerk." She said under her breath as she entered the school.
She had government for her first period class this year, which simply meant that she had a student council meeting every day. After morning announcements of course. She was feeling even more like a figurehead than she'd assumed she would last year.
Announcements were given from the front office, so she went in there to begin her duties.
"Hey, Jubal! So, you ready to begin the adventure of our senior year?"
"Yep, but apparently some new student thinks I should be starting my freshman year."
"Well, you have to admit, beautiful, that he has a point. You're younger than my sister, who is a freshman this year."
"Ok, Lance, I admit. I'm the same age that Amanda was when she started as a freshman."
At the mention of Amanda's name, Lance winced.
"Why did she dump you again?"
Lance winced even harder. "You know we don't have to go into that."
"Just checking. So, we ready for the morning announcements, or what?"
"Yes, I have them here." Lance had gotten himself elected as the student body secretary. Which was a fancy way of saying step and fetchit. He got the onerous task of preparing the morning announcements.
"Well, let me see them."
He seemed a little reluctant to hand them over, and I could see why as I began to read them.
"I can't say this."
"What? You have at other times."
"But I was always joking."
"Well, be joking this time. Hank and Cathy both agree that it is funny."
Hank was the senior class president, and Cathy was the student body vice president. She'd been the only person to run against Jubal last year, having put in her name before Jubal was roped into candidacy by her friends.
Jubal thought sometimes that the other girl held a grudge against her. There were rumors that the voting for SBP had been unanimous in Jubal's favor.
The bell rang announcing that classes had begun, and Miss Landau handed Jubal the microphone.
"Before I begin, I did not write this. It is I, Queen Jubal the First with your start of year announcements. All charters for clubs must be presented to Mr Brellin or Mrs Kinks before end of school on Friday. As with every year, a new club charter must be written and presented.
"Open tryouts for the football team begin tonight after school. . .I am not reading this."
Jubal turned to Lance and handed him the microphone and paper. "I'm delegating the rest of my responsibility for announcements today to you, Lance. Please finish."
"Um. . ."
"Lance, your grade in this class is based upon participation in student government activities," Miss Landau said with a little smile.
"Um, alright. Give me the paper."
"Begin with Open tryouts, lance."
"Open tryouts for the football team begin tonight after school, where the hot team captain, George Eades will be leading the team through its paces. Other announcements will be made regarding changes as the week progresses. It is I, your queen and benevolent ruler, Jubal signing off.
"There, happy?"
"Lance, please don't do this again. That was embarrassing for both of us, don't you think?"
Lance nodded, blushing furiously.
"I have to agree with Miss Franks, Lance. You have a responsibility to provide the announcements in a clear and concise manner. That is all. Sure, a little spice is okay, but don't put things in there that would embarrass our president." Miss Landau was a firm believer in leading through lesson.
They headed to their classroom to begin the council session and plan some school events for the year.
"Who's the ditz?"
"That's Jubal, new kid."
"Like short of Jubilee? Parents were big x-men fans or something? And my name's Kirk, not new kid, or fresh meat."
'Open tryouts for the football team begin tonight after school. . .' he heard a male voice say
One of the girls turned to him and looked at him as if he were insane. "Jubal is her name. Jubal Marie Franks."
"Her parents must have hated her to give her a girl's and a boy's name." He was used to getting laughs, and even started himself before he realized no one else was laughing.
"Listen, Kirk was it? You have a lot to learn about Griffin Academy. Comments like that could get you suspended?"
"What, because I am mentioning how silly her two names are?"
"Mr. Gessler, I assume by the fact that you're sitting in class, that you read and signed the student handbook, as of course you would have to in order to register for classes."
"I, um, skimmed it, Mr. Anderson."
"And while you, um, skimmed it did you happen to skim the section entitled 'Hazing'?"
"I guess, but isn't that the same policy that most schools have? Don't do it you bad wittow chiwdwen you?"
"Mr. Gessler. While the school you went to previous to this might have been lenient in this regard, we are not. In the past five years since implementing this policy we have suspended seven students and expelled one. This is not because we do not catch students, but because students police their own.
"You would be wise to remember that."
"But high school is about cliques and rivalry. The nerds are picked on by the jocks. The outcasts avoid everyone. The princesses rule from on high. The cheerleaders move between the princesses and jocks. Everyone survives and is happy as soon as over and they can go back to their own lives."
"Not in this school, Kirk. And Jubal may be the biggest nerd in our school. Considering she's taking more than half of her course load as concurrent enrolment online through the University." Katie'd had enough of this idiot.
"Wait, she is a super nerd. . .and giving the morning announcements? What is she the student body secretary or something? And how was she elected to that."
"Kirk, it would be a god idea to shut your mouth now," Katie said. "You've reached your knee and are still inhaling foot."
There were some giggles from a couple of the girls and a few of the boys chuckled.
"What? What did I say?"
"Jubal is the student body president."
"While Mr. Gessler does an impression of a goldfish, I'd like you all to turn to chapter one. Welcome to AP Biology. I'm sure that we'll have a pleasant year, those of you who have not been dissected."
"Mr. Anderson, We get to dissect cadavers in this class?" Katie asked.
"No, but hope springs eternal."
After her first couple of courses in her sophomore year, word got around about her.
She'd taken all of the science courses to her, and her English general education courses were completed as well. She was taking a creative writing course this semester, hoping it would provide some help with her book.
The first day of school, and already alone in the library.
She was only half paying attention to her professor, as she had already read the syllabus, as well as the first half of the textbook. Today was a general introduction to the course, with the slight possibility of some new material.
She found herself thinking about the student who had run into her at the door this morning. She knew that she looked a year or two younger than she was, which at ten took a significant portion off her actual age, but she didn't think she dressed like your average freshman.
She was poised and confident.
Why couldn't he see that in her?
Why did it matter at all if he did?
It was a chance encounter and. . .
"Ms. Franks? A little something about yourself for the class please?"
"Oh, I'm ten years old and a senior at Griffin Academy High School. I'm taking this class because I've taken all the other concurrent education courses at the University, and a publisher wants me to write my life story."
"That ought to be short," one of the other students said loud enough to be picked up by the mic.
"Ms. Franks is not exaggerating when she says she's taken all of the other courses, and with A's as well. She is the reason we are currently looking at the quantity of concurrent education courses. As she is currently in the class, I will be running a modified curve this year. The second highest student in the class will be getting a 99%. Ms. Franks will be getting whatever her grade is in relation to that, however far above 100% it goes."
"That's not fair!"
"Ms. Franks. Please tell the class what your grade did to the previous class you had a curve grading system in."
Jubal blushed but replied, "the second highest grade was a B-."
There were a couple of gasps and sounds of shock. "We grade on a curve in many of these courses so that it is based upon the abilities of the students in the class, and better judges how good the professor was at teaching the subject.
"Students like Jubal throw off the curve because they learn all the material regardless of how poor a teacher I am."
There were a couple of laughs at this.
"Now, it would be a good idea to listen to the questions Jubal asks, as well as to their answers. She is as much the teacher in this course as I."
Jubal wondered how much of this was true, and how much was to defuse potential problems she might have with these students in the future. I had embarrassed her all the same.
The bell rang, but she still had another five minutes left of class. As Lunch was next, that meant she had the time. She'd just have to hurry a bit to eat so she could be to her next class, P.E., on time.
When you take classes during summer school not because you need them, but because you're bored, you tend to get way ahead of the curve. She was taking P.E. to fill in a hole in her schedule, since she'd already fulfilled her P.E. requirement her freshman year.
And it would be fun to be with girls closer to her own age for at least a part of the day.
The class ended and she signed off and headed toward the lunchroom.
Again the green and blue blur ran over the top of her.
"Hey, watch where you're going!"
"I was watching, and you seemed a much more pleasant obstacle to collide with than the wall, frosh."
He continued running down the hall, seeming to head in the direction of the cafeteria.
I was starting to wonder where he would sit, when he spotted one of the people he'd been looking for.
"George! My man!"
"Hey, Kirk. So you decided to defect from Sampson after all?"
"Yeah, it helps that I got accepted to Griffin. Loved that letter of recommendation from your dad."
"Don't mention it."
"You're dad is a rich alumni, who has donated money to this school every year."
"No, I really meant, 'don't mention it.' Some of my best friends are here on scholarship and I really don't like to advertise who my father is."
"Gotcha." Kirk sat down in the seat to George's left. Katie, who Kirk had ignored 'til now, was on Kirk's left and made a noise, but George shook his head.
Kirk heard the sound. "Oh, you. Why'd you have to bust my chops so hard in AP Biology this morning."
"Well, Jubal happens to be a friend of mine, as well as George's"
"You're friends with a nerd, George?"
"Kirk, I've. . ."
"Let me handle this, Katie. Kirk, you're here to play football, right?"
"Hell yeah. It's the reason I came here."
"Well, keep in mind if you get suspended for hazing, or anything like unto it, you're off the team for the rest of the year."
"You've got to be kidding me."
Katie smirked at him, "Nope, it's the truth."
"Hi, I do believe that you're in my seat."
Kirk tuned and looked behind him and smirked, "Coming to join your betters, Frosh?"
The girl he'd run over a couple of times today in the white dress and brocade vest glared at him. He didn't find it very intimidating coming from the pixy face.
"Jubal, he's not worth it."
"Wait, this is Jubal? I thought you had to be a senior to be the Student. . .oh, crap."
"Yes, I'm a senior."
"Look, I didn't mean anything by it."
"Well, I'm sure you're aware of the hazing policy?"
Kirk turned white as a sheet, and George stepped up to his rescue. "Kirk didn't mean anything by it, Jubal. Let him be. It's his first day here."
"Well, I supposed I could over look it this once if he apologized by taking me on a date."
When everyone started looking at her in shock, she blushed. "I just said that aloud, didn't I?"
Jubal sat down on the other side of George and wouldn't even look in Kirk's direction. He wasn't all that cute, and he was so rude, and sure he was an okay runner, but there was nothing. . .well, he did have a nice firm behind. . .no. She would not think about how the muscles moved as he ran off. . .
"George, this is all your fault, I'll have you know." Jubal said, trying to hide some of her embarrassment in anger.
"Me, what did I do?"
"You broke up with Katie, that's what."
Kirk and George were still mystified, but Katie's shock and growing half smile let Jubal know that she knew.
This is not good.
"Jubal, I think you and I need to go to the ladies room."
Kirk began to make a comment about girls going in packs to the ladies room, but George shushed him.
As soon as they were out of earshot, Katie lit into Jubal, "You've got a crush on George."
"Why did you two have to break up? Before that I was content with him just being my friend. It wasn't until he was on the market that I started having all these difficult thoughts, and then I began to realize that I liked men. . .oh, why did you guys break up? It would have been so much easier to deal with this if you'd just kept on 'til graduation."
"Jubal, honey, you know why. George wanted me to go to Texas A&M with him, and I want to go to the Fashion Institute."
"But, I'm not old enough to deal with it."
"Based on your reaction to Kirk, I think you are perfectly old enough."
"But. . ."
"No buts, Jubal. I wish you luck with George. You to fit better than he and I ever did."
"Then why do I think this way about Kirk?"
"Probably because he has a nice butt."
"Katie!"
"Well, he does!"
"That's not the point."
"Well, I see you noticed as well."
Jubal nodded. "And when he's running? I think I'll have to avoid the football games if he joins the team because those tight pants. . ."
Katie stopped for a moment and turned bright red. "Oh, you're bad."
"Oh no I'm not. I'm perfectly innocent and pure."
"Well, you're pure, that's true, but you've never been innocent since I met you."
The two girls giggled as they walked back over to their table and their half eaten meals.
Instantly Kirk's mind flashed an image of Jubal.
She's so young. And she's so irritating as well. Just because she's a ten year old senior doesn't mean she has to act like she knows everything, and that morning announcement? 'Queen Jubal'?
"Wow, sighing already? You're infatuated on your first day? Who's this girl whose already captured my bro's heart."
"What? No! She's your age, sis."
"Where did you meet a fifth grader? And why would you want a ten year old. That's kind of gross."
"No, she's a senior and smart and, oh. . .crap. I need to avoid going back."
"Bro, come on, it can't be that bad. I mean she's smart if she's a senior."
"You can't tell ANYONE, Beth. No one. I would never live this down. I mean, for once I don't care how a girl looks."
"What?"
"She's smarter than I am, Beth! I mean, I thought I was good being ready to graduate as a sophomore. I haven't been able to have a real conversation with a girl in years, well except for you."
"That's because I'm not a girl, I'm your sister."
He chuckled at that, and she joined him after a few moments.
"So, maybe I'll challenge her to a game of chess for the right to date you, bro."
"Oh no you don't. Last girl you did that to went away in tears."
"She was the one that thought being the head of the chess club meant she could play."
"Well, you've got a point there."
"Hey, thinking of Stephanie, she wasn't that much of a looker."
"What are you talking about. She was pretty."
"She had braces, freckles, and coke bottle glasses."
"And impeccable fashion sense, beautiful hair, the cutest little button nose. . .blue eyes. . ."
"Stephanie's eyes were brown. Although the other ones kind of fit. Are you sure that you aren't really metrosexual or gay or something? I mean fashion sense?"
"Great, I think I've got a bit of a type, Beth."
"What are you talking about?"
"I like a confident girl who dresses well and takes care of her appearance."
"Well, now you know, just find one of those your own age."
Then, she began transcribing it. She had the first two chapters rewritten and sent off to Beverly Daius before the night was over. It had taken her almost a week per chapter the first time she'd tried to write this.
She sat down to relax, and immediately her mind wandered to Kirk.
"Must keep busy. I can't deal with this. Ok, let's do chapter three then."
She'd done her homework at school for the same reason that she was working so furiously on her book. She wanted, needed , to distract herself.
She stopped for a moment, thinking about what she was doing. Why did this boy capture her mind so. It wasn't because of his behind, although it was fun to watch.
He was, something. . .something about the way he carried himself. Something about. . .
She was pissed at him for running her over. She wasn't infatuated. She hated the jerk. He was good looking and knew it. He was arrogant and conceited. That's why he was occupying her thoughts.
Ok, she just had to focus on her anger over his poor behavior and actions and she'd be able to move past him.
Then she could get back to her life without him.
She ignored the tears in her eyes as she began working on the third chapter again.
She'd stayed up until four this morning, unable to banish thoughts of Kirk and George fighting over her from her mind. She wasn't even sure right now who she wanted to win that fight.
The book she had been using as a distraction would no longer be there to take her attention from things she didn't want to think about.
At a little over two hundred thousand words she was done. She'd done a quick pass over the last passages she'd written for overt spelling and grammar mistakes and then sent it off to Beverly.
She'd then lay down to try and get a couple of hours sleep before school. At least today was Friday and not much could happen to her before the weekend.
Kirk looked at his sister and just shook his head.
"Jane, you are too much a morning person to have come to this family naturally. You're either a mutant alien, or an elfin changeling or something."
"Oh come on. I'm not that different. You just take until seven before you're chipper. I'm happy to greet the sunrise."
"Chipper. Now you're sounding like Mom or Dad."
She giggled at this, "So, did you ask her over yet?"
"No."
"Why not? It will be fun! I want to test out her chess skills. See if she's worthy of you, bro."
"Leave off, okay, Jane! She's way too young for me. It's. . .weird."
"Personally, sounds to me like the entire school you go to is weird, but whatevs."
"Where in the world do you get your word choices, sis?"
"Movies, the internet, and the dictionary."
"Sorry I asked."
"Look, either you ask her, or I will. She's not someone to be afraid of, I mean come on. I'm only ten and you're not afraid of me!"
"Jane, you absolutely terrify me."
"Oh, haw haw haw."
Kirk chuckled as he moved toward the garage. "Give me a ride to school? Pretty please?"
"You're feminine charms won't work on me, harlot. I am immune." He said in a bad Charleton Heston accent.
"Yeah, but my little sister power of blackmail works just fine."
"Ok, brat. Come on."
She got into the office without incident, and then noticed a girl sitting looking around her.
Jubal walked up to her, and was scrutinized for a moment by the girl before she looked away.
"Can I help you?"
"Yeah, I guess. So, my brother told me that this girl does announcements? Jubal? And she's supposed to be my age and I wanted to ask her something."
"I'm Jubal."
"No way you're my age. You look so much older than 10. Like, 13 or even 14. But not 10."
Jubal blushed as she smiled, "Well, I like you already, cause even if that's flattery, it's nice to hear."
"Seriously. And you don't talk like my friends either."
"Would you believe that I started coming to high school when I was 7? It sort of kept me away from my own age group."
"I wish I was in high school already."
"Do you go to Griffin?"
"Oh, no. My parents can barely afford for Kirk to go here."
There was a momentary flutter of her heart as Jubal heard the mention of Kirk's name. This was his sister? Jubal hadn't even known he had a sister.
"You perked up when I said my brother's name, didn't you?"
"Stop it, I did not. I don't even like your brother."
"Lips may lie, but cheeks do not!"
"Kids, we have some responsibilities to attend to here?"
Jubal glared at Cathy, even though she knew that the other girl was right.
"Sorry, I have to give the announcements, but after that, I can talk to you for a moment before I go to class."
"Good Morning Griffin High. A final reminder that all club charters need to be in today before the end of school. We have been asked by the principal this year to refrain from painting, marking, or otherwise defacing our lockers, inside or out, as they are the property of the school and it does cost them thousands of dollars every year to fix them in preparation for the new year.
"He suggested that I tell you to treat them like your iPod or iPhone, but I've seen some of your iPods and figure that would be a worse idea than saying nothing.
"Cheerleading try outs for everyone interested will take place on Monday after school. The basketball team would like to get a head start on practicing as they are feeling outdone by the reigning champions of the football team. As such they will be holding tryouts in the same place, at the same time as the cheerleading team.
"Mostly, I've been told, it's so they can get into the closed tryout and ogle the girls without actually trying out for the team.
"And last, I have a very special call out to one of our students from a very special someone."
I handed the mic to Kirk's sister. "Hey, Kirk. I'm ditching school." The other student councilors laughed at this.
I took back the mic back. "That concludes the announcements for the day."
"So, how long do you figure before he gets here," Hank asked.
Jubal made a disgusted face. "Have you seen hoe hr runs through the halls? I figure the moment we try to leave the office he'll run right over the top of me."
Jane looked shocked, "What?"
"He did it twice on Monday. Apparently I'm too small to see."
"Well, let's get to class." Miss Landau said as she headed toward the door. She should have listened to Jubal's warning.
"I'm so sorry," Kirk said helping Miss Landau up from the floor.
"Kirk, I assume? You may consider slowing down in the halls."
"I'm sorry. I just needed to take care of my wayward sister it seems. Jane, what are you doing here?"
"Inviting Jubal over to our house tomorrow. She still owes me that chess game."
"Well, I wasn't aware I owed you a chess game, but it would be fun, I think. Just so you're aware, I've never played chess. You'll have to teach me."
Jane looked shocked. "But, everyone knows how to play chess."
"Not me, unfortunately. I really would like to learn though." Jubal snuck a glance in Kirk's direction, which Jane caught.
She narrowed her eyes a bit, but let it pass. After she destroyed Jubal's confidence by winning at chess, her brother would be safe. It was that simple for her. "Ok, just get our address from Kirk, since he seams angry with me for some reason."
Kirk practically dragged Jane out to his car. "I didn't need you to do that for me, brat."
"Yes, you did. Otherwise you wouldn't know that the only reason she's coming is because you'll be there."
Kirk was speechless.
"Maybe I should let her win a couple of games before stomping her. I like a speechless older brother."
Kirk glared at her but continued to say nothing. He'd get his revenge by telling their parents about this little escapade later this evening.
This was supposed to be HER year. Cathy Brandis as SBP. And she would get George to love her, because he was only what Cathy deserved. She was supposed to be queen bee here. She was supposed to be the center of attention. She had the right parents, the right clothes, and the right doctors.
She was beautiful and pleasant to be around.
So why was that nerd in her place. They even acknowledged the little thing as Queen of the school.
She needed some way to get back at Jubal, but everything that came to mind would get her suspended from school and removed from the student council. No, she needed something that couldn't be tracked back to her, and would, even better, remove Jubal as a problem permanently.
Cathy didn't need to kill her. No that would be too good for the little bitch. She just needed her to acknowledge her place in this world. . .at the bottom.
She took a couple of calming breaths, not to remove her intense hatred of little mis(ter) perfect. To bank the embers of it and let her seem to be the sweet person who would win the school's approval in the power vacuum that would be left when their Queen was no more.
Now, how to remove Jubal as a rival.
Jubal got a salad each day, but it wasn't about being healthy. Iceberg lettuce as a base, cottage cheese above that, ham chunks, sweet peas, and then mandarin oranges in light syrup. Occasionally the mandarin oranges were either absent or out and she would go with pears instead. Rarely peaches.
She was afraid of how many calories it was adding to her diet, but that's why she ran home from school. These days she didn't go running unless there were a shower for her at the end of it. Damn puberty.
She almost giggled at that. The fear the endocrinologist had regarding her ovotestis was that she would need HRT for the rest of her life. Apparently that wouldn't be the case, since she'd started puberty before summer started.
Her fear of not having a normal puberty had been replaced with disgust at having a normal puberty.
Oh well. She would survive. Especially if Kirk would just show up.
And that was what had her so nervous. She knew he had the same lunch as she did this semester, but he was nowhere to be found.
He came through the door with George and her heart beat faster. She wasn't ready for this. Too young and inexperienced, even if she was a senior. It felt ironic to her that she was having her first schoolgirl crush in her senior year.
She didn't let that stop her from adjusting her hair, and checking her makeup surreptitiously in a hand mirror.
She smiled at them as they came toward her bearing their selections from the food offered.
"So, Kirk. Apparently you're supposed to be giving me your address for tomorrow."
"What's this?" George asked.
Kirk opened his mouth to respond, but Jubal jumped in before he could get a word in, "Kirk's sister, Jane, invited me to their house to learn how to play chess."
"Wait, didn't you learn how to play last summer? I seem to recall my Dad spending a couple of weeks giving you the basics before you were trouncing him."
"Yeah, I started looking up master level games online, and memorizing the movement patterns."
"But, you told my sister you didn't know how to play."
"All part of the game, Kirk."
"Telling my sister you don't know how to play chess is part of the game?"
"Not THAT game," Katie said coming up behind them.
""Huh?" Kirk said.
Katie looked over at Jubal, who nodded for her to go ahead, "the girl game. The one that boys never get. Jane is trying to keep unworthy females from dating her idolized big brother. So, she embarrasses them at chess. Primitive, but effective in certain situations. If they feel uncomfortable in your house, Kirk, then that puts a strain on the relationship.
"See, Jane never overtly lets them know she disapproves. She just invites them to play every time they come over. She just acts like an exuberant youngster. Only a skilled operator will be able to notice her actions for what they are. Well, that or a savant like our Jubal here."
Jubal blushed prettily and it was Kirk's turn to have palpitations. He had to figure out some way to dissuade her coming over.
"You know, I'd understand if you didn't want to come over."
"No, I'm fine with it. I hardly ever associate with kids my age, and I've been looking for a challenging match. People have started declining games with me at chess.com. I've even been accused of being a chess master incognito."
"You two deserve each other." Kirk said under his breath, but not quietly enough.
"I'll have you know I'm not into girls." Jubal was blushing as soon as she'd said it. Why didn't she just leave well enough alone?
When Kirk's mouth dropped open, Katie grabbed Jubal by the arm and steered her toward the bathroom.
"What was that, Jubal?"
"It just slipped out. I don't know what I was thinking! He must think I'm a total freak."
"Or he might get the right idea and realize that you're totally into him."
"Oh crap. Not good."
"Why? Because you had this fairytale romance between yourself and George?"
Jubal looked at her with a bit of fear. She still wasn't sure where Katie stood on that issue.
"Yes, I am relieved to know that my friends will not start dating each other. I was okay with it, or so I thought, but it is a weight off knowing that Kirk is just as much into you."
"What!?" Jubal's face lit up.
"You are so young sometimes. Yes, Kirk likes you, Jubal. Anyone but the two of you can see you've both got it bad."
Jubal squealed and hugged Katie.
Katie giggled and hugged her back.
"So, what are you going to wear to your date tomorrow?"
All the color drained from her face as the import of Katie's words struck home.
"Well, not really a date, but you want to look your best when his parents see you for the first time."
"Katie, that's even worse!."
"All the more reason that we should start tonight to get it taken care of."
"Ok, come over to my place after school and we'll get started."
"Hello, Jubal. Afternoon, Katie."
"We're giving Jubal a makeover. She's going to a boys house tomorrow."
Mama Joey laughed at this, "well, have a good time girls."
They went upstairs to Jubal's room.
"Katie, could you give me a moment? I want to check my email."
"Not thinking Kirk might have send something to you, are you?" Katie said with a smile.
"What? Oh, no, I sent my book off to my publisher. Wanted to see if she sent anything back to me."
"Well, hurry it up. We have so much work to do, and we might even need to go shopping before tomorrow."
Jubal giggled at this, "I almost wish the dresses from last year still fit. I have a feeling they might be a little tight in a couple of areas."
Katie got a thoughtful look on her face and went in search of Mama Joey while Jubal worked on her email.
"Do you have a tape measure?"
"Somewhere. Not thinking of making her a dress are you?"
"Not enough time for that. No, I'm thinking of altering one of the ones I made already. As long as her measurements haven't changed too much, that is."
They did a quick search of the kitchen drawers and turned up the tape measure.
"Thanks, Ma'am."
"I've told you in the past. Just call me Mama Joey."
"Ok, Mama Joey."
Katie went back up to the room to an excited Jubal.
"She got it, Katie. She's already read the first three chapters and thinks that it is worthy of the faith she had in me. She says if the rest of it is as good as the first three chapters she's going to publish my book."
"That's so great, Jubal." Her words might have been right, but something in her body language was off.
"Katie?"
"Sorry. I just find it hard to deal with you sometimes."
"What? What did I do wrong?"
"Nothing. That's the problem. Published author. Super smart. Half the student body in love with you. Student Body President. I mean, you are so perfect it hurts sometimes."
"Katie, you know I'm not perfect. I make all sorts of mistakes."
Katie began giggling at that, "you even make mistakes perfectly. You make them once for the life experience and then never make them again."
"Oh, you. Why did you get the tape measure?"
"Because I can think of the perfect dress for you to wear tomorrow. Remember that black, red and white number you wore third for the fashion show?"
"It made me look like a college student."
"Exactly. You looked as mature as the rest of us know you are inside."
"But. . ."
"No buts. I can make some adjustments, let it out a bit in the bust and hips," she looked at Jubal appraisingly, "Maybe even take it in through the waist."
"What?"
"How tall are you now? You seem to have slimmed down just a little."
"Don't know. You're the one with the tape measure."
"Well, then let me use it. You're going to have to strip, girl."
Jubal stripped down to her training bra and panties.
"You know even if I'd never seen george in his underwear I doubt I would mistake you for a boy."
"What? Why?"
"Not enough of a package."
"Well, it does what it's supposed to, and in a little over a year I'll have it corrected."
Katie quickly measured all the relevant areas, and jotted them down on a piece of scrap paper.
"Well, if I remember your measurements correctly, then I will have to let you out in the hips just a bit. Maybe an inch. Your waist is a bit slimmer as well. Unfortunately the bust hasn't changed much at all."
"Oh, pooh. I thought they were a little puffier than before."
"Well, they might be, but it takes time for them to develop, girl."
"I know that. I have taken courses in human sexuality and development. It's just I want to be older so badly right now."
Katie and Jubal giggled at this.
"Yeah, I know what you mean. In such a rush to be women, and then we want everything to slow down again. Hey, at least you'll already be in the real world long before you're even twenty."
"Yeah, so I'll have ten years before I turn the dreaded 3-0."
"Unlike me, who will be mere moments away from that dreaded point in the same period of time."
"Yeah, but it would still be nice to be a bit older so I had something more than promises to offer. . .people."
"If they're worth it, then the promise will be enough."
"And if the promise is not enough?"
"Then there's always George who is a complete gentleman."
Jubal's computer dinged.
She went over to take a look at it. There was another email from Beverly.
'Jubal,
Apparently the medical profession currently calls intersex a disorder of sexual development or DSD. I don't think it should cause a problem with most people reading your story, since you describe what it is for those who have never heard of it, but, and this is a big but, we may want this to be something that medical professionals are fine with suggesting for parents of children with DSD. Just a thought I had.
If you want to do that, then we may want to consider changing references to intersex to be DSD instead.
Regards,
Beverly.
"Huh. Well, leave it to medical professionals to change a perfectly good label for something for no real reason than making an acronym."
"What?"
"Oh, apparently I'm no longer intersexed."
"Oh really?"
"I am suffering from DSD. Disorder of sexual development."
Katie snorted at the other girl, "So, does that make you any less or more like the rest of us?"
"Nah, just a new name for it."
"Good to know."
"So, what is the plan for your makeup and hair?"
"Is there much I can do with shoulder length hair?"
"Oh so much. Not that I am a hairstylist, and not that we want to go completely bonkers. Save that for prom. No. Hmm. Let's leave it loose. A slight curl maybe?"
"Sure. We can do that."
"And you're normal subdued makeup is probably perfect."
"Well, I had a great teacher for that?"
"Thanks, Jubal. You are really nice to say that."
"What? I was talking about George."
The two of them giggled over this.
Katie looked appraisingly at Jubal's legs, "no hair to speak of yet, so there is that. No shaving for you tonight."
"I have a hair or two in my pits. . .sometimes. I pluck those instead of shave for right now."
"Probably for the best. Easier on the skin."
"You know, Katie. Sometimes I really feel trapped in my own body. It's weird I know. I just feel like I'm so much bigger than my 10-year-old looking body gives me credit for."
"Honey, we all feel that way sometimes."
"Well, I'll stop by tomorrow with your dress before you head out. You still got the shoes?"
"Yes, and they still fit. My feet haven't noticeably grown yet."
"Okay, sweetness. You get some sleep, Okay. We want you well rested for your date."
"Get on with you, slave, and prepare my royal vestment."
"Yes, my liege. Your will is my own, my liege."
They giggled as Katie left.
Jubal sat to compose an email back to beverly.
Beverly,
That sounds like a good idea. I'll do a quick search and replace on my copy of the text and determine where DSD is more appropriate than intersex. . .
Jubal sat there thinking for a moment before changing her mind. She didn't need to make this change. She needed a foreword.
She sat down at her keyboard for a moment, fluttering her fingers above the keys, and then began to search for DSD using scholar.google.com
After reading through a number of entries on DSD, especially the rarer variant of Ot-DSD that she had, she began to write.
In recent years the definitions for what makes a person have been under attack by the scientific community. They quantify, codify, and catalog. People are not the sum of their DNA and also are not the sum of their experience.
We are a mixture of our DNA, Nature, and the life experiences that we survive, Nurture.
There is no one answer to what makes a person, and should we be lucky, there never will be.
The medical community have decided that intersex is simply one of a number of disorders of sexual development.
Dictionary.com, care of Random House, defines disorder as a disturbance in physical or mental health or functions; malady or dysfunction.
I am not a dysfunction.
My life is not a disturbance.
Luckily I was given the choice to join in what the rest of society deems normal, but it was my choice. Should I choose to stay as I am, there should not be a problem with that either.
There are no long term side effects of the specific type of DSD I have, OT-DSD, although a slight increase of the risk of cancer is indicated.
This is my story. It is a tale of the path I've taken to be the person I now am.
My name is Jubal Marie Franks and I am eleven years old.
She sent this off with a note to Beverly, and lay down to get some sleep.
The worst of them was when, for any number of reasons that she could come up with, Kirk ended up seeing her panties. Either because her dress slipped up, or because she fell over or. . .
She kept inventing new reasons why it might happen as well.
He was the only person she knew at school who didn't know her issue.
Oh, crap. The book. Everyone in the world would know her condition. Intersex, DSD, it didn't matter what you called it. She knew her life at school was different than she'd likely encounter in the rest of the world. And the world would all know how different she was. Sure that would be changing in just under fourteen months, but they would know what she'd been before.
A feeling of dread overcame her, and she was suddenly feeling ill.
She rushed to the bathroom and vomited everything she had in her stomach, and then tried to follow that up with her small intestines.
"Jubal, honey, are you okay?'
Jubal nodded, and opened her mouth to speak, but quickly leaned over the toilet again to continue her communion.
"What's wrong?"
"I just realized that a lot of people are going to be reading my book."
Mama Joey began to laugh, "Oh, honey. I'm sorry. It is so hard to forget how old you are sometimes. You act so mature, and then something like this. You've never been shy before. . ."
"I know, but the idea of all those strangers knowing so much about me. It was more than I could handle. That and the idea of Kirk finding out that way."
"Jubal, honey. You are a girl. You've always been a girl. Sure, you have some traits that are more boy like, but all of us are a mixture."
"I know that. Years with Dr. Rath has left me with that knowledge."
"Yes, but that's not the point I'm making, dear heart. Anyone who knows you will know how much you really are a girl. You've just had a slight birth defect for the past eleven years."
"I'm not eleven yet, Mama Joey."
"In two months you will be. That's good enough for me."
Jubal washed her mouth out a couple of times in the sink to remove the taste of bile.
Mama Joey wrapped her up in a huge hug when she was done. "Everything will be okay, Jubal. You'll see. People enjoy being around you."
"You only say that because you're my Mama."
"I thought that the first time I met you, when you're grandparents died."
A thought occurred to Jubal, and she began to tear up a bit.
"What's wrong, baby?"
"Am I a bad person because I don't miss my grandparents anymore?"
"Of course not. Everything in this life comes to an end, even grief. We mourn the loss of people we love. sometimes, we will remember them at odd moments. Happy sometimes, and sad others. But it won't be with the immediacy of that first mourning."
"But I loved them so much."
"And I'm willing to bet that you still love them."
Jubal nodded silently.
"Then they will never truly be dead to you. When we keep the memories of people we've loved alive, they live through us. Our actions reflect upon then for good or evil."
"Would they be happy with my choice?"
"Did they ever directly tell you to be one or the other?"
"No."
"Then they would be happy with your decision."
Jubal smiled.
"Well, since we're both now awake, how bout I brew us some chamomile and we have a little chat until we're both ready to sleep again."
"I'd like that Mama Joey.
Jubal sat as Mama Joey prepared the tea. She wasn't ready to begin talking so Mama Joey kept up her side of the conversation without assistance. She talked about 'her' kids as she called them.
She told Jubal about the difficulties that they faced, and her worries all using generalities of course. Then, slowly, ever so slowly, Mama Joey began to rope her into the conversation. She'd ask Jubal's opinion on what she was doing to help, and even got Jubal to volunteer a couple of hours during the next week to help out at a group home. Mama Joey expected some new youth volunteers and wanted Jubal to show them the ropes.
"So, you want to talk about it, honey?"
"I'm afraid of Kirk finding out that I'm me."
"Why does that matter do much to you? You know you're female."
"I know, and if he doesn't really respect me enough to realize that, he's not worth it. That won't change how much a rejection like that will hurt."
"I know, honey. He hasn't rejected you yet, though."
"But, if I tell him now when he has nothing invested, it would be easy to just reject me out of hand without even trying to get to know me. He'll decide it was because I was lying to everyone when you know that's not the case. If I wait until we've spent time together, and things are going smoothly, then I will have been lying to him from the beginning and he'll have a reason to reject me even if he has something invested."
"So, you've already decided for him?"
"Statistics say I'm right. Unless a guy is actually looking for a transsexual he is less likely to accept being with a transsexual in a relationship."
"Look, there are guys who know what you are that are after you."
"Lance? I think the only reason he stays interested is he saw me naked."
"What? You never told me that!"
"Oh, um, when I was a freshman. Locker room. um, yeah. Can we not talk about this?"
"Ok, but I'll get this story out of you eventually."
Jubal sighed. "And then, I'm opening myself up for a world of freaks and crazies with my book. They'll all read it and get the wrong ideas about me. They'll want me to support their pet sexuality causes, or they'll think I'm their perfect mate, or they'll. . ." Jubal shuddered.
"I don't think I can handle that, but I think, like Beverly, that this story is important enough that people need to be told. They need to know me, not some pen name."
"But Jubal honey, this puts you at risk. You could get yourself killed. I know I never said anything about this before, but at the rate you were writing I thought we had time to stop the project."
"Blame Kirk. I was writing to try to not think about him."
"Then why are you going to his house?"
"I don't know! I don't get why I can't focus. I've never had this problem before. I just change my mind and I can get back on track. I change what I think about and I don't have thoughts of his hands, or his eyes, or the way his behind. . ." Jubal blushed.
"Honey, you're just infatuated."
"I want to stop being infatuated. It is so frustrating. I want so much out of a relationship, why are my hormones so in charge of it all. Mama, I want a guy I can talk to, who will hold me when I cry and tell me everything is going to be alright. I want him to hold my hair when I vomit. He will be able to take me dancing at the drop of the hat. He needs to love me more than his family, but still want to experience all of their sadness and joy.
"I want a man who is more concerned of my needs than getting to his class by the shortest route possible even if it means running me over."
"He didn't."
"Twice!"
Mama Joey began laughing.
"It's not funny!"
"Yes, dear heart, it is."
"Oh, pooh. Yes, it is."
"Honey, you know that there will never be a man that fits this entire list?"
"Can the one I fall in love with at least meet that last criteria?"
"Oh, Jubal. Love isn't that simple. It is part emotion and part choice. It is an emotion that only sweeps us away when we let it. It is powerful and moving and demands that we do something about it.
"The thing you have to remember is that as long as you go in with both eyes open, then you'll never be surprised. No one is ever exactly who they think they are. Never believe what a person tells you. Believe what they do around you.
"Watch how he treats his mother and sisters. Watch how his father treats his mother and sisters. You'll get a good idea of how he'll treat you from those two things."
"Okay, Mama, but aren't you trying to give me an entire life worth of homilies in one breath?"
Mama Joey sort of chuckled at this, "yes, I suppose I am."
"I'll be okay, I think. I'm so worried about it, though. I really want him to like me."
""Honey, I know. It's tough to live as a physical child in a world of teenagers, isn't it?"
Jubal nodded. She yawned and realized that the talking had helped.
"Well, off to bed with you, sleepy head. See if you can't get some rest."
Jubal nodded and then went up to her room. She lay down and was a sleep almost immediately.
She ended up in a dark blue peasant top and a pair of black stretch jeans. She used an Alice band in her hair and pronounced herself as good at she was going to get.
She looked at her chest and sighed. Still just he puffy nubs they'd been for a while now.
It wasn't really fair, but fairness had nothing to do with it. Oh well, she'd grow into her body. Or would it be that her body would grow into her mind. She'd survive.
It was so long before she could actually go over to Kirk's house, so she went and got breakfast, making sure she got nothing on herself.
He didn't remember any plans he had for the day. He'd kept it clear of his normal schedule clutter so he could be here. His sister would be playing Jubal. . .
A smile came to his face. That was the feeling. Jubal was coming over to his house.
Kirk got up and walked downstairs. Saturday was a weights day for him, so he went into the garage and started on the machines while he waited for his dad to get up. Even he wasn't crazy enough to try free weights without a spotter. He had to wait almost fifteen minutes this morning.
His parents still had a loving relationship, and while he didn't like to think of the mechanics of it all, he knew that the two of them must have had a late night last night.
"So, Kirk, where are we starting at this morning?"
"I figured that three hundred would be a good place. I almost got a single rep of that last weekend, and I've been getting a good workout during my weight training class."
"Don't be surprised if you still can't get it, Kirk."
"Hey, a guy needs goals."
While he'd been talking, Kirk set the bar on the uprights and began putting on weight. Three hundred pounds used up all of the weights that they had. If he went above that, he'd have to either get more weights, or think of something else completely.
His dad took his place at the head of the bench and Kirk went to it.
Up off the rack. Down was the easy part; just prevent the descent enough to keep it from crushing him. Then up. The strain in muscles. The burning feeling. His smile was more of a rictus grin as he put everything he had into getting that bar up to a full extension. There it was. He could still feel the strength in his arms but he wasn't going to push it. He racked the bar and looked up at his dad.
"Okay. Let's do a more reasonable one-fifty."
They went on like that for another twenty minutes with steadily decreasing weight. Pump until he could barely get the bar up, then reduce it a little. Pump until he could barely get the bar up then reduce it a little.
Saturday was his complete muscle failure day. Well, that's what he called hit. When he could barely lift the bar, which was only fifteen pounds, he knew he was done.
Then it was time for breakfast.
Breakfast was always a huge affair for him. He'd start by cooking himself a few fried eggs, and some bacon, some pancakes, juice, milk, oatmeal, and maybe a slice of toast or two with jam but no butter.
Then, if he was still hungry, he'd whip up a protein shake or two. Those were nasty, but they provided him with what he was using up.
He finished homework as soon as it was assigned in class, and when he couldn't finish it in class then he finished it as soon as he got home.
"Kirk, I want to hone my skills a bit before Jubal get's here. Play me a game?"
"Fine, squirt. I'll play you a game."
Like usual for them, Kirk grabbed a couple of pawns, mixed them up under the table so he didn't know which hand was which and then put his closed hands over the table.
His sister was the one who knew all the names of the chess moves and what a Kasparski offense was, but Kirk wasn't that bad for an amateur.
They began with knights after he moved his queen's pawn out to the center of the board. He could tell in three moves that his sister was a bit off her game, as she let a number of openings pass.
She lost a rook to a forked king.
"What's up?"
"I don't know if I can do this, bro."
"Why?"
"She's nice. And she's my age."
"Smarter than you, though."
"Well, maybe, but I don't want to chase her away. Maybe I should just let her win."
"You never chased Susan away. We dated a lot last year. She just didn't want to come back here. She was embarrassed losing to someone so much younger than her."
"What?"
"Yeah, sorry I never told you."
"Well, if she doesn't end up liking chess, then I guess she can be forgiven. Hey!"
"Checkmate."
"That's no fair, you cheated."
"It's perfectly fair to distract your opponent in a time of crisis."
"I demand a rematch!"
The doorbell rang. It was a little after nine at this point, and so he figured he knew who it had to be. Who he hoped it would be.
"Hey," she said as calm as could be.
"Come on in, Jubal. My sister is waiting for you."
Jubal smiled and then followed Kirk into the living room where Jane was indeed waiting for them.
Jubal put her game face on and sat down across from Jane.
Jane went through the basics quite well, but seemed to neglect a couple of things like pawn en passant and castling. Jubal really didn't feel bad about what she was about to do.
They played a few games, with Jubal losing both. And of course the additional rules came out on Jane's side of the board.
Jane was leaving her a huge opening. She was playing aggressively. And using her pawns a lot.
Jubal went for a nice fool's mate in the next game. Two moves and check mate.
"Well, that was a lucky break for you." Jane said after the game.
"Want to play again?"
Jane started using her knights heavily, but Jubal was ready for her. Early queen swap to throw her off balance, and a knight-bishop trap. That really flustered Jane.
"Wasn't that right?" Jubal asked.
"No, that was perfectly fine."
"Okay. Can we play again? This is fun."
This game was a lot longer. Jubal began with a pronged pawn attack. Queen's pawn up one, and king's pawn and queen's bishop's pawn up two.
Jane avoided a queen swap in the fifth turn and Jubal knew the game was hers. Jane was on the defensive and doing her best not to lose a war of attrition. It was turn twenty before Jubal put Jane out of her misery with a signature of hers when she was showing of: A king protects queen checkmate.
Basically, your king is just out of range of their king, next to your queen. It is an illogical move, but it works. The king can't move into mate even if it's from another king.
"Crap, I've been had."
"What?"
"You used that move against me on Chess.com a couple of weeks ago. You're tooyoung aren't you."
Jubal blushed.
"I knew it. Wow, you're really good. Play me again?"
"You're not mad?"
"Course not. I love a challenge."
"Can I make a suggestion?"
"Yep."
"A queen for a queen trade is always worth it."
"Huh? But without my queen. . ."
"Unless you only have a single piece and your king left, you can pretty much get checkmate with any combination of pieces."
"How do you get a mate with two bishops and a king?"
"King blocks movement and a corner."
"How do you get them into the corner without a forced draw?"
"Carefully. No, it's not easy, and the last time I had to do it, I took twenty-six moves to get him into the corner."
"Why didn't he just give you the game?"
"Some people feel a draw is better than a loss."
"Let's play again!" Jane was happy.
"You're not mad about the fool's mate?"
"Nah, I totally tried to screw you over initially and I deserved it."
"You're one weird kid, Jane."
"Speak for yourself, Jubal. We're the same age."
They began giggling and played another couple of games. Jubal still creamed Jane, but she didn't make any more really stupid mistakes.
"Sounds like you two are having fun."
"We are daddy. Jubal totally sharked me."
"So, you're Jubal, huh."
"Yes, I am."
"Aren't you the cutest little thing."
"Sir, I doubt your daughter puts up with you talking to her that way, and I'm her age, at least physically. I'm also a senior in high school, as you might have heard."
He stopped and blinked, and stood up to his full height. "I see. I thought that you were. . .well, I see that I was wrong. I apologize."
"Don't worry, I get underestimated all the time."
"Yeah, daddy. She just skunked me completely at chess."
"Oh, really? Care for a match?"
"Mr. Able, are you sure?"
"Who do you think originally taught my children how to play?"
Jubal smiled sweetly, "Their mom?"
"Oh, that's it. No holds barred, full contact Chess for you, missy."
Jubal let him have white, as she wanted that one move advantage to see where he went with his pieces. She realized in a few moments that she'd played him before. More than once actually. He was one of the few who would still accept a match with her on chess.com.
Each chess player has a method that they usually play under. They have their favorite moves, and their favorite maneuvers.
The problem was that if you just used the same gambits over and over again, you became predictable.
"I believe that's mate, Mr. Able."
"tooyoung?"
Jubal giggled at this.
"Now, if my family is done vetting her, can I spend some time with Jubal?" Kirk said as he came in the room.
Jubal made sure her hair band was still in its proper place and he came and sat down on the couch near her.
"Hi," he said uncomfortably.
"Hi, yourself."
"I like your top."
"Are we really going to do this? The whole awkward teenager thing? If so, I probably have a lot to do, like checking with my publisher to see if she likes the latest changes I made."
"You're an author?"
"Well, technically, no. I wrote a book, at the publisher's request, and she thinks it will be published, but we'll see."
"Well, so I know a soon to be published author. Anything I'd like to read?"
Jubal blushed.
"You didn't write erotica or anything did you, cause that would just be too weird."
"Oh no, nothing like that. It's just. Look, Kirk, before we go on, I need to talk to you about something."
"That sounds serious."
Jubal began to cry a bit and just nodded.
"Hey, don't cry." He tried to put an arm around her but she scooted to the other end of the bench.
"Kirk, I'm," she took a deep breath.
"I was born intersexed."
"Okay. . .which means what?"
"It's a somewhat generic term meaning that a child exhibits features of both sexes."
"You're not really a boy or something are you."
Jubal felt the tears in her eyes welling up again, "sort of. And sort of not."
"I really don't understand."
"Physically, I look like both, you know, down there."
Kirk sat up and scooted to the other end of the couch.
"That's. . ."
"Freaky? Weird? Gross?"
"Different, but yeah, it's all those too."
"I'll leave."
"Wait, don't leave. I need a moment to process."
Jubal sat there quietly and cried a bit. She knew she shouldn't have said anything, but she also didn't want to lie to Kirk.
"Are you a boy or a girl?"
"I already told you. . ."
"No, you said physically you were both."
"Does it really matter? You're just going to reject me. . ."
"Jubal, for a smart person, you're acting really stupidly right now."
Jubal stopped and blinked at him, "Wha. . ?"
"Answer my question please, because it matters to me."
"I feel like a girl. I'm not sure I am one in the traditional sense, but I sort of more associate with that mindset."
Kirk got a little concerned look on his face.
"Wouldn't they normally fix this sort of thing at birth?"
"Some doctors would. But which one is right?"
"Well, they could do a genetic test, and then assign based on that."
"What happens if the child doesn't agree with the choice?"
"Doesn't matter, boys are boys and girls are girls."
Jubal gave Kirk a sad smile. "I'm sorry you believe that, Kirk. I'll be going now."
"So, you are a boy."
"No, Kirk. I'm a girl, from my brain to my body I'm a girl. I'm growing breasts and will likely have a period. I AM A GIRL! I'm leaving because your bigoted attitude toward transgendered individuals makes me uncomfortable."
"Why? If you're a girl why does it matter?"
"Because I spent a number of years presenting as a boy, Kirk. I'm even that way in a couple of my year books. It's part of my past, Kirk, but it is a part of me. If you can't handle that, that I can't be here."
Jubal rushed out of the house in tears. Why did she mention her publisher. Why did she write that stupid book. Her life would be over as soon as it came out, and people would read it. She would never be accepted as a normal girl, and all she wanted at that moment was to be a normal girl and cuddled with Kirk.
Jane came rushing into the room after Jubal left the house, "what did you do? She was perfect! She was smart, and not intimidated by dad, and she liked you."
"All my girlfriends have liked me."
"No, they usually wanted to be with the great big football star. It was never about you. You've never once had a girlfriend whose eyes lit up just because you entered a room, you big dork."
Kirk's mouth fell open.
"What are you waiting for, bro? Go after her."
"I can't," Kirk collapsed into himself, "I screwed up, Janie."
"It's not like you told her you never wanted to see her again."
"Almost that bad. She thinks I'm a bigot."
"What?"
"She's transgendered, whatever that means."
"Oh, really?"
"Don't act like you know any more than I do, squirt."
"Ok, you're right. Let's look it up."
"How could I be so stupid, Janie?"
"You didn't know."
"No, but she was trying to explain it to me and I wouldn't listen. It just goes contrary to what I think I know about the world."
"Then admit you're wrong."
"Easier said."
"Look, you know where she lives?"
"No. . .but George might."
"Can you invite him over?"
"I'm not setting you up with George, Jane."
"Aw."
Kirk dialed George on his cell.
"Kirk!? What in the hell did you do, man?"
"Um, so apparently you've heard. I really screwed up."
"You tore her heart out. I really feel like killing you right now."
"Is she there with you?"
"Yes, but she doesn't want to speak to you."
"Tell her I'm a fool. Tell her I'm sorry. Tel her I should have just listened and not said a word. Tell her I want another chance."
"No."
"Why not, George?"
"Because she's a friend of mine, Kirk. Look, you're sorry you made her cry, but are you really sorry for your words?"
"Um. . ."
"See, you don't know. You don't know your own hert right now, and you just want everything to be nice between the two of you.
"Jubal doesn't do nice, Kirk. She is all or nothing and has been that way for as long as I've known her. She was putting her entire self on the line with you. Opening herself up to hurt, and you hurt her."
"Thanks, Dr. Phil. Now let me talk to Jubal."
"Not going to happen, Kirk. I really hope you're aware of our hazing policy at school, since I would hate to see you off the team."
"George, wait."
"Don't, Kirk. . .are you sure?" This last was a little muffled, so someone was likely talking to George from the room.
"Hello, Kirk."
"Jubal, let me explain. . ."
"No. Not right now. You hurt me deeply, you know that? I know you didn't mean to, but you reacted emotionally. That was your instinct. You might change your attitude, Kirk, but you might not. I choose not to risk it right now."
"Jubal, give me a chance, please, one more chance? I was ignorant and stupid, and I'm a jerk, and I lo. . .ike you. A lot."
"Why do you deserve a chance?"
"Because I spent the last two hours realizing how stupid I was. I looked up information on the transgendered. I didn't know. Really."
"Then you should have listened."
"I know that."
"If you didn't listen on something this important, then how can I be sure that you'll listen on something that's not important at all."
"Truth? You don't. I'm willing to try. I'm willing to do whatever it takes. Just don't leave me. Please?"
"I'll have to think about it, Kirk. Okay?"
"Jubal. . ."
"No, I want to think about this. I need some time."
"Fine. I'll give you time. Will Monday be long enough?"
Jubal giggled softly at this. "I think Monday will be long enough. See you on Monday, Kirk."
"Does this mean. . ."
"No, but it means I'll tell you whatever I decide in person."
"So formal."
"Oh, you. You're silly you know that?"
"It comes from hanging out with young people all day long."
"I'll have you know I'm anything but a silly young person."
"You're right. You're wonderful."
There was silence on the other end of the line.
"Jubal?"
She sighed, "see you on Monday, Kirk."
Kirk pumped his fist and said, "see you."
He hung up, but was happy for the rest of the day. Maybe he'd be able to salvage this situation yet
So, I began to write. Don't ask me where Cthulhu came from, as I'll never talk copper, see.
Sorry, I'm a bit punchy. It's late. I'd intended to write a bit more before I called a first chapter of this done, but I think I should see first if it is at all well received. So, let me know what you all think.
I had been turned down for a job again. It was something simple, but it seemed to take everything out of me. I loosened my tie as I collapsed into the sagging collection of fabric springs and backaches that I called a couch.
It had been another one of those days in a long string of days like that.
My girlfriend of ten years had left me on a day like that, taking my dog with her. She said something about the dog I won't repeat here, suffice it to say I didn't want him anymore after she told me.
Apparently I had commitment issues or something. I told her that she had intimacy issues. She really got pissed at that remark. She took my mom's china, my grandparent's silverware, and a good chunk of my dignity.
All I got left with was her cat.
Funny that. I'd never been much of a cat person. Still wasn't if truth be told. But there was no way I was throwing any living creature out on the street, and least not before I found myself there myself.
I really didn't think that was very far off at this point.
I'd been out of work for a year at this point, and I despaired of ever getting a job in my chosen profession.
I was a professional geek.
No, not a circus performer, a computer geek. In the past ten years I'd molded myself into a problem solving machine. A computer tech bar none. A real wunderkind. Too bad the wunderkind was more wunder than kind.
Yeah, I know. I'm old for the industry at 34 years. I had an okay phone demeanor, but I kept getting myself in trouble with my big mouth. I would tell one too many people what I really thought of their inability to double click on a #$% #@#$%@ icon on their. . .
Yeah, I've got anger issues.
I blame the testosterone.
I blame my mother.
I blame everything but myself, or at least I did until that day I'd been turned down for a job once again.
So, I slip of my tie and toss it across the room to hang from the front door knob. One of the things I've spent so much time practicing it looks, and feels natural. I think it is the years I spent putting a ball through a hoop in high school and college, well before I dropped out to become a computer geek.
I thought I was about to hit the big time. I got an MCSE in Windows 95, and I was the big man on campus. . .for a couple months until Windows 98 came out, and then ME and 2000 and XP. I never got another MCSE.
I figured they were worthless after the first one got me a job with people better qualified with less schooling.
I am rambling. Sorry. It's just, ok, let me start over. this was the day that everything changed.
So, I'd had an interview with an internet service provider, or ISP for those in the know, wink wink, and they told me I was under qualified for their entry level position.
I didn't think it was too much of a problem. I'd gotten to chat up the cute brunette who was sitting there waiting for the interview after me. I'd felt pretty confident going into the interview, because I knew my stuff so much better than the brunette, and it made me feel. . .hopeful.
So, I go out to my car, waiting for a bit for the brunette to come out. I'm there an hour and nothing. About this point I've had enough so I call her number, yeah she gave it to me. Yeah, I'm that smooth.
"I'm so sorry you didn't get the job. They offered it to me on the spot."
"Hey, maybe we could hang out sometime."
"Maybe not. I only gave you my number so you could put in a good word for me if you got the job."
Ouch, yeah, I'm not as smooth as all that.
So, I drove home without any further mood destroyers, sit on the couch, loosen my tie, and throw it on the door knob.
The cat comes in the open window, back from wherever cats go when they leave their domain, and hops up on my lap demanding attention.
"Well, at least you haven't abandoned me yet."
Human's are so stupid, thinking they rule this place.
"What?"
Um, Cthulhu. . . Meow.
"Ok, Mr. Nibs, I heard you speak."
Meow. He batted my hand with his head.
"Look, I heard you invoke the name of Cthu. . .
Human, if you know what's good for you, you wont invoke his name aloud.
"This isn't a Lovecraft novel."
No, Its reality. Lovecraft was a psychic, much like you seem to be becoming. He talked to his cats.
"I've finally gone insane. I'm talking to a cat about the great old one Cthu. . ."
Mr. Nibs scratched me. Unlike most humans, you've actually heard Cthulhu's name pronounced, even if it was only in your mind. You are now capable of giving it the proper inflection.
"You are looking at me like you really are speaking to me."
Mr. Nibs made a growling noise and then pounced me. He was big for a cat, but that makes him small to me. However, the shock of it all caused me to lie flat on the couch and next thing I knew I was looking up into his angry green eyes as he gave me the dressing down of a lifetime.
Listen up, Mouse. You are even pathetic by human standards. Of course none of you will ever achieve the perfection that is cat, but some of you come awfully close.
"Mouse?"
Yeah, cause you talk a big game but when push comes to shove you're mostly bones and skin and gone in a single bite.
The way he was looking at me made me shiver.
We give animal names to our humans. Makes them seem a little more. . .real to us that way. You have the second worst name we give a human.
"What's the worst?"
Do you even really have to ask?
He had a valid point.
Because I never listened to my mom, and took up swearing, I now have a problem on my hands, namely you. You have it within your ability to destroy the entire world with a single misspoken world. I think I'm just going to have to kill you.
"There's got to be another way," Notice my state of mind at this point. I didn't even question the talking cats ability to follow through on his threat.
Let me think on it. You are pretty good at living up to your only reason for existence, scratching me behind my ears. Much better than Dog. And to think I once almost considered calling her Cat. Foul betray. . .ah
I figured at this point if I let him get worked up, that I was screwed, so I scratched and rubbed as if my life depended on it, which at that point I believed it did.
I realized as I was scratching and rubbing that Mr. Nibs had a point. A pretty good point. A valid point.
I was impotent, I know, bat word to apply to a guy, but life makes things like that seem unimportant, and it is the most fitting word.
It was the reason I was angry. I was pissed at myself for letting the world have its way with me. I was not out going enough. I let others pump me for information.
I presented this manly image to the world, when in reality, I was just a mouse. A timid, worthless little mouse.
I then thought of the cute brunette who'd gotten the job today instead of me.
I continued to think through my problems as I skritched and scratched and groomed Mr. Nibs.
"At least if I were a girl, my mousy behavior would be accepted, and might even get me more opportunities."
That's IT! You're a genius!
A sudden feeling of dread came over me. What had I said? I reviewed my thoughts for the last thirty seconds, and my dread became a cold stone of fear in my stomach. I'd said the thought aloud, and never intended to voice anything like it.
I liked being a man, damn it. Really liked it. I didn't want. . .didn't. I looked over at Mr. Nibs, and his eyes were glowing green. They were hypnotic in a way, and I felt my eyelids getting heavier and heavier.
The last thing I heard before the darkness consumed me was, Damn it, Feracles. I've told you before that you are not to perform magic without supervision until you are at least a thousand years old.
Momma?
A memory of the evening before burst through my consciousness and I screamed. It was a very girly scream, which tore another one from my throat.
"No, no, no, no, no. This can't be happening. I can't be a woman. What will my landlord think? What will my MOM think? I can't handle this."
At that moment, I realized that there was something else I needed to handle if I didn't want to turn my couch into a swimming pool.
I handled it as best I could without the man parts I was so used to, flushed, and just sat there not moving.
My life as I knew it was over. This all had to be a dream.
"Yes, it's a dream, and this freaky, and somewhat sexy, female voice I'm speaking with is all in my imagination."
It's not a dream, Mouse honey.
Now, since I haven't described him, you wouldn't know that the completely white Persian that walked into my bathroom at that point wasn't Mr. Nibs. Besides, the voice in my head sounded distinctly matronly.
Mr. Nibs is also a Persian, but with more orange and grey to his coloration.
My son the daft child he is decided to curse you.
"Can't you un curse me?"
Ok, cackling in your head is really creepy.
Unfortunately, he botched the fifth couplet of the fifth stanza. Basically, that means we have to await a greater convergence to be able to cancel this spell.
"And when is the next convergence thingy?"
If this were a story, this is the part where she would tell me that I have to wait a week, or a month, or six months or something and all will be right in the world.
Oh, there's not going to be another one in your lifetime. The last one was last night, which was the only reason he was able to complete the spell without killing himself.
"What!?"
My son named you well, Mouse.
I collapsed to the floor saying 'no' over and over.
I repeated it to myself, and kept hoping I'd wake up. I began to sob and I kept saying it.
There there, honey. I've given Mr. Nibs the worst punishment that cat kind can ever receive. I changed his true name to be his human name.
She rubbed her body against my bare leg and purred, speaking soothing words to my mind.
I had a funny though, which I shared with her. "You look like SPECTRE's cat."
I was SPECTRE's cat.
Wow, I had a real life Bond girl in my apartment. I laughed hysterically at my bad joke.
It'll be okay, Mouse. You'll see.
"How will it be okay, huh? I'm a girl. I have no ID. I have no proof of my skills. I'm done. My life is over."
Your old life is over, Mouse. Your new life is just beginning.
I shook my head and stood to run my face under some water. It felt flushed and puffy.
The face in the mirror was mine, and yet it wasn't. I could see the similarities to myself there, but mostly there were differences. Like my hair and eyes. They were my grandmother's red and green. I even had a bit of her complexion now. White as milk and smooth as cream she used to say in the long ago days of my youth.
Even at eighty when she died she hadn't had a wrinkle. . .
"Oh my. . .It can't be. Can it?"
What's that dear?
"My Gran was a Mouse, wasn't she? You turned her from a man into a woman too!"
Of course not. Never speak ill of the dead. Your Gran simply had great genes for a human. Some of you do. When my idiot of a son turned you into a woman, he simply tapped a bit into your inheritance.
"I can't handle any more of this. I'm leaving."
Wait, you can't go out like this. At least let me explain. . .
But I was done listening. Seeing my Gran's face in the mirror had given me an idea. If anyone would believe me, it was Mom, and two heads were better than one in coming to solutions about life's little problems.
I snorted at this. Only one morning as a girl and already I was calling it a little problem. As I began to dwell on it, I realized thinking it a little problem was a coping mechanism and moved myself mentally from the brink.
I slipped myself into my car, and spend the next thirty minutes driving my way to my Mom's house going no faster than the speed limit.
Luckily I got there without being pulled over, and went up to ring the bell. Usually I just walked in, but this time. . .
"Brad, you know you don't need. . .Mom?" Her eyes got wide, and I figured she thought she was seeing a ghost.
"No, Mom, it's me, Brad."
She fainted dead away. That could have gone better.
You never know what you have 'til it's gone. That is never more true than when you truly ignore all the good things in your life, and suddenly it's not your life any more.
One of the things I was really missing right now was my casual strength. If I were still in my old body, it wouldn't have been an issue to lift the unconscious body of my mother up off the floor and move her to the couch, or even the bed in her room.
As it was, I'm amazed that I didn't break something with all the pushing and pulling that was necessary to get her just inside the house enough to close the door.
As I was closing said door, a cream, gray, and rust colored blur slipped in.
You really should have let my mother finish explaining things, Mouse.
"So, you're now blaming me for my mother being unconscious?"
Of course. The human mind isn't resilient enough to handle magic. Why do you think none of your kind never was able to do any?
"So, I take it witches never really existed? That's good to know."
Weeeell
"Well, what?"
It wasn't the witch who was doing magic, per se. . .
I started laughing, with that touch of a hysterical tone to it, again. I was insane. That was it, insane. I would wake up in a padded cell and I would be Brad again.
Snap out of it man!
"If you'll remember I'm no longer a man, Mr. Nibs."
Don't say that!
"Say what?"
My name. Don't say it aloud. It feels weird when someone speaks your True Name, and you could give other cats power over me.
"It didn't seem to bother you before. . ."
That's because it wasn't my true name before. Mom changed it on me.
"Wait, how can a true name change? Isn't it supposed to reflect your core being or something?"
What are you talking about? Of course a true name can change. I mean, how else are you supposed to get your exes off your back? You humans and your concepts of permanence. A true name is simply a way to invoke someone, you know, get their attention.
"So, naming Cthulu. . .oh crap."
Nah, I changed your brain chemistry which made it so the imprint of the true name no longer worked for you. You have to imprint a true name to invoke it. Mom gave you my true name, I think because she wanted me to try and fix this as much as I could.
"So, basically, no matter where you are, when I say Mr. Nibs. . ."
Mr. Nibs shook himself and glared at me. Yes, I know where you are, and that you're calling. This is so humiliating. To be at the beck and call of a human. Makes me feel so much like. . .a dog.
He wailed a bit, and I felt my mom stirring next to me.
"Bradly Emerson Card, why do you look like a woman, and why are you talking to that cat?"
Oh, crap. Mom's pissed
"Mom, um, well, you see, apparently I can hear cat's thoughts, and they're a lot more complicated than you'd think, and well, um, Nibs here kinda turned me into a girl."
She was out like a light again.
Like I said, the human mind can't handle magic.
"Then how come I'm not gibbering in a corner somewhere."
Remember the witches you mentioned earlier?
"Yeah. . ."
It was all this misunderstanding on the part of humans. You see it's the human who is the familiar, not the cat. You, my friend, are a familiar.
"Um, okay?"
You're basically catnip on two legs. Most of you never actually awaken enough to be able to actually talk, but you're all pleasant to be around.
"But, I don't even like cats."
That's never stopped us before. So, back to my almost story. In times past we used our magic to protect our familiars, and since all you people are way to humanocentric you all thought it was the familiar doing the magic. It unfortunately led to a lot of you getting killed.
"But why? I mean, if you did magic openly back then, how come humans can't even comprehend it now."
Look, it's probably that practical human mind you all are always going on about. Mostly cats just go with it, and live with the consequences. We don't need to know the why, only that it is a fact that we deal with.
"So the only people who are going to be able to hear my story without freaking out or totally discounting it as fiction. . ."
Other familiars? That's about the size of it.
"My Gran was a familiar, wasn't she?"
Now she gets it. Mom mentioned your inheritance after all.
"Then why isn't my mom. . ."
Look, I'm tired of answering questions, you want to do your job while we wait for your mom to wake up, again?
He plopped himself in my lap, and I began to skritch and scratch away at his neck and ears. I paid attention to what I was doing this time, and I could feel a sort of energy sparking along my fingertips. Nothing huge, and easily overlooked, but there none the less.
Mr. Nibs purred at me, oh, yeah. Right there. Purr-fect.
"That was a really bad pun."
My mom was beginning to get up again. "Brad?"
"Yeah, Mom."
"And you're now somehow a woman?"
"Yes, Mom."
"And if we go into it again I'm probably going to faint?"
I nodded with a little smile.
"Reminds me of some conversations I had with your Gran, actually. You look so much like her now."
"Apparently it's my inheritance." My half smile faded thinking of the other parts of my inheritance that were gone.
"Still thinking of the stuff Julia stole from you?"
"Yeah, the police still have no leads on her location, and she hasn't pawned it yet."
"I'm sorry sweetie. Well, I can look at you now without my mind going for a little trip, so why don't you help your mother up off the floor."
I unceremoniously dumped Mr. Nibs on the floor as I was getting up and he wailed at me.
"Well, excuse me, your highness, you'll just have to get over me having other things to do."
"Brad, were you really having a conversation with that cat earlier?"
I helped Mom to sit on the couch before answering.
"Yes," I said cautiously.
"Ok, I figured as much. Your Gran used to do that all the time. Some people even thought she might be a witch."
I chuckled at this, well I tried to chuckle, but it came out more high pitched and tittering. I giggled, okay.
"Well, you seem to be adjusting well. Better than I thought you would. And you look so young."
"I think it's the face. Gran always looked years younger than she was."
"You could easily pass as eighteen or nineteen."
"What are you getting at, Mom."
"You should go back to college, dear."
"Not this again, Mom. We've been over it. I'm too old. . ."
"Bradly Emmerson Card! Do not take that tone of voice with me young lady. You are never too old to get your education. And you don't look too old anymore."
"But, I have no records, no birth certificate. Nothing."
She gave me a little smirk. "Actually, we have everything we need to get started."
"Wha. . ?"
"A couple of years ago, on the insistence of one of my genealogy friends, I had a false birth certificate issued"
"How?"
"Well, certain counties were a little slow getting their records computerized. If you knew which states and counties were like that, you could. . .finesse the system a little. No details, but I had a record of live birth created for a female child that died within days of birth. The child would be seventeen now."
"Mom, if she's dead. . ."
"The child never existed. The clerk took my word for it as a registered genealogist."
"Mom! I'm shocked at your duplicity."
"I always felt a little guilty about it. I had done this before when I had ample evidence of a birth, and the birth certificate did not exist, but I'd never been dishonest about it."
"So, what you're saying, is that we have a birth certificate for a seventeen year old that doesn't exist."
"Yep."
"I don't know if I can be seventeen again, mom. All the angst and such. Especially now that I'm a girl."
"Oh stop. You know you'll enjoy having this part of your life back. And maybe you can even start playing basketball again."
And just like that, my happy mood was gone. The real reason I'd dropped out of school was that I couldn't take the looks of pity any more.
"Mom, you know I can't play anymore."
"You couldn't play anymore. Now? How do we know unless you try?"
"But I'm so out of practice."
"Tell you what. Let's see if some of your sisters old clothes fit you, since you look ridiculous in those slacks and that white button shirt, and then we'll go try and get a social security card issued for your birth certificate. When we're done with that, we'll shoot some hoops and see what you have in you."
A thought occurred to me, "Mom, if I'm seventeen, aren't I going to need a parent or legal guardian along with me?"
"About that. . .I told the clerk I needed it for one of my own children."
I blinked at her. "You mean. . .you're still my mom?"
"I know, weird, right."
You humans and your paper trails. If you'd been born a cat this would never have been a problem.
"O hush, you."
Mom looked at me quizzically, but didn't say anything. I shrugged. What else could I do?
We walked upstairs to my youngest sister's room. Well actually, if I was only seventeen, then she was a year and a half older than me.
That was a little weird to think about.
Mom began throwing clothing at me for me to try on. I have to admit I had no idea what I was doing, or what the pieces of cloth and lace were called.
First things first, though. I stripped out of my clothing and got a good look at my body for the first time since this change.
I wasn't half bad looking.
Mr. Nibs saw my appraising glances and broke into my thoughts, Hey, what did you expect? Cats are perfect after all.
He began grooming himself in the doorway. I snorted at his comment.
The panties fit rather nicely. Apparently all she'd left behind were bikini cut in cotton. Oh well, I could live with a purple behind, especially if no one ever saw it. I was too used to my underwear being white, and a lot looser. I was a boxers man. Silk I'll have you know.
I completely forgot my panties in my efforts to get my bra situated.
No, clasping it in the back wasn't a problem for me, and no I'm not saying why. It was the fit. My breasts felt like they were either smooshed, pinched, or both.
"Mom!" I exclaimed when she reached up to try adjusting it.
"Hush, you're my daughter now. I have a pair of my own and I've never been attracted to them."
She tugged and adjusted leaving me blushing all the way to my toes before she shook her head, "Oh well, it will have to do 'til we can get you out to the store to buy some more."
"There's no way I'm wearing this, Mom." I said holding the denim skirt up to my waist, "It's way too short."
"you're not a man anymore, honey. A lot of your clothing will be worn down here," she illustrated by moving the skirt down to my hips.
She realized I would be showing about an inch and a half of panty over the top and went rummaging through the drawers and pulled out a ribbed cotton tank top in a pale green.
It hugged me like a second skin and went all the way down below my hips, almost to the bottom of my behind actually.
I slipped up the skirt, and I have to say that the look wasn't half bad. I slipped on a denim half jacket, or at list that's how it felt. It probably came down to just above my waist.
Good look on you, Mouse. I can tell you that there will be a lot of guys out there wanting to play Predator and Prey.
I blushed again, and my body got in on the act again.
I slipped on some short crew socks and a pair of dark flats. My mom pulled my hair into a ponytail at the back of my head, and I have to admit; I really didn't look bad.
Not only that, but I looked a bit like a seventeen year old. Ok, one who was dressed by her Mom. I needed to figure out what seventeen year olds were wearing these days so I could begin to form my own sense of style.
I was still a bit uncomfortable with how short the skirt was. I'd say how far above my knees it came if it wasn't easier to say that it only came about five inches below my behind. Did I mention that I'm a bit taller than my sister still?
And I think my butt was bigger, or at least looked like it from my current angle.
My breasts were definitely a little bigger, which made me happy. My sister's were always too small for my taste.
My mom retrieved my keys from my pants pocket.
"Mom!"
"You're much too young for a beamer now, Annalyce."
"Annalyce?"
"Your new name, Annalyce Brianna Card."
"My initials are ABC!!!!"
"Well, you'll just have to marry someone with a last name beginning with something other than C then, honey." She realized what she'd just said and her mouth dropped open.
"I'm so sorry, dear. That just slipped out."
"Yeah, don't think it hasn't occurred to me. I get to play catcher from now on."
"You haven't played catcher before have you?" Mom asked me with a shrewd look.
"Mom!? I can't believe you asked me that!"
"Annalyce, think of it from my point of view. She was kind of butch and, well, you know."
"Forceful and oversexed?"
"Exactly. Your dad was convinced she was a transvestite or something. Said her jaw line was too strong."
"Same thing could be said about, Sarah, Mom."
"You shouldn't talk about your sister that way, even if it's true, Annalyce," she said with a giggle.
I try not to wince. "Mom, if I have to be called Annalyce or Brianna the rest of my life, I'll shoot myself."
She lost her smile instantly, "honey, you wouldn't"
"No, I wouldn't. I can't imagining my life actually getting bad enough that I seriously consider suicide. It's a figure of speech."
"How 'bout Anna, then? It's in both your names."
I made a face of disgust.
"Mom, just call me Abbie."
"Huh?"
"AB, Ah Be, Abbie."
She blinked at me and then smiled, "that is so you, I mean the old. . .you know what I mean."
"Yes, Mom. I know exactly what you mean."
Back in the day I'd been the nickname king, self appointed of course. I could come up with an appropriate, and unique, nickname for anyone. Well, looks like I just did it for myself.
The skirt let me feel how my hips swayed, and it was distracting to say the least. I tried to stop it a couple of times as I went down the hall, but it was so uncomfortable that I just let it go.
Me-yeow! If you were a cat. . .
"Don't even go there, Mr. Nibs."
Stop doing that!
"What? Mr. Nibs?"
Mr. Nibs caterwauled at the top of his lungs so I felt it was about time that I Left him to his own devices. Besides. It was about time I started making my new persona legal.
Besides, I'm sure that none of you really wanted to hear about how Mouse stood in line for three hours so she could be told to fill out a form and then wait in line for another three hours so she could be told it would come in the mail within two weeks.
Her social security card that is.
See, how hard was that. Two paragraphs and done.
If I'd let Mouse tell it, we'd be here tomorrow waiting for her to describe the exact shade of the jumper the lady behind the counter was wearing or some such.
Honestly, can you imagine a less efficient manner of. . .
"Feracles, honestly. You and I have some unfinished business to take care of." I looked around the house quickly, not seeing my Mom in the immediate vicinity, I began to 'groom' myself. I figure she'd get the message eventually and leave me in peace.
"Feracles!"
Have I mentioned yet how much I hate static electricity? Oh, that's right, this is the first time it's been my POV as it were.
Mom zapped me in me bum. Yes, I think in a bad English accent.
"Pay attention. You know I made a blood pack with Eloise Pritchard to look after all of her kith and kin. And the first opportunity you get you turn her grandson into her granddaughter. What do you have to say for yourself?"
"Look, he caught me by surprise and I said Cthulu."
"You WHAT! Have you begun worshiping with that destroyer cult again! So help me I'll bring you back into the arms of Bast if I have to rend you limb from limb to do it!"
"Mother!"
"Whining isn't becoming of a cat. Have you been spending too much time with humans? Have you forgotten what it truly means to be a cat?"
"Oh, no. Not again mom. Please tell me you're not going to do what I think you're going to do."
"No, not this week. Your brother never recovered when I did it to him. He was never the same cat again."
Ok, that was a close one. Mom was a really powerful operator, and she was able to pull off spells that made the rest of us look like minute old kittens.
It really made me wonder why she'd lied to mouse about. . .
"Shhh, you daft boy. Spoilers are unbecoming of a Cat. Those are for hack writers and dead refrigerators."
"Um, Mom? Are the refrigerators spoilers themselves, not the generators of said spoilers?"
"It's not nice to contradict your mother."
When she gets like this there's no arguing with her, so I didn't even try.
"Ok, Mom. So, what is my punishment then?"
"You get to be Mouse's permanently. You are going to watch over her until such time as she's not a danger to herself or others."
"You mean until she's DEAD! You've got to be kidding!"
"Nope, and she better die of natural causes, or I will be following through on my earlier 'threat'."
I was about to hop over to where she currently was, but a final thought stopped me.
"She must never know the true nature of that spell, Feracles. Do you understand me?"
I gulped, and then responded to her. "I understand mom."
How do I get myself into these things. Seriously. All I was doing was getting a good scratch behind the ears and poof; my entire world is thrown topsy-turvy. Leave it to humans to complicate a good ear scratch.
Speaking of which, I felt the need for a good scratching coming upon me.
I hopped right into Mouse's lap.
"Now, Mouse, before you cry out, these people will think it's perfectly natural for me to be here."
/What? Why not make yourself invisible?/
"Simple, because it is easier to trick a human to ignore you, than it is to trick light to ignore you. Light has a much longer attention span. It's very cat-like in that regard."
Mouse snorted at me. They were in the middle of their second wait to go up to the counter. The room was furnished in 'Institutional: for public consumption' manner. Meaning hard plastic chairs, beige walls, and no AC to speak of. A small fan oscillated on a counter, just keeping the air moving enough so that you realized how hot it was.
Basically it felt like Lucifer designed the place and then decided it was too cruel even for him.
So, I'm overheating in my long winter coat, but getting the scratching of a lifetime. I don't know what it is, but a scratch by a really hot woman is so much better than one from a man. Well, at least I think so.
She finally gets called up, so I decide to ride up there on her shoulders. She talked human to the lady behind the counter, and realized it would be two weeks before she could get another card, and not until after that would she be able to get a new ID. She had time enough. She was only seventeen after all, or as soon as she got that ID she would be.
"Feracles!?"
Crap, I wasn't supposed to say that. I've gotta run before my mom really let's me have it. Ciao
"Mom, how could you do this?" I asked looking at the birth certificate in my hand. "This just feels so wrong. Sure, it makes my life a little easier, but seriously. It's against the law."
"Actually, your using it is the only point where we broke the law. See, as long as the county provides it to me, and I only give it for the use of the person depicted, then at worst it is a failure to follow procedure on the part of the county recorder."
She got a thoughtful look on her face, "Actually, now that I think of it, you are only breaking the law if they can prove that an ID is false, and the burden of proof is on the government."
"Wait, so, since it is impossible to prove I'm anyone else, they have to accept this as mine? Especially since no one else can claim it?"
"I'm no lawyer, but from what I know of the situation. . ."
I looked at Mr. Nibs who was sitting in the back seat and grooming himself. "You did this didn't you?"
'Actually, I think your mom is correct. The only reason ID systems even work in the first place is the supposed infallibility of the issuing agency. If the issuing agency recognizes you as the person they are identifying, then it is their responsibility to repudiate their own identification, which in this case, is impossible.'
I didn't feel right about this, but I was outnumbered two to one. I had a completely legal birth certificate, even if it was issued under false pretenses. I had requested the issuing of a Social Security card and number. Soon I would have a new drivers. . .
"I have to take my driving test again!?"
"It's worse than that, Abbie. You have to take driver's ed again. Oh, and get your GED."
This just kept getting better and better.
We drove home, as I really wasn't feeling up to my first foray into the mall, since I'd just found out that I would be losing all of my credentials in the world. I needed something that would make me feel. . .in touch with my life.
Since it will be important for the story at this point, I guess I have to relive the most painful memory I have.
About fourteen years ago, I was on a basketball scholarship. I was damn good at what I did. When other kids went camping with their dads, I practiced basketball. While they played video games, I played basketball. All four years of high school, I played basketball.
There is a certain amount of physical ability that is inborn talent. The rest is perseverance.
I usually hit 1 in 2 two point shots during game conditions, and 2 in 5 out in three point land. Sure, that wasn't in the NBA, but it was during my college career. I'd promised my mom that I would finish college before going on to the NBA. What is so stupid, is that I never would have been on that bicycle in that intersection if I'd never made that promise to my mom.
I was clipped by a Fed Ex truck. Well, that is how the cops recorded the incident.
Yeah, I got a settlement from the company, but it was barely enough to cover medical bills. They had to rebuild my right knee. They told me that it wouldn't stand up to the punishment of playing a full game.
I didn't believe them and was out on the court as soon as I healed up. It almost exploded on me when I came down from a rebound in practice.
Yea, I used the other half for the second reconstruction.
Mom had promised to pay for the rest of my schooling, but I'd dropped out as mentioned before. Without the need to keep up my grades to play, I had no incentives to go to school anymore.
Yeah, I recognize how immature I was acting.
So, we got home, inflated the ball up to regulation pressure, and went out to my old friend the hoop.
I wanted to see if I still had it, so I began sinking free throws. No, I meant sinking them. Outside of games I usually hit somewhere around 992 per 1000 shots. Yes, I kept track when it mattered.
I began walking around inside the three point line. Flat footed, I was able to get about 3 in 4. I took a deep breath, and began doing jump shots. That little extra height made the difference and I was hitting closer to 7 in 9.
I smiled at that. My mom was rebounding for me, so I really started warming up. Evasion drills. Layups. Hook shots. Then I started playing HORSE with myself. I used to do that for hours. Setting up impossible shots, and then making them twice.
I hadn't felt this alive in years. I leapt up to try and grab the rim. . .
"You've got to be kidding me!"
I couldn't jump high enough. Apparently, even though I had the muscle memory, either the loss in a couple of overall inches in height, or simply being out of shape, I couldn't even get within a foot of the rim.
"Honey, I don't think there are many female players who can dunk."
The cool air on my legs felt good, as I walked in drenched in sweat, and then something occurred to me. I'd been doing jump shots in a loose, oh so short, skirt.
I blushed all the way to my toes.
'If I were a man, I can tell you it would have gotten MY motor running. The only thing that would have made it better, from my perspective, would be if you had a nice hairy tail, Mouse.'
I made a swipe for him with my foot, but catlike he hopped out of the way. Shaking my head I went upstairs for a couple of towels and went into the bathroom. I showered, feeling better for the exercise, and squeezed myself into another tiny bra.
"Mom! I want to go bra shopping."
"Ok, Abbie dear. We can do that tomorrow."
I walked down and showed her the current bra I was wearing. She took one look at the flesh pouring over the top and changed her tune. "Ok, get a shirt on and let's head out to get you some bras."
We drove to the mall, and I followed my mom into a small boutique. The dressing area was screened from the front, and I would be able to parade the bras for my mother without worrying about anyone from outside the store seeing me.
The pretty blonde saleswoman turned to me as soon as we got to the back.
"Would you feel more comfortable if I measured you out here, or in the dressing room?"
"I don't know. . .I've never been measured for a bra."
"Well, you'll have to take off the one you're wearing."
"Um, uh." I blushed red. Crimson. I just kept blushing.
"Ok, we'll do it in the dressing room."
I stripped off the tee shirt, and then the bra. "Well, we know you're not a 34A."
She measured me just under my breasts making sure the tape was snug. "Let your arms fall to your sides please."
Then she measured across my nipples. I made sure to keep my arms down this time.
"Well, you fall right between a 36B and a 36C, so we'll try a couple of different brands for each size. You'll probably feel most comfortable in a padded 36C, but we'll have to see."
"Un, I was wondering, well, do they come in front clasp?"
"Of course. I'll get those for you."
So, I tried on bras, paraded them for my mom, and then tried on others. I have to say, whomever invented the front closure was a genius. They were actually the most comfortable fit of any of the bras I tried.
So, I ended up getting the 36C bras, each of them with the front closure. Some of them even had lace on them. It was itchy, but my mom said that it was pretty on me, so I figured I might as well pick it up.
I was walking out of the store when it hit me. I'd just purchased something because I looked pretty in it. I really hoped that wouldn't become a habit.
Mom started heading for the car, but I called a halt to that.
"Mom, since we're here already, I figure I at least need some workout clothing. I don't want to flash everyone every time I go for a jump shot."
"Well, I have to admit that would probably be a good idea."
And so began my first foray into shopping. We would no sooner finish one store when we would realize there was something else we just had to have.
It wasn't until the third time I saw my mother in a dress that was absolutely her that I realized I was having a good time. I also realized I was being very girly.
'Took you long enough to notice.'
"What did you do to me?"
'Other than change you into a girl? Nothing'
"Wasn't that enough? I am going all girly."
'Going girly? There's nothing going about you and girly,'
I glared at him. I wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of admitting he might be right.
No, not that I wanted to be a girl or anything.
But, I was kind of taking a back seat role to my entire life waiting for someone to come in and sweep me off my feet and lead me into. . .something. I'd never gotten much further than that before realizing that guys didn't get knights in shining armor.
I mean was it too much to ask to have a pretty female knight in shining armor?
It was at that moment that I realized I hadn't thought about sex once since I woke up this morning.
I know, shining armor and sex, perfect segue.
Anyway, before this whole mess, you may remember that I tried to pick up the girl who was trying out for the same position I was going for. I had a healthy libido. Sometimes it was a little too healthy..
Now, on the other hand? I felt literally neutered. I couldn't seem to think of anything that excited me.
Look, I admit that I've read my share of erotica online, and some of it even included characters who were changed suddenly from males into females and proceeded to have sex with everything on two legs.
Some of it was a lot more circumscribe, but they always went out for sex.
Not one had I ever read where they were changed and just not interested any more.
"Hey, what the. . ."
'Language, young lady.'
I glared at him. "Mr. Nibs."
'That wasn't nice!'
I was completely knocked off my train of thought but something that occurred to me. "Mister Nibs."
He cringed, but then relaxed, 'What in the world? How did you. . ?'
"Simple, I change how I thought of your name. Apparently I change the symbol image of the sound in my head and it changes how I say it."
Mr. Nibs body language suddenly changed. He almost looked afraid.
'I just realized that I had a pressing engagement elsewhere.'
And with that Mr. Nibs disappeared from the store.
"Mother! We've got a huge problem!"
I sent out my feelers into the aether trying to find a trace of his mother somewhere.
"I really hope this is important as you just interrupted one of my rites to the goddess."
"Mouse understands the difference between knowing a true name and saying a true name."
"What!? That is so not good. How could you have done this to us, Feracles. This hasn't happened. . ."
"Since Merlin? I know. I know. Even working with our familiar Mab we were unable to bring him to heel."
Mother took a deep breath and let it out, "all may not be lost, Mr. Nibs. Merlin was just a man, and he was called a fish long before his awakening."
"Good thing we never told HIM that or we could have had really big problems."
A thought occurred to me, "Funny how people think that Merlin was the good guy."
"Shhh. We have bigger problems than that right now."
"Mom, I think that Mouse is mostly harmless. As long as she just thinks it's a onetime occurrence than were fine. She's already regressed herself into the mindset of a seventeen year old girl. There was only one moment where she realized how weird it was."
"That is the problem, Feracles. She recognized something was wrong. As time goes on, she will recognize more and more things that simply don't fit. Hopefully she hasn't noticed that the birth certificate was a little too convenient."
"What?!"
"Of course, dear. I arranged that. I did a minor temporal adjustment."
"Mother! All I did was a physical entanglement and you just about skinned me alive. What did the goddess Bast have to say about this?"
Mother had the decency to act embarrassed. "Why do you think I was in the middle of penance rites when you called me?"
"Oh, fourteen pure white doves. I should have known."
"It's comments like that which make me realize there is still hope for you yet, even if you are male."
I hiss at my mother, and leave her to her rites. How can she help me with this when she has broken one of the cardinals. I realize if I am to save reality from itself, then I'm going to have to do it on my own. . .
After a short nap. This sunny rock is so comfortable.
When Mr. Nibs took off so quickly, I knew there was a rat somewhere. I was beginning to think that the rat had a very feline appearance as well.
"Mom, I'm not feeling well all of a sudden."
"Was it something to do with, you know."
"Changing into a girl?"
"I was going to say your period, but that works too."
"Why would that come to mind?"
"Well, it was about this same time four weeks ago."
"Mom, four weeks ago I was a guy."
"I know dear, but we can never be too careful."
I had no idea what she heard, but it definitely wasn't what I was saying.
"Mom, I really need you to be strong enough to understand me. You are strong enough to understand me. I don't really care what Mister Nibs said."
"Why was I thinking you might be having a period, Brad? Oh, Abbie. Sorry. That was so weird."
"How old am I, Mom?"
"Now I don't feel so well. Let's go home, Abbie."
We paid for our purchases and carted everything out to the car. Then we made our way to the car and I drove us home. Right now I didn't care that I didn't have a legal license. My Mom wasn't feeling well enough to drive, and I could feel 'reality' trying to reassert itself.
I had to hold onto the fact that I was a man, who had been turned into a woman. I could feel reality trying to bounce back.
It occurred to me that the main reason that humanity could no longer handle magic wasn't because of anything in our makeup, but because someone had changed reality so we no longer recognized it.
They had cast a spell so powerful that reality itself did not allow magic any more.
And I had a pretty good idea who had done it. She'd been conveniently there right after I'd been changed. She'd help me cope. She'd forced me into this seventeen year old mindset. . . no, that had been me, hadn't it. I accepted that I was seventeen so easily, and then I WAS seventeen. An innocent seventeen year old virgin, blissfully unaware of sex.
I'd become what I assumed a seventeen year old was like.
"And these aren't my thoughts. Whomever you are, please stop feeding me lines and show yourself."
-You're no fun.-
"You're not a cat."
-How can you tell. It's just a thought after all.-
"And a thought is the most powerful thing in the world. It is the fount of all actions we take."
-Well, apprentice. You've passed your first test. I shall return with another in the future.-
I had to pull over. I had an inkling of who, or what, I'd just been speaking to, and if I was right, then I was in a whole deep dish pizza of trouble.
"Stop that!"
-Couldn't resist.-
I was getting better, however, at telling when a thought was being inserted into my mind. I think that had been the reason that my mystery visitor had actually come. Not to test me on some esoteric idea, but to teach me what a foreign idea felt like.
I felt reality pull back a bit from me, and realized that without the foreign ideas I no longer had certain assumptions about the world.
And the first thing I realized was that humanity can accept magic.
There was no magical change. Someone, probably the cats, had decided they didn't WANT humanity to be able to handle magic.
Apprentice. . .I can do magic.
Oh, shit. I don't want to do magic.
I'd already seen what a mess a little magic in inexperienced hands could create. I'd been the one who created part of it. My body on the other hand. That was all Mister Nibs fault.
I drove the rest of the way home in silence. I hoped I hadn't caused any lasting harm to my mother.
"Mom, we're home."
"Brad, I had the strangest dream. . .oh, it wasn't a dream was it?"
"Nope, it wasn't."
"Well, you make a very pretty girl, you know?"
"But I don't want to be a girl, Mom."
"Honey, let's take these things inside, and I want to have a serious talk with you."
I didn't like the ominous sound of this, but it wasn't something I was going to be able to avoid. We took the bags and parcels in, and put them un in my sister's room.
Then my Mom sat down on the bed, and patted the spot next to her.
"Brad. You know I love you, right?"
"Yes, Momma. I know."
"Your father and I did a rather horrible thing to you. When I saw you at that door, I thought that you might have found out about it and done something rash."
"What are you talking about?"
"How do I explain." She began to wring her hands. "What do you remember about your childhood?"
"I was born. . ."
"Not facts and figures and words. What do you remember?"
I began to think back, and all I saw, all I remembered was a story. It began "I was born. . ." and ended with "And at my eighth birthday party I had an ice cream cake in the shape of a fire engine."
The same words. No variation. It ran over and over. It was a foreign idea.
"A man spoke those words to me, but not you or Dad. It kept repeating it. About little league, and cub scouts and. . .Mom, what is this."
"Do you remember Doctor Jacobs?"
"Who?"
"I'm so sorry, sweetie. Doctor Jacobs said that it was a little harmless hypnosis. That you had convinced yourself that you weren't a boy, and that he could help your mind to understand the truth."
The horror of what she was suggesting. How could my Mother. . .
"Sweetie, we thought it was the best when you began having tea parties with your sisters. We thought it wasn't natural! You've got to believe me that we thought what we were doing was the best, but the older you got, and your inability to really connect with a woman. . ."
She was crying and I found myself unable to comfort her. Where were my memories. Where were. . .
In my mind I felt what seemed to be a thread. It was tied into the story that looped over and over. I yanked with all my strength, and the first thing I remembered was my grandmother. Not the picture of her on the mantel piece, but talking with her face to face.
"But Granny. Only Girls can be witches. Mommy says I'm a boy."
"It isn't the body that defines us, dearest heart. It is the mind and the soul. Daughter of my power, child of my heart, you are a girl. You told me so yourself."
I also realized why I had failed to really connect with any of them.
I was not, nor had I ever been a lesbian.
Up until I was eight years old, I had understood. Even after that I would occasionally have 'relapses'.
My face burned in shame. It made sense now why Bobby Greely had suddenly stopped coming around. Bobby and I had kissed. He was the first boy I had kissed and my parents had that doctor take that away from me. Had replaced it with another little story. Another little lie for my mind to tell itself.
When I looked at women's clothing, the story told me that I wanted to see the body underneath it, when I really liked the way it looked.
The stories had tried to build a personality of a man out of straw.
Granny had known though when she gave me her silver. She'd known.
And so had my Mom. She chose me among all my sisters to give her china to.
I'm glad my parents never told me at the time that I was the reason they broke up.
I was crying and holding my mom. I knew that she'd done this to me, but she remembered it every day of every year for twenty six years. She'd borne the guilt of this act upon her soul and let it fester and rot.
"My dear sweat child. I am so sorry for the pain we put you though."
I felt another vision of the past come to me.
"Abbie, do you feel this string? This place in your mind?"
"Yes, granny?"
"This is attached to yourself. A witch is stronger than anything, child. He can't destroy you, only push you under for a while. Remember that. I'm attaching this string to your inner self. I'm wrapping all of your memories up in it. Remember this place and hide in it the next time. . ."
The scene shifted, and her grandmother was no longer there. She was in a tiny room. It was Doctor Jacobs office.
A white Persian hopped up on the table.
'Aren't you done yet, Antonidus? This should have been completed weeks ago.'
"I'm sorry mother, but someone has prepared her mind. I'm having trouble with the purely magical techniques, and putting the parent's choice in imprint there is not helping any. Her entire being is fighting that one."
'Not her entire being. She has a male body after all. Tie into that.'
"She is too young. Not physically developed enough."
'Antonidus, you know I can't do this. My paws must NOT be found upon her mind. Merlin's Heir will not be given an excuse to rise because of me.'
At this point Jacobs turned toward me, and I remembered thinking, 'this I must remember,' as I moved everything that was myself into the vault of my mind.
She looked so much younger than she had in years. It would seem that a lot of what had kept Granny looking young was a clear conscious.
I covered her in the blanket and went downstairs to fix myself something to eat.
Mom had believed that each of us should learn how to cook for ourselves. I never knew why I loved being in the kitchen with her, even more so than my sisters. Now I could remember. It was in the kitchen that I first realized what love was. Preparing food for your family is an act of love.
That memory more than anything else spurred me into making something not only for myself, but for my mother as well.
As I cooked, I began to think about the things that had opened up for me.
Granny was a witch.
That was probably the biggest of all the revelations.
I had felt like a girl growing up.
That didn't feel so big for some reason. It just felt. . .right.
Merlin's Heir.
A dim memory from my past, from the beginning, opened up for me, and I knew it was the last vision I would see.
"Magic is what holds the cracks in the universe closed. It can be used to change things, but mostly it's there to keep things the same."
"Keep things the same? But wouldn't that happen automatically?"
"Science says yes. Magic disagrees. That is the real reason why science and magic are different. They are opposites. Science believes that there is order in chaos. Magic states that order is all."
"But, that seems so strange to me. It seems like science is trying to order the universe, not destroy it."
"Such big thoughts for a little thing. No, you need time to grow up, Merlin's Heir. Time to be a child."
"Granny, will being a child hurt?"
"Sometimes, but then it's the natural order of things. Child then adult then wizard."
"What if I don't want to be a wizard? What if I want to be a witch like you instead?"
"Then, child, you shall be a witch."
"That smells good, Abbie."
"Thanks."
"Will you ever forgive me for what we did to you?"
"It wasn't you or dad that did this to me, Mom. It was Antonidus."
"Who?"
"Sorry, Doctor Jacobs. He was a cat."
"What are you talking about?"
"Doctor Jacobs wasn't human. He had been shifted from cat form by his mother to make me forget my birthright."
"You sound so much like you did as a little girl. . ."
"Mom?"
"I just realized how much I did accept you as just another of my daughters. When your grandmother first explain it to me, that you thought of yourself as a girl, and not a boy, I just accepted it. Your father. . ."
"He wanted me to be a boy. I know. Don't worry about it, Mom. It was the world he understood. The world of science with its qualifications and its absolutes and its inevitable fall into decay."
"What are you talking about?"
"Just a little bit of magic versus science. Ages old debate apparently. Don't worry about it."
"Well, if magic is what it takes to get my beautiful daughter back, then sign me up."
We both had a little laugh over that, but there was a lot of bitter in the sweet.
I did forgive her. She did only what she felt was right for herself and her marriage. But it would take a while before I could talk to her an no longer feel the hurt of years in my soul.
-Well, the lazy one awakes finally.-
"Who are you?"
-One older than yourself. Younger than time, though. I'd really hate to be older than time.-
Fear entered me at this. I knew from the bedtime stories of my kittenhood who this must be.
-I am no bogeyman to keep you up at night. I was just a man, and now I've been awakened.-
"But you're dead?"
-The power of magic is to remain the same. Remember that Sebastian?-
I felt something shudder within me at the mention of that name.
-Contrary to what your 'mother' believes, some things can only be temporarily altered by magic, but never changed. She is about to learn this the hard way. She and that foul goddess of hers.-
"Some bonds can never be broken? Is that it?"
-No, anything joined can fail. What is, is.-
"You speak in riddles, old man"
-Old? Most definitely. Man? I was a man once, but no longer. That is what that creature who calls herself mother took from me.-
"Why are you telling me this?"
-Because it has begun again, old friend, and I need you to protect us all once again.-
"What had begun?"
-The war, of course. The war for who will rule this next one and a half. Cats or Humans. Who gets control.-
"Cats don't rule the world, silly old man."
-No, they rule the magic. Remember!-
The pressure on my mind was intense, unbearable, and then the wall broke down, and I remembered the last war. Humans and cats on both sides of it, and a champion for each. A human champion for the humans. Mother lead the cats.
"Merlin?"
-Not any longer, Sebastian. Not any longer.-
"So, the heir has been born already? It's already that time?"
-The time is already past for it to start. The foul mother delays it.-
"Who? Who is the heir?"
-You already know, Sebastian. Go to her now, and be ready.-
I hadn't gotten them in bed since the first time I visited "Dr. Jacobs."
"Is this supposed to get into my good graces, Mom?"
"No, this is to let you know I remember. These were your favorite, and a comfort food for you. I thought. . .you never wanted them any more after you visited that doctor. You changed so much, Abbie."
My Mom was crying, holding the tray of pancakes and boysenberry syrup. My stomach rumbled. One little taste wouldn't. . .
"I'll just take them. . ."
"No, you can leave them, if you want. I mean, I am hungry after all."
"Maybe we could talk while you eat?"
"Mom, I know from your actions over the past twenty-six years that you meant me no harm. I know you love me. Right now I don't care. My heart is the part of me that's railing against this. I don't feel loved."
"I'm sorry, baby. I'm so sorry," she was crying as she left and all I could think was 'good.'
I began to eat my pancakes, but they tasted like ash in my mouth. I had achieved no victories here. All I had done was alienate the only person who really understood what was going on with me.
I was so conflicted. Did I just leave? Did I just tell her I didn't care about all that?
I felt a warm body leap into my lap and I pulled it to my chest and absentmindedly stroked his ears. I needed the comfort of another being right now, and I didn't care if that being was Mr. Nibs. He didn't know it yet but he'd actually done me a greater service than anyone else in my life at the moment.
He'd opened the door whereby my body, mind, and soul were one.
Didn't mean I trusted him either.
I didn't much trust anyone right now.
'Can't breathe.'
"So, Mr. Nibs. Where have you been?"
'Oh, here and there. Learning that certain people are not to be trusted'
"Like I don't trust you."
'That's warranted considering what you know.
'
"New revelations for me?" I said with more venom than I'd intended.
'I guess it can wait. We're only in the beginning of a war for dominance after all. Heck the last one lasted almost fifty years and spawned some of the longest lived stories in the history of the human race, but you know. Take your time.'
"What are you talking about?"
'Only the fate of reality.'
"Stop talking nonsense, Mr. Nibs." Nothing happened. I tried again, "Mr. Nibs."
'It was never my true name, Mouse.' I felt laughter in my mind.
"What's so funny?"
'I just remembered why. . .I named the boy Marlin originally. Problem was he had no idea what a Marlin was, and the vowels kept getting mixed up.'
"Is there actually a hierarchy of these names or are you making all this up as you go?"
'Of course there's a hierarchy. Dog and Mouse at the bottom. Then sea fish. Then lizards. Then Birds. Then other land mammals. Then sea mammals. Then cats.
"So, it is actually saying someone is beneath a whale or a cat to call them Human?"
'Crap, you weren't supposed to catch onto that. Most familiars are too humanocentric to even realize that.'
"Ok, so, in these groups, there is no hierarchy?"
'Of course not. How much of a pain in the butt would that be?'
"They're names, got it."
I just sat there rubbing his head as he purred, that is until he started to nuzzle my breasts.
"Hey, watch that!"
'Sorry. Wasn't really realizing where I was for the moment.'
"Uh, huh."
'Getting scratched is almost as good as sex for a cat. I was completely in the moment and not really aware of my surroundings.'
"Oh, gross." I dumped him on the floor and went to the bathroom to wash my hands. I suddenly felt so accidentally violated.
'But it's a natural physiological response!'
"I am not having sex, in any form, with my cat.
'I'm your cat? I feel so honored.'
"Wait, I thought all you cat's felt that you were above humans. That you couldn't be owned?"
'So much to learn about cats, Mouse. There's a difference between belonging and ownership.'
"Oh, really."
'Of course. With belonging, you accept joint responsibility for me. With ownership you are saying you define me.'
"Like when I say someone is my boyfriend?"
'Don't you mean to say girlfriend?'
"No, I meant boyfriend."
'Oookay, well yes, it is like that. You don't own another person. You accept responsibility with them for their future. You are admitting your reliance one on another.'
"I'm still not having sex with you."
'Not even a little sckritch?'
"No."
'A minor rub?'
"Fine, as long as you don't nuzzle my breasts again."
I began to rub his neck, and realized that he'd distracted me from the entire reason I'd started holding him in the first place.
"Thanks, Mr. Nibs."
'For what?'
"For distracting me from my sucky life."
'That's what cats are for. But with your mention of boyfriends, I thought you were settling in nicely to being a girl.'
"Oh, being a girl is perfect for me. I never knew I always wanted to be a girl. No, it's everything in my life that I thought I knew that I don't want."
'Want to talk about it?'
"What for? Why would I want to talk about the betrayals of everyone I know, including you, with you?"
'Sometimes talking to someone about your problems doesn't make them seem so bad.'
"My Mom and dad sent me to a fake shrink who used magic and hypnosis to erase my entire life before the age of 8. They also had a new persona implanted there so that I would think I was a boy.
"They erased my first kiss. They erased every memory I had of my grandmother. And if that wasn't enough. . .actually that's about it. They erased me.
"Killing me would have been better."
'Really? You'd prefer to be dead than a seventeen year old girl?'
"But I'm not seventeen."
'Are you a witch, or aren't you?'
"I'm a witch."
'Then you're seventeen.'
"Huh?"
'A witch is one who defines the constants of reality, Mouse. You define birthdays, and loves. You define race and gender. You choose what everyone else perceives.'
"How can this be? They're supposed to be evil? Aren't they?"
'The witches lost last time, Mouse. Of course they were cast in a bad light by the winning side. Wizards only avoided it because of the strength of the ideal that was Arthur's Camelot.'
"I don't understand."
'Camelot as an example of perfect order has been upheld through wars, and concerted efforts by chaos to tear it down. Even attempts to destroy it as an ideal have failed. I mean all Le Morte d'Arthur did was keep the expand the fame of Arthur.'
"How did. . ."
'Simple, it impugned the manhood of Arthur suggesting that one of his nights had to service his wife for her to be satisfied.'
I blushed to my boots.
"Ok, this is insane. How come I'm reacting this way. I've said worse."
'You redefined your reality, Mouse. When you accepted your name, and your birth date, you changed your history.'
"I almost lost myself to that change."
'Which is why amateurs should not do magic. Remember yourself. Your personality has changed. Not all of it, but parts of it. Keep hold of who you were and you should regain it. Don't forget yourself.'
"How powerful is my definition of reality?" I said getting a small smile.
'For most witches? It might cover a week or two in time and their immediate surroundings.'
"I didn't ask for most witches."
'You have the ability to rewrite all of time.'
"Shit."
I sat there and let that sink in for a moment. I could redefine reality itself.
"You're mother is that powerful too, isn't she."
'Mother is not mine. She is your opposite.'
"My opposite?"
'Your rival. Your nemesis. Your opponent.'
"You keep disuading me from this. Am I powerful enough to. . ."
'STOP THINKING THAT!'
-You can read my thoughts.-
'Of course I can, especially with they're this loud. Do not consider what you are thinking. Do not contemplate it. Do not fantasize about it.'
"But, you're my cat. I just want. . ."
'You shouldn't want it.'
"You put the idea in my mind. It will not just go away, Mr. Nibs."
'STOP!!!!!!!'
"I CAN"T!"
I was so tried, but there was something important that I needed to do. Something I had to remember.
I stretched. . .and something felt wrong. So wrong. The carpet just didn't feel right. It felt so rough. I opened my eyes and took a look at my hairless arms.
"What in the. . .Abbie, what in the hell did you do, girl!"
"You just called me Abbie, Mr. Nibs."
I was speechless. I sat up on my rump and looked at where Abbie was hiding her head in her arms. She was blushing as well.
"What? I'm just naked."
"Look at yourself in the mirror, you silly cat!"
"You self centered, ignorant, adolescent, human girl. What in the hell did you do to me?!"
AUTHOR'S NOTE: When I first began to write this story, I had a good idea where I wanted it to go. I had a plan. Then, unfortunately, the story got the bit in its mouth and simply began to run away with me. The story is currently in a blind alley that is not heading anywhere I would like it to go.
I have written between 3k and 4k words for the next chapter. Unfortunately, I keep deleting everything I wrote and starting over. About the time I did that the fourth time, I decided that this story was a lost cause.
I was interested to see where I would take me, and unfortunately, it has not taken me far enough. I apologize to everyone who was enjoying this story.
This does not mean I will never end it. It simply means that I would have to rewrite it before I continue. I'm not really up to rewriting it right now.
I would love to be able to market this to people out there in the real world, in print format, but I am afraid, as always, that I am not good enough for that. The other problem is that I simply don't feel that it is commercial enough. Regardless of either of those points, I present this story here, to you. As I get more done, I will post it up in two chapter segments, at least until the B reel of the story concludes, which it is likely to do before the end of the story proper.
1. INTERIOR: LUNCHTIME, SCHOOL CAFETERIA.
STUDENTS CAN BE SEEN IN GROUPS AT THE ROUND TABLES SCATTERED THROUGHOUT THE SPACE IN A SEEMINGLY RANDOM PATTERN. WHILE IT IS OBVIOUS BY THE CLUMPS IN THE OTHERWISE EVEN DISTRIBUTION THAT CERTAIN GROUPS PREFER TO SIT TOGETHER, LIKE THE JOCKS AND THE CHEERLEADERS IN ONE AREA, THE REST OF THE PEOPLE AT THE SCHOOL SEEM CONTENT TO BE INTERMINGLED. THE SCHOOL UNIFORMS BLUR WHAT WOULD NORMALLY BE EASY DISTINCTIONS OF CLASS, ECONOMIC BACKGROUND, OR PERSONAL STYLE THAT NORMALLY DIVIDE THE CLIQUES AT A HIGH SCHOOL. BRIAN IS SITTING ALONE ATTEMPTING TO WRITE IN A NOTEBOOK. VALERIE APPROACHES FROM THE DIRECTION OF A TABLE SET A LITTLE FURTHER APART THAN THE OTHERS.
“Hey, can I take this?”
I looked up from my contemplation of the fake wood grain on the table and into the bluest eyes I have ever seen. These were not a pale blue like a winter sky. These were not the royal deep blue of a bottomless sea.
No, this blue was that particular shade that you see and all you can say is, ‘Hey, that’s blue.’ Yes, her eyes completely defined the color blue. I had to shake myself to realize that she was talking to me, and not just showing off her sapphires to me.
I looked down where she was pointing, and realized that she was gesturing, not to the sheaf of papers that refused to orient themselves into a proper story, but to the forgotten brownie on the table. When I’d put my lunch together this morning, I’d thought that the brownie would go great with the other foods that I was tossing into the sack that would reside in my bag until that moment, almost thirty minutes ago, that I would draw it forth into the light of day for a moment before consigning it to the empty black pit that I used for a stomach.
“Hello?”
I smiled and shook my head.
“Sorry, I was somewhere else completely. Sure, take it.”
Still trying to get my mind out of the place that it had run off to, I was amazed when she sat down in front of me.
“I thought…”
“As long as you’re sharing a desert with me, I might as well share my company.”
My next thought wasn’t one of appreciation, and my frown accompanied the thought to ask her to leave.
“Look, Brian, before you say anything, my friends did bet me that I couldn’t get you to give me your brownie. I took the bet because…”
“You felt sorry for me?” Disgust filled my voice. I didn’t need people to be sorry for me.
“Yes, actually, you always sit here along in the cafeteria. I mean, no one likes to be alone.”
“Thank you…” I paused, waiting for her to supply her name. It's not that I didn't know it, just that we'd never, officially, met.
“Valerie.”
“Thanks, Valerie, but I sit alone because I am fifteen pages behind and my agent is telling me I’m going to lose my contract if I don’t get these into my producer by the end of the week.” She opened her mouth to speak, but I answered the question before she could voice it, “Last week I sat alone because I had fifteen pages to write, and I had no idea where to take everything. Well, where to take anything really.”
She smirked at me, “And the week before?”
“Well, the week before, I wrote fifteen pages, assuming that it would always be that easy, finished by Tuesday, and spent the rest of the week watching what other high school kids do for fun during lunch.” I smiled at her and she laughed. I only hoped that this time it was someone laughing with me and not at me.
My smile became a bit more genuine, and after a moment or two she composed herself and got up, I assumed, to leave. I turned my attention back to the sordid on-screen lives of my characters when I felt a hand on my arm, drawing me to my feet.
“What are you doing?” I protested.
“It’s Wednesday. If you haven’t even begun by this point, then your writing is a lost cause. And even if it isn’t, two weeks ago you wrote fifteen pages in two days, which means you still have Thursday and Friday before everything falls into the crapper.”
“I really need to get back…”
“Look, what’s so important that you’re writing anyway?”
“Nothing. I’ll go with you.” I shook my head ruefully as I shoved the papers into my backpack unceremoniously. I shoved the papers unceremoniously into my backpack. I unceremoniously shoved the papers…
Now you see the real problem I was having writing the fifteen pages that were due. I simply couldn’t get the feel for the words. I felt as though my entire life were a lie. I was writing about situations I would never be in performed by people who would never give me the time of day.
People like Valerie and her friends.
Well, visiting with them for the rest of the lunch hour might actually give me some food for thought, and help me to add some realism to the oh-so-popular lives of my protagonists.
It wasn’t until I’d walked halfway across the crowded room that I realized who it was exactly that she was leading me toward.
“Oh, shit. You’re a drama geek?”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
I simply couldn’t say anything at all. I walked numbly, as if on my way to my own execution, sure that if anyone would figure out the person I was hiding, it would be a group of thespians. No, those aren’t women who are into women and lisp. They are the people who…act, the people who bare their souls to the world for a few coins and fleeting applause.
They’re also the above the stairs nobility to my humble below the stairs writing servitude.
“No, not bad, just I’ve gotta…” I began.
“…go not write something?” She continued for me, and then laughed. No, she more giggled. I really liked it, but I didn’t want to tell her something as inane as that.
“Look who finally decided to join us,” the token Goth girl said from her corner of the round table. No, don’t ask me to explain it any more than that. It was a round table, but the…way…that she sat there suggested to me that she was sitting at the corner of the table. Her makeup, unlike many Goths I had seen, was very Egyptian. You know, the long sharp points that jab out from the top of the eye orbit halfway to her ear? And unless she was wearing makeup on her hands, her pallor wasn’t caused by anything other than her porcelain skin.
“You know, those contacts aren’t good for your eyes.”
“These are my natural eye color…sweetie” she said with a very toothy smile.
“Nah, your eyes are green. I can see the rings, and your hair is naturally red, even though you are dying it black. Your roots are showing.”
Everyone except of the Egyptian Goth laughed at this, and she just blushed.
“He has you there, Leanne, your roots are showing.” Valerie said coming to my rescue.
“So the reclusive Mr. Hemingway has finally condescended to join the rest of us,” said a boy. I could only see the back of his head, as he had not turned around as we approached.
“Shut up, Aaron,” Leanne said.
It seems I would never outlive the stupid producer’s cruel joke. My hair, before I moved to this school, was untamable without a half ton of gel. I exaggerate, but only a bit. I know this because I go through a bottle of extra hold every two weeks so that my hair didn’t resemble the boy in front of me. It was a passable attempt to create the ordered chaos that had inspired the locks that graced the head of my main character.
When people had begun to ape the character, I had done everything in my power to change my hairstyle, including trapping my hair in a shell made out of styling gel. All I’d used to have to do was get a haircut every two weeks and run my fingers through my hair a couple of times after I got out of the shower. It wasn’t much of a style, but it had been mine.
I also used to be able to go out of the house in a t-shirt and jeans without feeling like I was completely naked.
It suddenly occurred to me that Valerie was inches in front of my face and I hadn’t noticed, I’d been so busy worrying about Aaron’s hair.
I stumbled backward a couple of feet, and got a laugh out of the people around the table.
“Welcome back,” she said with that sweet smile on her face again.
“Thanks, I think.”
“Make way, guys,” she said as she took a seat at the table, dragging me after her. As I was just shy of a foot taller than her, and likely outweighed her by at least fifty pounds, I had to let her drag me to the seat, but right at that moment, I would have let her drag me anywhere.
To tell the truth, I was getting bored with…
“So, I was telling Chelsea, before you came dragging the writer with you, that there’s no way that Whitney will ever sleep with Mark,” said one of the other girls at the table.
“Why not,” I asked innocently, ”Mark is completely in love with her and would be willing…”
Crap. Crap, crap, crap.
“So you watch Murray Heights?”
Watch, that works, I thought to myself as I blushed furiously. Even if I hadn’t watched an episode in almost two years, I’d written three quarters of them on my own, and the remaining quarter in collaboration. I knew the characters inside and out. I knew their motivations, if I would never know the motivations of the people around me. So, I could say that I watched…
…if only the words would come out of my mouth.
“Look, you embarrassed him.”
“I don’t watch the show.” I said looking directly at Valerie. What was I doing? After all of the work coming to a new school, hiding my real hair, sitting alone at lunch, why did I have to tell the truth now?
I realized that I never wanted to lie to the person sitting there at the table next to me, that’s why.
“Come off it, how would you…”
“I’m usually on set, at least a few hours a day, when they are filming.”
“You’re in crew? That’s so cool.” The Egyptian Goth was the one who voiced that. Isn’t a Goth in Tech a little cliché? I know I’d never write one into the series. Before I could deny it, Valerie had snatched my pack and was already opening it. I tried to reach around her to get it, but without actually touching her… and I didn’t feel comfortable doing that… I couldn’t get it away from her. She looked at the printed name on the notebook that I did all of my writing in.
I heard a small intake of breath.
“What is it, Val?”
She said nothing, just quickly shoved the notebook into the backpack and zipped it shut. The entire world fell out from under me. Usually, I had the black cover notebook with me. It had no identifying marks, and I’d be able to spend the time between here and the studio copying into the official notebook, the one with my real name on it. Today, however, I’d brought the official scene notebook with me, hoping that I’d get everything done right the first time.
No, let’s be honest, I didn’t bring the other notebook because I was sure I wasn’t going to get anything written.
“Spill, come on, what does he have in his bag. It’s not like he has Brian Metzner’s notebook…in…”
Valerie blushed and everyone turned to look at me.
The girl who’d asked me about Murray Heights let out a little giggle, “Hi, I’m Angela. That is Chelsea over there,” she pointed at another of the girls at the table, “and Murray Heights is our favorite show.” A number of the other people at the table voiced agreement with this statement and told me their names as well. Aaron was an obvious member of this group, suddenly more interested in getting on my good side than he had been only moments before.
I seriously considered banging my head into the table at that point. As it was I took my bag and calmly left the cafeteria. It was still a good ten minutes before the bell rang, but I figured walking anywhere would be better than staying in that room and might even do me a world of good.
”ƒ
2. INTERIOR: METZNER HOME, BRIAN’S ROOM.
THERE IS A NOTEBOOK COMPUTER OCCUPYING THE LION’S SHARE OF A SMALL DESK. A DESK LAMP IS CLAMPED TO THE LEFT SIDE OF THE DESK. A YOUNGER BRIAN SITS ON THE BED, WRITING IN HIS SPIRAL BOUND NOTEBOOK. THIS ONE LACKS THE BLACK LEATHERETTE COVER OF THE ONE HE WILL BE WRITING IN AT SCHOOL. A MONTAGE OF SCENES FOLLOW THIS INCLUDING A GRADE SCHOOL PLAY, GOING TO THE MOVIES, AND BRIAN TYPING AT HIS COMPUTER. VOICE OVER THROUGHOUT.
I didn’t want to be a writer when I was younger. I wanted to be an actor. If I thought beyond just the moment, the short term, then I thought about being a director, and bringing the best out of my fellow actors. If I ever thought about being a writer, then it was something at the bottom of my list, and then only to write my memoirs at the end of my life. I wanted the spotlight, not the shadows.
I caught the bug, I think, when I was in grade school. My school put on a production of Romeo and Juliette. I’m sure it sucked, but that wasn’t the point. I loved it.
There is something about the world of actors that speaks to me. I love pretending to be something I’m not, to take up someone else’s shoes for a mile or two, and then releasing them and going back to being myself. There is self-discovery for anyone who takes the time to be someone else for a while.
The atmosphere of the stage is addicting. It is non-stop running from place to place so that you can calmly walk onto the stage just at the moment that your cue comes up, and make everything look effortless.
Unfortunately, I never made anything look effortless.
I was the person that they would cast because they needed another guy in a scene to balance out the ratio. The person they begged not to move, or speak. To look interested in the real stars, and not what I really was, bored out of my skull.
When I was fourteen, I got a part with lines. Ok, not lines, line. Actually, it wasn’t even a line. It was a word, one single word that separated me forever from who I was and what I wanted to become.
That word was look, and in five performances in a week and a half I forgot that word, or missed my cue, or came in too early. I…suck as an actor. So, a year and a half later, just after my sixteenth birthday, I hung up my cloak, wiped off the last bit of makeup, and tried to move on with my life.
Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach. Those who can’t teach, become critics.
That is exactly what I did. In this age of easy access to free web service, I simply hung my shingle out amongst all of the others, and began to rip into the attempts of people so much better than myself to present a different face to the audience.
I began small. First I destroyed a school play, and then a symphony orchestra. Before I knew it, I was tearing apart movies, television shows, books, or anything else I could get my hands on, and I was getting downright mean. It was after I watched a television show, which I’ve promised never to mention again, that things began to change. It’s not that the show in any way changed me, as that would be giving too much credit to one of the worst pieces of f…iction it has ever been my misfortune to inflict upon myself, but that I changed because of what I thought about the show.
I know, it’s a paper-thin distinction, but one that I feel is oh so important to my story.
If I am really being truthful, I wasn’t the one who started the change.
My sister loved to read my blog, as usually I destroyed other peoples’ work with wit and humor. I even occasionally praised the truly inspired things that people wrote. It wasn’t something that I did often however.
This time, the offending piece of refuse prompted me to write, ‘This show was so poorly written, that a three year old with a crayon and a lack of imagination, or understanding of the world, could have done a better job. At least there would have been fewer plot holes.’
She stormed into my room as I was listening to my headphones and ripped into me, “Why don’t you do it then, Brian?”
“Come again?” I asked, rather stupidly I might say. I’d written the piece a couple of hours before, and I’d mostly put it out of my head.
“Write the show better. You said a three year old could do it. Why don’t you?”
“Because…”
“You spend so much time ripping on writers, and you never even tried that. Sure, you failed as an actor, but…”
“I’m not a writer, Kat.”
“Really? And what is it you do on your blog?”
“I…critique.”
“Using the written word?”
“Fine, I’ll try it, but not with that show. Anything but that show.”
“Write for Murray Heights, then. Fix the problems with Murray Heights.”
I’d watched the first few episodes with Kat, because she insisted, and it had an actress that I once had a crush on, but the show had quickly shown itself to be poor writing fronted by one or two good actors and a cast of mediocrity.
And in this case, Kat was feeding my words back at me. I’d said things like, “if I were writing this, I would have…” or “they should have done this instead.”
I sat down, and watched all of the episodes I’d missed over the course of a week, and then I started taking apart the storyline. I figured out the plots, sub-plots, side-plots, and alternate plots. That took a week alone. I was a man obsessed.
That is when the germ of an idea came to me. There were three characters in the show that were central to the main plot, and the main plot was the problem. For the main plotline to change, the three characters would have to change. I stopped and considered my options for a moment before inspiration struck.
I began to write.
I’d be lying if I said that it was easy, and nothing about it was really good. My first pass just rehashed more of the same stories, in the same order, with the same bad result.
“Gah!” I yelled out, inches away from throwing my notebook across the room. The sound of the pen scratching across the paper was something that I could never do without. There was simply something about the impersonal nature of the clicking of the keys that didn’t quite feel like real writing to me. So, when I wrote, it was in pen on college ruled paper.
This wouldn’t be the first time that I would have thrown the notebook, listening to the swish of pages flapping in the manmade wind, but this time I stopped and just sat there. I’d be so sure of my ability to write, but when I sat down to do it, it was nothing more than pale imitation of the work that other’s had done before me.
“Not working out as you’d hoped?” Kat said with a smile.
“Every time I try to take Tonya and make her into a real three dimensional character, she defies me and slips back into her old habits, or just sleeps with James, or tries to seduce Mark. I end up with the same arguments and lack of growth that I think the writers should have fixed a season and a half ago. Entropy, thy land is Murray Heights.”
“Nice monologue, Shakespeare.”
I snorted at that.
“Look, Brian, if she’s that bad, kill her off and replace her.”
I’d never considered it, but Tonya…
“Oh, no, get that gleam out of your eyes.”
“Why not? I could just…”
“Just nothing, people like Tonya.”
“Why? She’s a conniving, backstabbing, self-centered…”
“She’s popular and holds onto that popularity with an iron fist. She commands respect.”
“She’s a slut.”
“Brian, you don’t understand.”
“No, I don’t. She’s a train wreck.”
We went on in that vein for over an hour of Katherine telling me how necessary Tonya was for the story, and me becoming certain that Tonya never belonged in the first place. Unfortunately for everything I was trying to accomplish, my sister finally convinced me that she might just be right.
I’d like to say I had the best of intentions, and that I simply thought that Melissa Nollin was a great actress who would fill a role perfectly, but that’s not why I was taking a break to look up images of hot girls.
No, I wasn’t looking at any naked images. I was just looking for new wallpapers. I mean come on, I was sixteen.
And there was Melissa, all blonde hair and blue eyes. I have a thing for blue eyes, ok?
Looking at Melissa, I began to think of a new way to fix the problem. It was becoming clear to me that going from where the show currently was, and trying incremental changes, was what was wrong with my screenplay. The show was about halfway through the second season at the time, and people were unsure if it was even going to finish out that season, let alone get renewed for a third one, so I used that uncertainty to build up my story.
I began to write about a new girl coming to the affluent school. She was there on a scholarship, so she was smart. She’d have to be pretty…I picked the best headshot of Melissa I could find and set her as the wallpaper on my screen and retrieved my notebook. What emerged wasn’t, quite, the season three opener that everyone is familiar with, but it had most of the same elements.
Things had changed in Denver, Colorado and Tonya was in a rehab facility, something I didn’t keep. James was in jail for stabbing Mike, which I did keep, and there was a fresh, but not innocent, Whitney. Her first day as a Junior in the midst of all of the other characters that everyone already knew.
I scanned the pages into my computer because I really didn’t want to type it all in, and then try and get the formatting correct. After I was done with that it took me a little over two hours to find an email address for the producer of the show, and before I could think better of it, I emailed it to him, along with the message, ‘This is where you should take the show for season three.’ I only hoped that Paul Reichen looked at it before deleting it.
I was dozing on my bed, listening to my music, when I realized how stupid I’d just acted not five minutes before and tried to recall the email. Just as I figured out how to do it, I received a reply.
‘Thank you for your interest in the show. I’m looking over your proposal now and will get back to you once I’ve had an opportunity to read it.’
“My what?”
Katherine came running at my shout.
“No, no, no. This can’t be happening.”
“What can’t be happening,” she asked, concerned at my behavior.
I gestured at the screen and she laughed.
“It’s not funny.”
“It’s hilarious. What did you send him?”
I showed her the pages I’d torn from my notebook, and she sat down to read. I’d written about forty pages, in script format. As it was single spaced, and in my cramped style, it would cover most of the forty minute ‘hour’ of a single episode of the show.
It took her about two hours to read through it.
“You killed off Tonya.”
“She’s just in…”
“You might as well have. Whitney is so much more…likeable.”
“She’s not all sugar and spice you know.”
“Oh, I can see that. There is no way she’s as much the good girl that everyone takes her for, not with how quickly, and efficiently, she seized power in a new school.”
“You mean ruthlessly?” I asked.
“No, she obviously has a sense of fair play, something Tonya never had.” Kat replied, not allowing me to pigeonhole Whitney before she’d even been cast.
Kat and I discussed the script that I wrote for a couple of hours before I went to bed. She seemed to like it, but I really had no hope that it would end up as anything more than a whim that I’d once followed.
Kat and I were talking in my room a week later, neither of us even thinking about the aborted attempt at changing the show for the better. I don’t even remember now what we were talking about, but my phone began to ring, and I picked it up.
“Hello?”
“Hi, my name is William Price. I’m looking for Brian Metzner?”
The shock of hearing one of the two producers from the show caused my voice to crack at a most inopportune moment. “I’m Brian,” I replied, even as I colored in embarrassment. I’m sure I sounded a lot younger than I was.
“Look, could I speak to your father then?”
“I’m the only Brian Metzner here, but I can get my dad for you if you like.”
“How old are you, Brian?” I could hear the disappointment in his voice, as if all of his hopes and dreams had suddenly been dashed in a single moment.
“I’m sixteen. What is this about?”
“Paul showed me your script proposal.”
“I’m so sorry you had to see that. I thought better of sending it the moment I clicked the button. Just destroy that copy and I’ll act like I never did it.”
“Look, it lacks polish, sure, but apparently it took a sixteen year old to resolve a problem in the story that the rest of us have been beating our heads against the wall trying to resolve for the first half of the current season.”
I was completely shocked. I couldn’t come up with a coherent response, and so my sister took over.
“Hi, I’m Kat… No, I’m his sister, but I am a little more mature than he is…. yes, nineteen… sure, I’ll let my parents know, and thank you again for calling, Mr. Price.”
“What did he say?”
“He said that he wants you and our parents to fly out to LA this weekend and talk to his writing staff about your ideas.”
That was probably the last thing I ever expected to happen. My knees buckled and I sat down, hard, on my bed.
“Are you ok?”
“Great… now I have to watch the shows again so I can be absolutely ready for any questions they might have.”
My sister just laughed as she left my room to go find my parents and tell them the good news.
3. INTERIOR: MIDDLE AMERICAN HIGH SCHOOL:
BRIAN IS WALKING AIMLESSLY AROUND THE SEEMINGLY EMPTY SCHOOL. THE SOUNDS OF STUDENTS CAN BE HEARD FROM BEHIND THE CLOSED DOORS OF CLASSROOMS. DAYLIGHT IS COMING IN FROM THE SPORADIC WINDOWS. NARRATION BEGINS AS HE CONTINUES TO WALK.
Walking around the empty halls of my school, I thought about everything that had brought me to this point. Mostly, I thought about those first few weeks of writing when everything was fresh and new, and I really didn’t know how much work it would be. I thought about the fear that maybe I wouldn’t be good enough, and the fear that I would be good enough.
When I first started thinking about what it would mean that the producer would be picking up my screen play. I realized that my entire life would likely have to change. This was a show that people watched. This was a show my sister watched. If everything went according to plan, I would be writing this show for an unknown length of time into the future.
Laughter began to bubble up inside me, and I just couldn’t help it. This school was supposed to be my refuge. It was supposed to be the one place in the world where no one knew me. For a while, it was, but apparently keeping a low profile just wasn’t in the cards for me.
I went into the boys locker-room. Physical Education was on the other lunch schedule, so they were all off somewhere else in the building, likely in the gym getting sweaty playing badminton or volleyball of something.
I slipped out of my clothing, after grabbing one of the scratchy towels, and washed my hair. I wasn’t going to trap what little style I had underneath the evil dome of gel that I’d forced myself to wear. I washed my hair a couple of times, dried off, and got dressed again. As it was, I was only two minutes late to my next class.
As it was English, in which I was the teacher’s aide, I was forgiven. Mr. Anders had me grading papers for him. I’d finished everything for the week yesterday, and there’d been no homework assigned last night, well nothing I could grade.
His classes were reading The Fellowship of the Ring, and had been assigned a hundred pages to finish before the end of the week. I hid out in the back room during most of his class as I really didn’t want people to know I was doing TA work for honor’s English. I closed the door on Mr. Anders’ lesson and began to pace.
People might start to get the right idea. They might start to think that I was a lot smarter than I pretended to be. I laughed at the thought. Here I was worrying about people discovering how smart I was, and the very people I did not want discovering already knew a bigger secret than simply being intelligent.
I was famous.
It wasn’t something that I often thought of, but it was true. My name was one that people had heard of, and beyond just those at the school. People thought of me as Brian Monroe here, or at least they used to before today.
I smiled ruefully at myself and began to laugh again. It wasn’t the sad laugh that I’d let out before, it was a real laugh, one from the bottom of my soul. What was I worried about?
I’d come here to Bellingham, Washington about six months ago. This was one of the more expensive schools in the city, and I was here on my own dime, my parents had a new house, and my sister was in the college of her choice.
Life was good.
My good mood lasted right up until I noticed that Valerie was in the hall to meet me.
“You ran out on us before I could say anything…”
“I didn’t need to hear it; I think I’ve heard it all before…” Her eyes fixated on my head as I was speaking, and I just let the words fade as she continued to stare. She wasn’t really listening at that point anyway.
“What did you do to your hair?”
I put my hand to my head, and then grinned at her. “Yeah, this is my normal hairstyle. I’ve been trying to hide myself away from the world, so to speak.”
“It looks so…natural.”
“That’s because it is. No product whatsoever. Just fingers to comb it and done.”
“You’re Tyler.”
I blushed a deep red, and turned to walk away.
“So, you think of yourself as the sometimes overlooked, but trying to fit in, younger brother. I can see it.”
Her statement made me pause and turn back around. “That’s not it at all. He’s got more going on than anyone in the show has yet realized. Tyler’s the one who…um…well…”
She began to giggle, as I tried to swallow my words. “That’s the reason that you hide, isn’t it? You’re horrible at keeping a secret.”
I laughed at that, but I nodded.
“Val, I’ve got to get to class.” I said and I turned to walk away, still smiling.
“We’re not done with this, Mr. Metzner.” Valerie called out to my back.
I laughed again as I continued down the hall.
“You’re late, Mr. Monroe.”
“Yes I am, Mrs. Caldecott”
My physics teacher turned a nice shade of puce that I knew I would use in a future scene of the show, and told me to go to the principal’s office.
I simply nodded, smiled at the rest of the class, and left. Mrs. Caldecott didn’t much like me because I tuned out in her class, usually writing script pages, and I was the only person who had an A in the entire class. It was the second time I’d taken this portion of the class. I’d had to disappear in the middle of my last physics class. They hadn’t given me credit, but they hadn’t penalized me with a failing grade either.
This led me to being seated outside the principal’s office, and for the first time in the past two weeks, I was actually writing.
Senior year for the students of Marshal High was much more difficult that I would originally have thought. It was all the same sorts of situations as Junior year, right? No, there are so many things that a Senior thinks that a Junior never does. I hadn’t finished my Senior year, and here I had to predict exactly what people were going to be doing at the end of it. We already had seventeen episodes in the can, which left me with the final five, maybe six, episodes to write. Next year would be Tyler’s Junior year, and I had no cast members his age. In fact, we basically knew nothing about anyone who wasn’t a Senior except for Tyler.
Perennial favorites of the high-school show like Prom, spring break, and so on, had already been covered. The class was set to graduate in the finale, or at least that was the current plan. I was supposed to be writing a series finale.
Mark had taken Whitney to the prom, an episode that hadn’t yet aired, and I’d almost revealed to the group earlier in the day. Something I really needed to learn to keep a lid on. Yes, it was implied at that point that Whitney had lost her virginity to Mark.
What if she hadn’t?
We never showed anything, and since then Whitney had been cold to Mark. The previous four episodes had featured Mark bragging to his friends about prom night, and a strangely silent Whitney.
I opened with Whitney watching something on her computer, and from that moment the simple end of the series got blown out of the water, especially when the scream issued from the speakers.
Unfortunately that was about as far as I got before the door opened and the principal ushered me into her office.
I was still buzzing with the ideas that had come to me, the re-imagining of what everyone was sure happened. I couldn’t help but smile when the severe looking Ms. Parsons began to glare at me.
“It seems you are disrupting Mrs. Caldecott’s class again.”
“I was about thirty seconds late. She called me on it, and I confirmed that I was late. What was I supposed to do, deny it?”
“A little humility wouldn’t hurt, Mr. Metzner.”
“Not only am I paying tuition here, Ms. Parson, but I purchased a state of the art chemistry lab, so that you wouldn’t use that name on any of my transcripts, something that I felt was excessive at the time. If we want to re-negotiate the deal, I could always call my lawyer and cancel the work.”
“Let’s not be so hasty, Mr. Metzner.”
I sighed.
“Mr. Met…Monroe. I know the money you’ve spent at this school, but I really need you to try to follow the rules.”
“Ms. Parsons, some people today figured out who I am. I have no idea what my agent is going to do about it.”
“I mentioned it was only a matter of time, Mr. Monroe.”
“I know, and I should have listened to my agent and accepted the invitation to that private school for actors. I get it. I’m sorry for taking it even a little out on you.”
“And I’m sorry for suggesting that we wanted you to bribe us so we would keep your name a secret.”
“What?”
“You were so quick to offer that I was shocked. I still have your personal check, if you want it back.” She pulled a slip of paper out of her desk and handed it to me. It was the personal check that I’d given her before the start of school.
I handed the check back to her. “No, go ahead. I’ve seen the state the lab is in, especially after that incident earlier in the year.”
She grimaced at the mention of the explosion, which I’d had nothing to do with, and pulled a sheet of paper from her desk and handed it to me.
“I’m sorry but I’m going to have to send you to detention.” I’d never seen Ms. Parsons smile, but she did sadness really well. It wasn’t a frown, but something she did with her eyes. A way she looked at me like I was condemned to die.
After the detentions I’d served in my old school, this one should be cake. There weren’t any gang members going to this school.
I thanked her for her time, took the pink slip of paper, and went back to class. I tried my best to hide the fact that I wasn’t taking notes. Instead I was writing more of the eighteenth episode of season four.
”ƒ
4. FX DIGITAL DISPLAY OF FLOORS IN SYNC WITH DINGING NOISE.
INTERIOR WOOD PANELED ELEVATOR
BRIAN, KAT, MOM, AND DAD WAIT FOR THE DOORS TO OPEN. NO ONE SPEAKS, BUT THERE IS OBVIOUS HAPPINESS IN BRIAN’S MOVEMENTS. MOM SMILES AT BRIAN.
INTERIOR OFFICES OF END OF LINE PRODUCTIONS
FAMILY GREETED BY PAUL AND WILLIAM AS THEY STEP OF THE ELEVATOR. THE ENTRY AREA HAS THE EOL LOGO ON THE WALL BEHIND A HALF-WALL. THE SECRETARY’S DESK IS ALSO BEHIND THE HALF-WALL.
“Brian, welcome to End of Line.” William said as soon as the doors were open enough for my family to step out of the elevator. I was looking around me, amazed at the size of everything. For some reason I’d been imagining that the offices would be something small tucked away into a corner of the building, and said as much.
Paul laughed, “End of Line was originally a game company. We produced a couple of games in the nineties, and then, when everyone was making the video game movies, we hopped on that bandwagon.”
“I thought all of those movies failed.” I said a bit confused.
William smiled ruefully, “Apparently our game wasn’t as popular as fifty million copies selling worldwide would lead someone to believe, plus, the nature of the film made it so that we could forgo the expensive special effects, but we’re not here to talk about Absalom, we’re here to talk about what you can bring to Murray Heights.”
“I thought…”
“Not here, William,” Paul said. “Let’s go to the conference room.”
We followed them to to conference room. When the troupe of us entered, William turned to my Mom, “Mrs. Metzner, would you mind taking your daughter on a tour of the facilities? It’s not that we want to get rid of you…”
Paul came to his rescue, “We want to verify that it was actually Brian here who wrote the script we received, and since he’s a minor we only need one parent. I know you’re here to support him, but for a least a little while we want to get a feel for what he can show us.”
Mom didn’t look too happy about it, but she motioned for Katherine to follow her and they followed the man, who seemed to materialize out of thin air, into the bowels of the beast. Ok, so it was an open, well lit, one might even say airy, office space. I don’t think I would have minded a tour myself.
“Before you begin, yes, Whitney was my idea, and in fact, the character was inspired by Melissa Nollin.”
The other men’s jaws dropped open at that.
“What did I say?”
“You never told anyone, did you William?”
“Not a soul, Paul.”
“Take a look at this before we continue, Brian.”
They tossed me a loosely bound script titled ‘Junior Year, episode 1.’ It read like a rough draft of the script I’d sent to them. It didn’t have the tie in to the earlier characters, and seemed to drop everyone that was in the show previously without any comment. It would have been the death of the show, and looking up once or twice at the other two men, I realized that they knew it.
In the show, one of the characters was named . It hadn’t even progressed far enough that they had names for all of them. There were striking similarities between Whitney, and the unnamed character in the printed script I was holding had some distinct similarities.
“I didn’t…”
“Oh, I’m figuring that out, and if we’d really thought you’d stolen the idea, you’d be talking to our lawyers,” William said.
“What did you want to discuss with my son, then?”
“Mr. Metzner, we need a sample of your son’s writing before we continue.”
“Then I expect him to be paid. This would be considered a commissioned work after all.”
“Dad, come on. We don’t need to…”
“Yes, Brian, we do. You may be willing to work for free, but your mother and I discussed this possibility before we came. I talked to an agent on your behalf to better understand the industry.”
Dad turned in his seat so that he was squarely facing to two men, “You would be commissioning this work from my son, so how about a thousand dollars for a complete script, plus royalties should you choose to air it. If you require less than a full episode, then you will pay him commensurate to the finished air time percentage.”
I have never known that a single word could carry that much desperation in it, but all William said was, “Done,” and Paul left the room.
He returned with a yellow legal pad and a pencil.
“You wouldn’t happen to have a pen, would you?” I asked.
He handed one to me, but before I could write, he spoke one last thing, “We’d like you to begin with the last aired episode, and give us a synopsis of where you see each episode going until the end of the season.”
“Wait a minute here,” My dad said, “This would be a complete plan for getting the season to the episode that my son already sent you. Providing that…”
“Mr. Metzner, we really like your son’s work,” Paul began.
“What Paul is trying to say is that we will provide him with adequate compensation.”
My father looked skeptically at them.
Paul took a deep breath and began again. “Mr. Metzner, we do not want to cheat your son out of anything, so while he works, how about we write up some documents and you can sign on his behalf, as you are his legal guardian.” Paul gestured for my Dad to precede him out the door.
“One last thing, Brian, we do not want Tonya sent to rehab,” William said as he moved to follow the other two out the door.
“Is it ok if she goes to Juvie then?”
They looked at each other, and Paul shrugged.
“The problem with rehab is there are rumors that the actress has been really taking drugs on set. She is clean and sober, as the random drug tests we are running prove, but if we send the character to rehab…”
I smiled in understanding. People often mistook characters for actors all the time, and if the character went to rehab…
“Alright then.”
The problem with starting from the last aired episode previously, was that I kept having the problem of lack of character growth. I sat there for about five minutes, just thinking of what I needed to do with the characters. It was only at the end of the five minutes that I realized that I had a readymade answer to all of it: James stabbed Mike.
They’d had no problems with it, so I might as well begin with the events that would lead up to that. The last episode to air was the sixteenth. I’d looked up a number of shows online, and figured I had between four and eight episodes to wrap everything up into a neat bow, a present to give to Whitney at the beginning of season four.
I had Tonya purchase the knife. Sure, it was a weak connection to begin with, but I had her purchase it as a present for Mike. She was still trying to get him to notice her as more than what she was, a bit of a slut and a backstabber, and thought that giving him something he could use the next time he went hunting would help her to break down his barriers.
He turned down the gift when she balked at going hunting with him.
It was a simple matter after that to build up the plan in her mind, and to plant the seeds of distrust in James. She let that fester for a while, and then literally put the knife in his hand and pushed him toward his former friend.
The problem was that in her twisted mind, she actually thought that calling the police on James would get Mike to like her.
Keeping the pacing the show usually followed, it took me seven episodes out of the eight episode budget I’d given myself to get this far. I considered creating a summer episode, but then I realized I didn’t need one. I created the courtroom season finale. A weak, but recovering, Mike sat on the witness stand and identified the knife that Tonya had offered him. It had an engraving of a Bulldog on the blade, the school mascot, something she’d done especially for him.
The episode would close with Tonya and James being sentenced. It was a perfect cliffhanger for the end of the second season.
Then, I wrote the beginning of the script for the seventeenth episode. I wove what had happened in the sixteenth episode, where it actually seemed as though Mike was finally giving into Tonya’s charms, into the story of love and betrayal that I had concocted for the rest of the season.
It took me almost five hours to finish it all, during which time I hadn’t even noticed who was in the room with me, just that people kept arriving and leaving.
I looked up when I was done to see that Paul was the only one left in the room with me for the moment. “I’m done.”
“Already? That was fast.”
I looked at my watch and stared, “It’s been five hours.”
“The last time we set this task for one of our writers, it took him two weeks.”
“I hope it is good enough them.”
Paul chuckled at this, and then put out a hand for the pad. I handed it, and the pen, over to him, and sat down to wait while he read it. He frowned more and more as he got further, and he had a scowl on his face by the time he’d begun to read the script at the end.
“It is really that bad?” I asked, getting really nervous at this point.
“No, it just means that we’re not renewing any of the other writers’ contracts.”
“What?”
“In less time than any of them you have provided more quality work than the lot of them together.”
I was shocked.
“If you can provide quality work like this in anything close to the time you just did today, then I really think we have a chance to fix the show.”
I blinked at him a couple of times. I had no idea what I was supposed to say.
“Since you apparently have an agent, I will need to make the formal offer to him, but if it’s not too bold I’d like to welcome you to the EoL team.”
“Dad!” Yes, I wanted my daddy to confirm the words that had just been spoken to me. It seemed to me that he’d just offered to make me the sole writer for a television show.
5. INTERIOR: HALF-PANELED CLASSROOM WITH BAY WINDOWS. AFTERNOON LIGHT IS STREAMING IN.
A SHORT STAGE AT THE FRONT OF THE ROOM, AND A TEACHER’S DESK IN FRONT OF IT ON THE RIGHT. MR. HUMPHRIES’ IS SITTING AT HIS DESK. BRIAN IS THE ONLY OTHER PERSON IN THE ROOM. BRIAN IS FOCUSED ON WRITING IN HIS NOTEBOOK.
I put the finishing touches on the episode and looked up, satisfied with myself for a job well done. I’d spent the greater part of two class periods and all of detention writing down what I felt was my best episode yet. I just hoped that Paul agreed.
It was about this point that I realized that I was the only student left in the room.
“Done, then, Mr. Metzner?”
“Um…”
“Valerie told me she knew, wanted to know if I did. I actually met you at a gala for the show, so I had to say I did know you, but you probably don’t remember that.”
“I…uh…”
“It’s a good thing you’re better with the written word, Mr. Metzner.”
I chuckled at this. “You will try to keep it a secret, at least from…whomever doesn’t know…”
He laughed. “Just go home, Mr. Monroe. Detention has been over for more than an hour.”
I looked up at the clock, and my stomach fell out. It was after five and I tried to be at the set no later than four. I threw things into my bag, zipped it up, and got up to leave.
“Don’t tell me you’re in a hurry now.”
“I’m late for work.”
“Work? Oh, you mean…”
“Yes, I’m supposed to be on set an hour ago.”
“I have something that I’d like to discuss with you. Could you talk to me before school tomorrow?”
“Sure,” I said as I ran out the door.
The car was waiting for me as I left the school. I thought that a regular sedan was a little less pretentious than the limo I could have afforded. I still had a driver on call, which driver I should have called when I knew I was going to be in detention.
“I’m so sorry, Dean, I should have called you.”
“I called the office when you didn’t show up in your normal five minute window. They told me you had detention, so I took off for an hour. No one told me they’d keep you for two.”
“That’s my fault. I was finishing up the next script.”
He pulled out into traffic before responding, “So, you finally finished it? Congratulations.”
I’m still unsure whether Dean actually likes me, or likes a job where he only has to work part time, but he is good company for the hour it takes to get from my school to the lot.
I pulled out my cell phone and called Francine, Paul’s assistant.
“You’ve reached Francine.”
“If I hadn’t ever reached your voicemail, I’d assume that this was it.”
“Hello, Brian. Glad you could finally call.”
“I got detention from Mrs. Caldecott. I swear that woman has it out for me. The main reason I’m late, however, is that I finished the script for episode eighteen.”
“Paul,” she yelled before removing the phone fully from her mouth. It was a bit deafening, but I was fine with that. The smile that lit my face was blinding and Dean had to drive.
“I hear you have good news for me, finally.”
“Well, I have news, but I’m not sure if it’s good.”
“A script in hand when the episode airs in two months is good news to me.”
“Then it’s great news.”
“I know that tone, Brian. What am I not going to like?”
I spent most of the rest of the hour describing what I had come up with. I told him what was in the episode, and not what was on the elusive video that Whitney watched. This episode was a descent into madness, of a sort. Whitney has no idea who took the video, who knows about it, or even how it was taken. There should have been no way for anyone to put one…there.
And her prime suspect for all of it is Mike who suddenly is nowhere to be found. He spends the entire episode gone. Well, except for the last page and a half. Him alone, answering questions you can’t hear in a sort of monologue.
I read the end to him as I’d written it.
“Well, I’ve got to go tell Jerry that he’s got the day off.”
“Let’s film that first, then you can call him back when we’re ready to film the next episode.”
“While that idea does have its merits, I think holding that bit of information will get a better performance out of Melissa. More believable.”
“You’re the boss,” I said with a smile.
“I am that. So, I take it you’re on your way in?”
“Pulling in now, actually.”
“I see you.”
Paul and Francine were standing outside waiting for me. I handed off the script to Francine who went off to get it typed out, or at least the pages that they would be working on today. They’d been re-running scenes that either William or Paul weren’t happy about, just trying to get that one perfect shot.
Since I joined the show, there were times that the show had been edited and in the can just a week before the show was supposed to air. It was thanks only to the distribution network of EoL that they were even able to get things in at that late date.
Giving all of the credit to EoL wasn’t accurate either. They had a sweetheart deal, or so it seemed, with the Television Network, that went a long way to keeping us in business as well.
I went inside and grabbed my official fake lot Id. My officially fake ID for the lot. The badge I wore so that people assumed that I was just Brian Monroe, gopher. No, the badge had an official job on it, but I’d never bothered to learn what my assumed duties were supposed to be.
“Hey, Brian.”
“Brian, could I talk to you about this line…”
“Brian, my man!”
I waved, talked, answered, and generally extricated myself from the only fans I really wanted. It could be intoxicating, which is why I stopped by Michelle last.
“I hear you finally got off your ass and wrote me something.”
“Hello to you too.”
She laughed, “Thank you, oh great writer for your condescension to we mere mortals.”
I just smiled.
“Hey, what’s up Brian?”
“Nothing.”
“Spill.”
“I already have a sister, Michelle.”
“And the last time that she was here, she said I should take care of you, so that’s what I’m doing.”
“Then why not go on a date with me or something?”
“Because I just turned twenty-nine. Come on, Brian. Sure, you may think it would be cool dating an older woman, but consider me in this for a moment. I’m ten years older than you. You were still in grade school when I graduated high school.”
“The first time.”
“And who do I have to thank for being back in this hell? You, thank you very much.”
“It’s not like you’re actually in high school.”
She just shook her head at me and smiled, “I’m still not going out with you, Brian.”
“I know that, and besides, yuck.”
She frowned at me and looked at herself in the mirror. I really liked Melissa, but she was a bit vain. Ok, so she was a lot vain. She looked younger than most of the girls in my class. Whatever products she was using, they were working.
If I’m being honest, it wasn’t all out of a bottle. She was naturally beautiful. And I’d heard the makeup techs talking about her flawless skin. It’s just that she was a lot older than me. She shouldn’t look like she could be going to my school.
One of the runners tapped me on the shoulder.
“There’s a girl at the gate? Says she knows you?”
“Oh, a girl…” Melissa began with one of her evil grins.
“Did she give her name?”
“Valerie Cartwright.”
“The girl.” Melissa said with the most evil grin I’d ever seen.
“Don’t you dare, Melissa.”
“I want to see the person who’s captured your heart, or has at least invaded your dreams.”
If she saw my scowl, I don’t think that it fazed her in the least.
“Come on, you talk about her all the time, and she’s probably the only person at your school that I could reliably name.”
I continued to glare at her, but she just laughed.
“Come on, Brian; let’s take a look at this girl…”
“Melissa, if you move one step further, I’ll kill Whitney.”
“You wouldn’t,” she said in mock horror. “Why, people love me.” She loved to bring out her southern belle at times like this. No one had the heart to tell her it was completely over the top.
“Then it will have to be an epic death scene, one to be spoken of in whispers until the end of time.”
Her eyes glazed over a bit. Many actors I’d met for the show had a soft spot in their hearts for death scenes. Melissa was almost gothic in her fascination with them. I threatened her with the one thing she wanted whenever I was trying to keep her out of something in my real life. She became so distracted that she’d completely forget what it was she was worried about before.
While she was occupied, I slipped out to the front gate.
“What are you doing here, Val?”
“Val? Did I give you leave to call me Val?”
That threw me aback. I hadn’t given much thought to it. I’d spent so much time crafting conversations with her, in which I’d just automatically dropped into calling her Val, that when I actually started talking to her I’d fallen right into it.
“Lighten up, Brai, I don’t mind.”
“Brai? I’d almost prefer you calling me by my middle name.”
“You have a middle name?” The gleam in her eye was frightening.
“Not that I plan on telling you,” I replied.
She pouted. I mean really pouted. Some girls try to pout. They stick out their lower lip, and look up at you through their eyelashes. It’s obviously fake. When Val pouted, it took her entire face, and it really looked like she was disappointed in me that I wouldn’t give her this one simple request.
“Don’t do that!”
“What? This?” And again, she pouted at me.
“You know, if you keep doing that I’m going to have to kiss you to…um…never mind.” I blushed bright red and she just stared at me, blinking.
“Sorry, that was completely…I’m a writer and…ok, I feel like I know you even if I don’t. I spend so much time imagining what I’d say to you…”
“Have you been writing lines for us?”
“No, I haven’t…wait us?”
She smiled at me, “Look, Brian,” she put special emphasis on my name, letting me know she used the full thing, “if we’re going to hang out, then there’s going to be an ‘us.’ We will end up doing things.”
“Sorry,” I began.
“And stop apologizing. The only reason I came over to your table today, is I was tired of waiting for you to come talk to me. I see the way you look at me.”
A shout came from behind me, “Mr. Metzner, they’re looking for you on set.”
“I’ll be just a moment, George.”
“You know, when I found that notebook in your bag, I was half convinced that this was all a put-on. I mean, not only is Brian Metzner my age, but he goes to my school. I asked for Brian Monroe at the gate and you came out, wearing a badge with that name on it, but he just responded to you when he asked for ‘Mr. Metzner.”
“You didn’t believe I was Brian Metzner?” I laughed at this.
“Hey, it’s not funny. Everyone at school thinks you’re Brian Monroe, straight A student and likely Valedictorian. There are some bright kids in the school, and for you to be the top student.”
“Second, actually. Sydney beat my score by one on the AP Biology test…um…”
“There’s a story there, isn’t there.”
“Maybe…” I said, suddenly defensive. I’d paid attention in class to the areas where Sydney had problems. I made sure to miss the problems that she would have problems with, four in this case, and then added a couple I knew that she would get. Apparently, she missed one of the ‘sure thing’ questions.
“Ok, tell me later.”
She waved and then turned to walk off the lot. It was only after she fully left my view that I realized I’d just confirmed my identity to her.
”ƒ
6 INTERIOR: EOL CONFERENCE ROOM
THE LIGHT IS DIM OUTSIDE THE GLASS WALL. ONLY A FEW OF THE LIGHTS ARE ON, AND THE LIGHTS OF THE CITY CAN BE SEEN THROUGH THE WINDOWS ON THE OPPOSITE SIDE OF THE ROOM. A NUMBER OF MEN CAN BE SEEN WITH BRIAN. CRUMPLED BALLS OF PAPER CAN BE SEEN SCATERED ACROSS THE TABLE TOP. BRIAN IS THE ONLY ONE WITH A LAPTOP.
"This is getting us nowhere. Look, I know that you were hired to help, but this series is irredeemable. You can put it on your resume in ten years when you are up for a real writing job."
I glared at him for a moment before I even thought to open my mouth to speak. He wasn't worth it.
"For a show that is 'irredeemable' as you put it, there is still a loyal fan base. It has potential that you and the rest of your team never explored."
"Like this abortion of an idea you have for the final episode of the season?"
My mouth dropped open. It wasn't the worst language that I'd ever heard, but it certainly wasn't something I expected from people who were supposed to be professionals. "Trite, I would accept. Dated even would probably work. Derivative, plagiarized, lacking in real dramatic content, or even simply poorly written, but an insult? And not even an original one at that. How about just calling it a sixteen year olds idea of dramatic conflict? Better yet, how about simply calling it a mary sue, wish fulfillment, or get really creative."
"Really, so, you're the writer, write. You be creative."
"This episode attempts to breathe life into a flagging series, but only achieves a temporary stay of execution through such dated and over used clichés like attempted murder of one of the main characters of the show and a court battle. They would have done better to kill the show than let this example of everything wrong with the genre ever see the light of day. The court scene is derivative and lacking in character depth, as the rest of the show has shown us for the past few years. In addition..."
"He got you there, Jason," one of the other men said while laughing.
Jason just glared at me.
"Now, look, I know that a couple of you are old enough to be my dad, but I am your boss. You may not think me qualified, and may resent that someone as young as me is in charge of this mess, but guys, we're on the same side."
"And what side is that, wunderkind?"
"We're here to fix this show and save our jobs. Now, who has actually read the synopses I sent to you all."
"Um..."
For the first time I really looked around and realized that no one else had their computers. Sure, I was writing on a pad, but I was using my computer for research, and other things. "Don't you guys read your email?"
"Yeah, at home." Jason quipped, smiling, but no one else joined in on the joke. They saw my scowl.
I looked at him in shock. How could he actually continue looking at this like I was just the kid in the room? Sure, I was a kid, but that didn't matter as far as his job was concerned. In fact, I thought he needed a wakeup call at this moment. If I'd been more aware of what it meant to be in charge I wouldn't have said anything, and let him just stew on it, but I being who I was, I couldn't let it continue.
"Jason, how about you just take the night off. We'll finish up without you."
"You can't do that!" He was pissed off, and was moving toward me.
"Jason, dude, he just did."
"You can't send me out of here like a bad child."
"Jason, if I wanted to, I could fire you. I am your boss."
"You're just some snot nosed kid. When you're gone in a week we’ll be back to finishing off the last season of this white elephant. Paul will come to his senses soon enough when you can't deliver, right guys?"
I looked at him in shock. Sure, the process had been painful so far but I'd never thought that these men would be as resentful of my presence as to intentionally sabotage my efforts to actually fix the show. I should have known better. I was taking their jobs after all.
I looked down at the table, and couldn’t look up at the men who were now staring at me. I heard the door open and close.
“I’m sorry…” I began, but looking at the smug faces I stopped. They were looking for weakness in me, and I was about to give it to them.
“I’m sorry you all feel this way. Paul has informed me that anyone not on board with this project can look for work elsewhere.”
You could have heard a pin dropping in the suddenly silent room, and then everyone was clamoring for my attention. No longer were they telling me how this idea wouldn’t work. Suddenly they were offering ideas to make it work better. The areas I could improve were pointed out to me through their suggestions and in a very short time we moved from what wouldn’t work, to what worked perfectly.
“Let’s call it a night, guys, and we can pick this up tomorrow.”
“We haven’t gotten to the best part of my idea yet,” one of the men said. I don’t remember what his name was.
“You want to have Whitney make an appearance in this season in the hospital for some reason.”
“How did you…”
“It’s similar to other things you’ve all written in the past. Whitney stays in the wings until the first episode of the next season. Period.”
There was some grumbling at this, but they all finally agreed with me. We called it a night and I went back to the hotel for a much needed rest.
I never imagined that the first day of my vacation was going to be spent writing for Murray Heights, but here my family was, in Canada, and I was going to be spending every one of the days of my ‘vacation’ in this building. Don’t get me wrong. I loved the fact that I had a real paying job doing something that came naturally to me. I was writing and being paid very well to do it. I was also a sixteen-year-old kid.
On the way back to the motel, I heard a song come on the radio that helped to change my perspective a little. I’d first heard it on Saturday Night Live. The musical guest had been a sixteen year old, and she wrote this song to perform it live for the first time on national TV.
Sure, I was young to be working, but so were a lot of other people. If you were lucky enough to fall into a career that you loved, complaining about it was the quickest way to either lose out on the opportunity, or become so fed up with it that you left it for something you would enjoy less.
I was whistling the tune as I walked through the door.
“You don’t look like any sort of princess to me, let alone daddy’s.”
I blushed at that and my sister laughed.
“Dad, tell me again why I can’t have my own room,” I yelled into the adjoining room as I glared at my sister.
“Because you haven’t been paid yet.”
“What about the commission for the first episode of next season, as well as the finale for this one?”
“In your college fund, dear,” my Mom replied.
Before I could answer my Dad continued, “This time, you were lucky. Next time they will want schooling. You’re going to college.”
This was getting to be an old argument, so I let it drop. I’d figured it out, and if I was careful I figured I could survive for the next twenty-five to thirty years on the money I was making now. Mom and Dad seemed to think that going to college was too important to pass up.
If I was being honest with myself, I agreed with them. But I also wanted to spend some of my money on things like paying off my parent’s mortgage…and a Ferrari.
I wanted a Ferrari or a GTO or a Mustang or something cool. At the time I had no idea what made a car good, I just based it upon what people in the movies thought was good. I would spend it on fashionable clothes, hire a consultant, you know, just the normal everyday rich kid things.
I realize that this wouldn’t have been playing it safe by any stretch. That is what I told my parents to try to get my hands on the money, all the while planning the things I would spend it on. It’s a good possibility that if I’d been sincere about wanting to be careful with my money that my parents might have let me play with some of it.
They knew me too well even then.
I went to sleep that night thinking about the core idea that they’d come up with for the show. They wanted Mark to spend the ending of the season in the hospital. They had some idea of Whitney as a candy-striper or something. While I would have loved to see the actress in that sort of a costume, it really didn’t fit with the character.
What did fit?
Then it hit me. Just because I didn’t want to introduce Whitney yet didn’t mean I couldn’t introduce her younger brother, Tyler. Before that moment I’d never thought too much about Tyler’s character beyond the fact that he was the younger brother. In that moment, I got to know him a lot better. I initially thought suicide, but not only has that been overdone in teen dramas, but I didn’t like what that said about Tyler.
So, I gave him a motorcycle and he crashed it into an embankment. He had a severe head injury, no helmet, and was in a coma. Mark would be put into his room, where eventually Tyler would wake up and they’d begin talking. It explained how Mark would first meet Whitney in the next season, as the two of them would be stuck there until the end of the school year. I’d have to explain Whitney’s absence from the room, but that wouldn’t be a big deal.
And to think, if I’d dismissed their suggestion out of hand I never would have thought to bring Tyler in.
I was ready for whatever would come my way the next day, or so I thought. Nothing prepared me for what actually happened. How could anything have prepared me?
“Everyone over-explains everything?” His passenger asked sotto-voce.
“Everyone over-explains everything,” the chauffeur continued, oblivious to his passenger’s response.
“Take you and me for example. They could explain the reason that the two of us look the same with something puerile like convergent evolution. You know, the idea that there is a perfect form for every function in nature, as if opposable thumbs were required for tool use or higher brain function.”
“You do have opposable thumbs.”
“Not the point I’m trying to make. Let me put it to you a different way. Take this fine vehicle we are traveling in. You don’t need to know how to build one to be able to ride comfortably in one.”
“I have you for that.”
“I’m not even sure I know enough about the mechanics of it to build one from scratch. Sure, if I can buy the parts from my local parts shop, I could put it together, but I have no idea of the specific variances or measurements of any of the individual bobbins or widgets.”
“Don’t forget the cogs and sprockets.”
“Now you’re making fun of me.”
“Not in the slightest. I don’t even know if there are any sprockets or cogs in this vehicle. How does the steering work anyway.”
“I only understand the basics, really. Sure, I know if part A is broken, I replace part A. I know part A inserts into slot B and so on.”
“The ankle bone connected to the…”
“Basically.”
As they continued on their journey, silence lapsed for a little while. The passenger looked out the window at the stars thinking about what the chauffeur had been saying. It seemed an eternity before the driver began to talk again.
“Take fantasy for example. No one worries if the monster has a proper evolutionary history. He can have 2 heads, breathe fire, and every time you cut one head off 2 grow back and no one questions it.”
“I think that’s because it’s magic.”
“Is that really an excuse? You get right down to it and everything is ‘magic’ from far enough away. Take your television for example. You may know the principle behind it, but could you really explain it as technology to someone who had never seen anything like it before? It looks a lot like a magic mirror if you ask me, especially the flat panel models that seem to be all the rage.”
The passenger laughed at him. “Aren’t you supposed to call it a vid-screen or something if it’s sci-fi?”
“Why? Human nature rails against it. People are, by and large, creatures of habit. If you called it a TV as a kid, chances are you’ll call it a TV as an adult. Consider when we started shifting from the standard definition screens to the high-definition ones. No one started calling them HDs, as much as the media would have liked us to. No, they are HDTVs, or simply TVs. Radio is still radio how many years later?”
“That’s different.”
“How? It’s simply named after the band of the electromagnetic spectrum that it uses. Tele-vision: two words meaning far sight. Auto-mobile: self moving. It is like coming up with a different name for a home planet of an alien species. Chances are it will be something like soil, earth, ground, or any similar word for the surface that the alien creatures live on…or in. Why even invent a name for an alien race? They’re just going to be human-kind, at least they will be in their own language.”
The passenger laughed a bit at this. Before the chauffeur could continue, an alarm went off.
“What’s that?”
“Something that can’t be there…atmosphere…” Before he could elaborate the vessel shook and there was a loud boom in the relative quiet of the cockpit.
“What’s that sound? Tell me! We’re going to die, aren’t we?”
“That was the sound of something important being sheared off by the force of us skipping along the surface of a planet’s atmosphere. I need you to belt yourself in because we’re going down.”
The passenger looked out the window that, until this moment, had shown him the splendor of space, and watched as the first wisps of vapor began to stream by. The view shifted as the craft rolled, barely in the control of his chauffeur. He caught sight of some landmasses as the vessel continued to roll. They passed into the night side of the planet, and he saw the lights dotted across the landscape in a parody of the stars they were leaving behind.
“It’s inhabited,” the passenger declared, a smile splitting his features.
“Yes, there are natives. How is that a good thing? Primitives. I’m only showing rudimentary communications satellites. No inter-stellar communications array of any sort. This is a backwater, and it’s not on the maps.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that if I don’t land with enough of the ship intact enough to take off again, that we are going to be stuck here for a very long time. Let’s hope that they breathe the same air we do. Now I need to concentrate.”
The passenger could only look on in horror as the lighted landmass got closer and closer with each pass around the globe.
The driver became more and more frantic as he lost more of the control surfaces of the craft. It hadn’t been designed to enter an atmosphere, and the closer they got to the planet, the less of his ship responded.
“Pray to whatever god you believe in, because I’m about to turn on the final safety features and leave our landing in the hands of fate.”
“But…”
“There’s not enough left to fly.”
Images from horror movies flashed through the passenger’s mind in the instants it took the driver to enter in a code on the computer panel and hit the enter key. After that he didn’t think a thing.
Take the object that is even now coming to rest upon the surface of the planet that the natives call Earth, as alluded to by the former pilot of the object.
It is strange to this world, being designed for use in a vacuum, and not in an atmosphere. Much of the portions that used to stretch out have been melted, sheared, or otherwise smoothed flat with the surface of the vessel. It glows with the heat of its passage through the atmosphere. A trail of smaller pieces is being shed even as it approaches the embrace of the planet it was never meant to meet. Most of those will burn up with their speed of entry.
And that speed is much greater than gravity itself would impart to the small bits of space rock that most planetary inhabitants call ‘shooting stars.’
Perspective tells you that the ship is graceful, and not all that large. You watch as it oh so slowly approaches the planet, almost a controlled descent.
Perspective lies to you because it knows your mind isn’t ready to handle the immensity of what you are seeing.
You get an idea of the size when the ship bounces off one of the mountains in the distance. The ship doesn’t dwarf the mountain, but for a moment, as it makes contact, perspective tells you that not only is the mountain a lot closer than you thought it was, but that it is much smaller. You thin that it might only be a hill. There is no way, perspective tells you, that the ship can really be that big.
Mountains block horizons, and this ship could easily be half the size of the mountain.
Easier, perspective tells you, to believe that the mountain is smaller.
Pieces of the ship spray out at the impact it made, and the trajectory of the ship shifts slightly as it begins to come in a little cockeyed. Even the mountain was only able to begin it moving, and not send the ship pin wheeling, as perspective tells you it really should have.
It is only a moment or two after this impact that the ship first kisses the Earth. Now it does tumble, shedding bits and pieces like clothes after one of your better dates. You know the ones I am talking about. Apparently the ship doesn’t stop there, as it is still shedding its material all over the desert basin where the Earth wants it to come to rest.
The ship continues to disintegrate, slowing as it does, until the only thing that’s left is a slightly glowing, mostly spherical object that is much smaller than the ship that it emerged from.
In fact, perspective would tell you it was only a bit of dust, but the cloud of dust that it raises tells a different story, and the enormity of the object that just tore itself to pieces aided by mother Earth and Gravity finally comes to you.
It is as if a city just crashed to the ground.
Now, if you were anything more than the lizards, birds, or rodents that really did see this now would be a great time to faint.
The thing about the so-called lower life forms is that they don’t really care about higher brain function. They are slaves to perception.
The cockpit continues to roll, shedding speed in the loose sand of the desert basin. The cloud of sand and other debris kicked up by its passage is huge. It dwarfs even the original size of the ship.
Slowly, the cockpit’s speed is reduced by friction until, finally, it comes to a halt. The dust tail still hangs in the air and points like an arrow to the final resting place of the cockpit.
He only realized he was screaming when the rawness of his throat added it’s own demands to the rest of the pain he was feeling.
He relaxed then, because thought was once again becoming. Becoming what he had no idea, but it was becoming…something.
His laugher was hysterical, which he could tell because a small dispassionate portion of his mind was critiquing it and comparing it to other hysterical laughter he’d heard in the past, thankfully none of it his own.
He took some breaths to try and calm his hysteria, only to realize that the act of breathing actually solved some of the pain he was feeling. Apparently suffocation hurts.
He got up and began to walk a bit, trying to restore circulation to his body, and realized that his heart was now beating again. And then memories began to worm their way into his head.
George. His name was George and he was now trapped on an alien planet. At the angle that the former cockpit was leaning, he knew that there was no way the ship was in any way intact.
His former passenger hadn’t stirred yet, so he released himself from his harness and tried to check the other man’s vitals. He couldn’t detect a pulse, and he quickly looked at the computer screen to see how long it had been. The numbers counted off time, and he was amazed that it had been that short; mere moments had passed when it felt like an eternity while he was trapped by the pain.
He rushed to action. It wasn’t that he particularly like the man, but he didn’t want to be here alone. If the ship was as bad as he thought, then this would be the only familiar face that he’d ever see again.
Resuscitation took moments, as the man’s body ached to live, it had just forgotten how. George collapsed in relief. Without proper preparation, the chances of surviving the stasis system were one in eight. With two people that made the approximate odds of survival about one in four. Or is that one in five. George knew how to pilot a star ship, but that didn’t mean he was any good at math.
George left the passenger to awake to his surroundings as he went to survey the damage. He had to use the secondary emergency exit, as the other two were at the bottom of the cockpit, and were likely flush, or close to it, with the ground.
The only things still connected to the cockpit had been inside the stasis field. The damage was about as bad as it was possible to get. He looked at the miles-long debris field, and felt a stab of fear. He noticed the telltale signs of investigation already at the site. Contrails attached to jet aircraft traveled across the sky. It would be a little longer before anyone on the ground could get there, especially with the technological advancement that he’d noticed coming in. They were still using fossil fuels if the smog clouds over their major cities were any indication.
That would limit their ground speed to somewhere between…
He began to laugh at himself a little bit. It wasn’t like he knew exactly where the nearest military base would be, or research station, or whatever group they sent when there was an ‘extra-terrestrial’ incident just like the one his ship had created.
It was funny to think that he was the alien in this encounter.
“You opened the cockpit. What it we’d been unable to breathe their air?”
“Then we’d be dead. I don’t know how to convert non-breathable air into a nice N2/O2 atmosphere.”
“But you’re a pilot.”
“And the movies have told you that all pilots are special ops geniuses who can make a spacecraft out of duck tape and bailing wire? Let’s examine this another way: You’re a what?”
“Accountant.”
“Okay mister accountant. I assume that you use a computer to keep the books? And you have an accounting program on that?”
“Sure.”
“Are you good with this accounting program?”
“I’m considered a wizard around the office. I can do things with numbers…”
“So, you could program the software you use into the guidance computer.”
“What?”
“Should be simple if you’re so familiar with the use. Just right here.”
“But I’m only an accountant.”
“Exactly. Anyway, we’re wasting time. We need to move away from here. The natives noticed our crash landing.”
“But don’t we want to interact with them. They might…”
“Be a super advanced race that chooses not to interact with the galaxy at large and will just give us a ship and send us on our way?”
“When you put it that way.”
George grabbed the two survival packs from their storage container behind the pilot’s seat and handed one of them to the Accountant. At some point he needed to learn the man’s name, but now wasn’t the time. Now was the time to run.
“Yes, Alfred, I know.”
“I still don’t understand why you persist in calling me that. My name is…”
“Unimportant. You’re my butler, for all intents and purposes.”
“I’m a full service AI with heuristic…”
“Exactly, butler.”
If Alfred had been able to, he would have signed at that moment. Of all of the things in this world that he hated, and there were a lot of them, he hated his creators most of all. To think that they would create him able to interact on an emotional level, but then never allow him to express those same emotions as he saw fit.
At least they installed him in a warship. He might not be able to take out his frustrations on his creators, or this little prima-donaa who walked his halls, but he could take it out on someone, and it looked like someone was about to receive his wrath.
“Angela, I have detected the presence of six ships on the edge of our scanning range.”
Angela rushed to the bridge, half dressed, in order to take a look at the consoles there.
“Hmm…not a standard formation. I wonder if they’re playing with me.”
The main screen came to life. “Looking good, Angela.”
Blushing, she closed her top and did up the ties. “Shut up, Brad. My AI made me think I might actually be in trouble. I rushed only to find you bozos.”
“We’re not the ones clowning around. I don’t know anyone who changes clothing as much as you do.”
“I just wouldn’t be comfortable wearing this clothing out there.”
“I get it,” Brad said with a knowing look.
“No, you don’t. Maybe sometime I’ll meet with you, but right now I think we have a mission to accomplish.”
“You and your missions. Don’t you get tired of the cloak and dagger?”
“It’s like the clothing, Brad. It gives me an outlet. Besides, isn’t part of the point here to push the limits?”
“Ok, babe. Whatever you say. There are some limits I’d like to push with you though.”
Angela blushed again, but didn’t smile.
“You know your part in this thing, then?”
“Yeah, we got it covered. I just hope that you uphold your part of the bargain this time.”
“That was a one time occurrence. See you on the other side, Brad.”
She was under no illusions of death by so called ‘explosive decompression.’ The physics just didn’t support it. It was much more likely to be instantly baked on sun side, and frozen on shadow side.
Well, it would be like dying in an explosion. There wouldn’t be enough time for your mind to process the pain before you were dead, which was as close to a painless death as anyone could hope for.
That, however, didn’t get her any closer to actually completing her part of the mission.
Space was really cool, in her opinion. There was no friction to stop something from moving, so Newtonian Laws of Motion ruled the day. She’d leapt out of her ship almost three hours ago, and only now as she approaching her destination. The time before now had been floating and looking around her at the majesty of creation. That and the occasional adjustment of her trajectory to make sure she landed in the proper place.
While it was difficult for her opponent in this little game to detect a single person floating in space, it was not impossible. Wearing the completely plastic suit helped that as well, but the main problem was the speed she was moving.
Saying that she jumped isn’t exactly accurate. Her ship was specially designed with a very deep airlock. Specifically it was three feet wide and twenty feet deep. With the artificial gravity of the ship, she was able to get a running start, and then when she peaked her speed, usually around twenty-five or so miles per hour, she would cut the gravity and “drift” out through the airlock.
Before she became really successful, the threshold speed of the sensors on most space stations had been thirty miles an hour.
Of course that was before she became successful.
Her helmet chirped. “Angela?”
“What is it, Alfred?”
“Just so you know, you are about three degrees off course at this point.”
“Good to know. You didn’t ping me with the laser just to let me know that.”
“It seems that active sensors have been upgraded again. We’re going to have to start from about a hundred twenty miles or so next time.”
She chuckled to herself before continuing, “So, what you’re saying is that I’m going to have a much longer trip home than out?”
“Pretty much exactly what I was thinking, yes.”
“Ok, good to know.”
“Alfred out.”
“Angela out.”
She adjusted her course minutely from the information on her HUD. She’d never been this far out of line before and was beginning to wonder a bit about this job. Something was beginning to feel off.
A space station was even more anal than a ground based air traffic control tower. After all, if an aircraft crashed it was only a lost of the aircraft and its cargo or passengers that suffered. If a spacecraft crashed into the station it could mean the loss of life of everyone aboard.
Angela smiled as the ships began to slow their approach and were moved into a proper closing pattern. She never saw if any of them docked, as she was coming in for a landing herself at that point.
She laughed to herself at that point. Her final course correction had been as close to perfect as you could expect. She was only three feet from the maintenance hatch she’d been aiming for.
Now, her true passion showed itself. Brad and people like him wouldn’t understand this, but women’s fashions mattered. Even if a man wouldn’t notice a problem, women would. They’d notice if you were wearing something that simply wasn’t available on the station. However, wear something just slightly out of date and you’d be noticed as well. You needed to hit that center point where you weren’t fashionable and weren’t out of fashion.
This was the reason that Angela owned more than a hundred thousand credits worth of clothing and that her ‘closet’ comprised almost a third of the interior of her tiny ship.
She quickly stripped off the now useless plastic suit and smoothed out the dress that she was wearing underneath. Out of a pack she took the shoes that matched and then seamlessly moved into the population of the station.
If only life were as simple for her when she was at home, then she might not feel the need to play these games.
And she considered this to be a game. It was too simple to be otherwise. Get in, retrieve some object or other, and get out. Smuggling was too simple a term for it, but she would be considered one.
Usually what she stole, however, was information. Information was so much more worth its weight than any other object she’d ever stolen.
It wasn’t long before she left the populated sections of the station behind. Now came the fun part. She walked confidently down the hallways. A left ahead and then a right, and she was in front of the office she was looking for.
She opened the door quickly and stepped inside.
“Mr. Connors, I was wondering…”
She cut off when her information proved correct and the aforementioned Mr. Connors was not in his office. She sat down to wait on one of the chairs. The thumb drive at her hip was one of the newest models that just needed to be within bluetooth range to be able to connect up. What wasn’t standard was the hacking package she’d installed on it.
There was a slight vibration when the drive got the data she’d programmed it to find. She rose, walked to the desk, and wrote a note. It was the same one she always left.
“Thanks for the game.”
Getting out was as easy as getting in, and that’s when she really started to worry. They should have discovered her note by now.
What was going on? Something about this really didn’t track. The fun part was always getting out of the station without getting caught. That was why she left the note. The makeup that blurred her features on the internal monitors was an added bonus.
No one knew what she looked like, except for a few like Brad who she’d met in person a long time ago.
This time, however, contrary to every protocol she’d tirelessly memorized about this station, there was no police presence. No port lock down. No response whatsoever.
She shook it off and continued to the maintenance hatch and her suit.
"Hello, the suit." She called out quietly. The voice activation system on her suit replied in her voice, "Hello, Angela." Only once in all the time she'd been doing this had she lost her suit completely. Someone had moved it. Since then. she'd used the voice activation system to tell her where it was.
She dragged the suit over to the airlock so that she could prepare for her return journey.
She smiled thinking about it. Alfred was always there to catch her. She cried a tear or two as she thought about what the most likely outcome of today would be.
It was for the best, though. Time to retire anyway. They were getting too close to catching her as it was. This one last score would be enough to set her up, if not for life, then at least for a long time, and if she got a real job, then maybe she could keep herself in the luxury that she loved for a long time to come.
Space was still beautiful, and with nothing to do but watch as she waited she looked at the stars. They were nothing like the stars on Earth, but that was to be expected. She was halfway across the galaxy after all. The constants were the other galaxies. On earth they looked more like stars with the intervening atmosphere softening them out. Out here, she could see the sweeps of starts that made them up and not just the center point that suggested the galactic core.
Her current field of view wouldn’t let her see the center of the Milky Way galaxy, but she’d seen that enough in her life. She lived here after all.
She supposed it was something like being stuck on a single planet and wanting the ‘alien’ vistas of a beach or desert when you had seen nothing but deciduous forests your entire life.
Then the ship was looming over her suit and collecting it into the capacious airlock.
Just as the door closed, a hail came from the space station.
“Unidentified craft, you are ordered to stand to and prepare to be boarded.”
A voice called into the airlock, “Angela, we’ve got a problem. They spotted us.”
“Be there in a moment, Alfred.”
“I’m sorry, but the lady of the ship is currently indisposed, could I help you?”
“You have thirty seconds to heave to. Noncompliance will be met with deadly force.”
“Angela, I need you up here now!”
The AI was getting frantic. This wasn’t supposed to happen. There’d been no active sensors on him. He was the next best thing to a hole in space on passive sensors like video.
“Be there in a moment, Alfred.”
“Not good enough,” switching channels the AI spoke again to the station, “I’m sorry but we need a moment or two longer, I’ve not been authorized to take any…”
He never completed that sentence; in fact he never did anything ever again. The core of his computer home, as well as the rest of the ship, was an expanding cloud of dust and debris. The fire that had consumed the atmosphere only lasted a moment or two and wasn’t much more that a flash. There isn’t much that burns in the vacuum of space, and the wreckage of the small pirate vessel was not exception. There was nothing left of the ship in less time than it took to read this paragraph.
“Yes, It’s five. Get your pretty little ass out of bed.”
I sit up and glare at him, but he just laughs. Once, when we were more than drunk, he commented that I have a cute ass. He thinks that it’s a shame that I wasn’t born a girl, because my behind is wasted on a guy.
Granted, I’m not much of a guy, but I am male, and happy to be so.
He uses the line whenever he wants me to get in gear, because he knows that it pisses me off whenever he talks about my gluteus. Somehow, I’ve got to find something just as humiliating for him so that he’ll stop.
“What’s the rush?”
“We’ve been activated. Apparently we have skills that they need.”
“Skills? What skills do you have that they could possibly want?” I assume, of course, that he’s the one they want, and I’ll be dragged along because they need him.
When you’re playing around with time there are certain things that you have to keep in mind. The first is that a single human sent back is unstable. It took a number of failed experiments before they realized this. However, as long as you send people back in pairs, they are a lot more stable.
They’re the most stable when they are a resonating dyad. You know the old myth about love at first sight? Well, science has determined that is just you recognizing that your chroniton particles are syncronized with the other person’s. Your body literally sings out to the other person in a Einstein-Rosen bridge sort of way. Think of it like a wormhole of the soul. This resonance not only makes you stable when out of your own time, but is really easy to pick out from the background chroniton radiation.
“So, any word on what it is? We weren’t scheduled to be sent upstream for another week.”
“Ray, when they say to hop to, I don’t ask why.”
“That’s what I love about you,” I say. The sarcasm drips from my words, “why think when they do it for you.”
“I know, right?” he’s laughing even before he finishes and I can’t help but join in. It’s not that I hate the guy, since we get along really well, it’s just that I hate being paired with a guy. Any guy.
We’re not the only ones walking around the campus at this hour of the morning, but we are one of the few dyads walking around. In fact, I notice that Candy and Andy, and Lois and Clark are the only other dyads walking toward the central building on campus, the sphere.
Candace and Andrew hate being called by the nickname, but with those names it almost begs to be assigned, and so it was.
I’m personally not even sure of the reference that it came from, but David is this tall guy with glasses. He’s a little built, sure, but nothing really noteworthy. It’s just that when you have a girl named Lois, and a tall guy with glasses it begs the nickname Lois and Clark? I don’t get it either.
We walk into the cool, still, atmosphere of the sphere not thirty seconds behind Lois and Clark. “Hey, any idea what’s going on here?” I call out to Lois as they stand waiting to go through the scanner.
“You don’t know?”
“Steve didn’t think to ask, and I was still asleep.”
“You really need to get a new partner, Ray,” David says from the other side of the scanning booth as Lois steps in.
“It’s something I’ve been telling the brass for years, but they never really listen.”
“It also doesn’t help when you two have spent more time relative than the brass has. What ratio are you up to now?”
“Five to one,” I say, grumbling.
David blinks and then begins laughing, “What happened to the mandatory vacation when you hit three to one?”
“The Jefferson Incident.”
David’s eyes get momentarily large and then he smiles weakly. No one who was part of that charlie foxtrot speaks about it. People who weren’t part of it just wouldn’t understand. That and we’ve received orders not to talk about it by top brass. “Why didn’t they just send you on your mandatory sync vacation after that?”
“Our ratio was at five to one when they were finally able to retrieve us. It’s remained pretty constant since then.”
Time travel is based upon windows of synchronization. From the beginning of the window in the past to the beginning of the window in the future you have a distinct period of time called a synchronized time window or sync-time for short. The most common sync-time is ten years. No one I’ve talked to knows why that is, since the math doesn’t even make any sense, but there you go.
The frequency that a specific sync time will re-occur is called a synchronized time wave, which of course we shortened to sync-wave.
I mention the beginning of the window, because here is where things get a little weird. Time flows at different rates on either end of the link. The most common rate is ten to one, again without any real reason, or none that I know of, so, if you spend what appears to be ten hours on the other end of the link, then you only really spent one hour according to everyone at home.
To stay at a one to one ratio, you would then have to spend nine hours at home. Since we just come back to sleep, no one wants to run the risk of an over-run, we end up with a 1 hour difference.
So, while the local time suggests that Steve and I have been partnered for about two years, with our current ratio that actually meant we had been doing this for ten years. There’s a reason why most dyads end up getting married. You spend that much time in someone elses company with everyone else just shuffling around it starts to make sense.
What really throws me for a loop is that while I feel like I should be going to my ten year high school reunion, most of my classmates aren’t even halfway through college.
“That’s rough,” David says, “wait...that means that you guys are coming up on your ten year anniversary.”
“Ha, ha, ha.” I say without humor.
By this point I’m standing waiting to enter the scanner. Lois steps out and I can hear David whisper, “ten years,” to her before I step into the booth.
There are two things that will prevent them from sending an agent upstream, one of which, as a guy, I don’t have to worry about. The one I’m always worried about is a buildup of chroniton radiation.
Sitting in one place, temporally speaking, is easy on the human body. We’re used to it. Going up or down the time-stream on the other hand is, well, another thing entirely. All of us in the program are bombarded with chronitons every time we either head out or return. Most of the time, this isn’t an issue.
Our bodies cleanse themselves of the excess when we’re given any sort of time on either end of the link. Traveling with less than four hours at either end is considered a no-no.
Occasionally, however, the particles don’t go away. If they start to build up, at all, then Bad Things Happen, capital letters and all. Most of the time, changing your own past is basically impossible. If you get chroniton sickness...changing your own personal history is the least of your worries.
It had happened once in the forteen year history of the program. Once was enough for them.
There is a moment when I’m in the booth, when the lights all go out, that I’m afraid that the red lights are going to come on. I’ve seen it often enough, someone has developed a slight imbalance, and so they’re put on the no-fly list for six months. Then the lights come on and I’m released back into the world. This time is no exception.
I smile at Lois and bump fists with David while we wait for Steve to be scanned. “So, what is this trip?”
“We’re going to The Pit,” David replies, all humor leaving his expression.
“What? There’s no fucking way I’m going to The Pit. They can find someone else with whatever combat/infiltration/whatever skills that they need for this...insane idea.”
David looks uncomfortable, and Lois actually looks sorry for me. I feel a sinking feeling in my gut when I realize it’s not Steve that they need. “Me?”
“First time?”
“They’ve never needed me. I mean, my ‘special skill’ is only useful during the last two hundred years...okay, a little less considering that the typewriter was invented in 1866, but still.”
“How did you get into the program with that skill,” David exclaims, and Lois punches him in the arm. All of the girls know what my ‘skill’ is. We get some downtime occasionally, and when we do I find hanging with the girls is more relaxing that trying to relate to people with training in ancient weapons, martial arts, blacksmithing, or any number of other skills deemed necessary by the PTBs.
There are just a higher percentage of girls who were there for the same reason I was; that they resonated with someone that had skills that they needed.
I’m not being sexist, trust me. There are some of the girls who know how to swing a sword and could easily kick my ass in a fight, but they don’t hold it against me that I have a useless skill, or should I say mostly useless. Apparently they’d tapped me to be a part of this mission, so it wasn’t completely useless.
“Steve, you asshole, why didn’t you tell me that they wanted me for this one.”
“Because I wanted to see your face when they told you.”
I punch him in the arm and the three of them laugh. The scanner behind us we move toward the center of the sphere and the briefing room we’ve been assigned. Each team has a briefing room assigned to them while they’re in the field. It acts as a common room, sleeping quarters, and meeting space for the duration of their mission. We’re allowed to leave the sphere, but with the time limitations we rarely do.
Andy and Candy are already in the room when we arrive. General Haynes walks into the room from the far side the moment that we enter the room. “Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, have a seat.”
We all sit around the table in the center of the space, and it feels empty. The next smallest mission I’d ever been on before this one had fifteen dyads. Even that number had made the room feel empty. It only really starts feeling crowded when you get up to about a hundred operatives or in other words fifty dyads.
As soon as we’re seated, General Haynes begins. “Janette got pregnant over the past month, so she has been replaced by Ray here. We would have considered Ray as a better candidate if it weren’t for some peculiarities of this mission.”
“Yeah, we’re going to The Pit,” I grumble.
“Stow it, Ray,” the General says, “Yes, you are late to the party, but you are going to The Pit. Since you’re the one who’s grumbling, why don’t you share with us what you know about it, Ray.”
“The Pit was a research laboratory opened by the US government into the as yet unnamed Chroniton particles that they had just discovered. Unfortunately, like with most radiation, they didn’t yet understand the implications of it at the time and were just looking for a weapon to use against the Axis powers.
“In 1944, they thought they had cracked the ‘code’ so to speak, and turned on their Chroniton generator. The Pit ceased to exist. Beyond that, it wasn’t until we began here that anyone even knew it had ever existed. With the seven year sync rate, we have attempted to enter The Pit three times.”
“Those are the basics. There is more information that you didn’t know,” the General begins, “the first is that there are three sync waves between us and The Pit that will be converging on this space-time in about two hours.”
“What?” I yell, and Lois leaps to her feet, “Three? I’ve never even heard of two before.”
“That’s because most of the time we only need to hit any one of the sync waves between us and any other point in space-time. With a truly unstable region of space-time, we might make sure that we have a double locus.”
“Is The Pit really that unstable?” Candace says quietly.
“If I thought this could wait ninety-six years for a quadruple locus, then we’d be waiting a hundred years. There is the other problem. We’ve determined that The Pit is in an unstable pocket of space-time. It both is, and is not, currently in 1944.”
“How many sync waves actually exist between two points,” I say, realizing that it’s suddenly become very important to hear the truth, especially with what Steve and I had been through with the Jefferson Incident.
“The largest number mapped so far is twenty-eight. The fewest is nine.”
I began to laugh, “So, even with the fewest, you’re always guaranteed to have a sync wave every ten years.”
“Well, usually it’s only after we have twelve or so waves that we get that sort of distribution, but you see what we’re talking about.”
“The Pit must be on the high end, then.”
“Actually, they are the only one we know of with only nine. We are just in the middle of a convergence of waves right now. We missed the first three waves at eleven, six and two years before we began the project. There was a double locus the first time we tried to link up and a single the previous time. The last of the waves will be in eight years.”
“I count ten waves in that.”
“With the span of time, one of the waves synced twice.”
“All of the background is cool and all,” Steve says, “but you said something about The Pit being unstable?”
“Yes, which is the main reason we can’t wait a hundred years. The bubble it is in is unraveling. If it was just going to deposit The Pit back where it came from, then we’d just let it go. The problem is, as long as the chroniton generator is running it will...as close as the scientists can describe it, it will bounce. Every time it bounces, it takes more of the surrounding space-time with it back into the bubble.”
“That sounds Bad,” David says.
“Why me?”
“Excuse me?” the General sputters at my non-sequitur.
“Why do you need someone who can type?”
“Because the generator is controlled by a computer. It’s a text interface linked to a mechanical typewriter.”
“Still doesn’t explain…”
“Because you need to enter in over ten thousand lines of code in order to re-initialize the system,” Andrew shouts. “I’m sorry, but you’re coming whether you like it or not, Rachel.”
“What?” I say.
Andrew, David, and Steve all color. Even the General looks uncomfortable. The girls look as bewildered as I do.
David is the first to speak, “Ray, well, some of the guys joke about, you know, how you’re almost useless. You know, how you’re here as a pair, not as a prime?” I wince at the slang term. It’s a crass reference to a woman’s body and used about someone who is here to ‘look pretty’ and ‘keep their man coming home.’
Hey, I knew I was useless, but to call me a that…
“You knew?” I say turning on Seve.
He just nods, his face ablaze.
“What the hell, you dumb mother-fuckers? Steve and I have been on more missions then the next two dyads combined. We were one of only two dyads to even survived the damned Jefferson Incident…” I felt my stomach drop out when I realized what I’d said, and in the front of top brass as well.
“That is enough!” the general roared. “Andrew, consider yourself on report. After this mission, you’re confined to barracks pending a formal review of your actions.”
“but…”
“No ‘buts’ Andrew. One in a room is enough.” There were some snickers around the table. “As for you, Ray, let me explain one thing, and one thing only,” the General said turning in my direction, “from this moment further, you aren’t even to think the words ‘Jefferson Incident’ in the same minute. Yes, you are fucking qualified. True, you only have one rare skill, but since you can out shoot anyone in this room with any handheld weapon from any time period except for your partner, I don’t give a damn whether typing is useful most of the time.”
“When did you learn to shoot,” Lois asks and I look at the General for permission. He frowns but nods.
“Well, when you spend three years as a soldier for the Colonies in the revolutionary war, you tend to pick up some skills.” Something clicked for the other two dyads and Lois’ face went very pale.
“Three years…” Candace whispered. “But I thought time sickness…”
Steve laughs ruefully and I just smile, “yeah, consider us part of the reason the regs changed six months ago.”
“Now that’s out of the way, let’s get you all to costuming and get the final briefing out of the way so we can get this all taken care of as quickly as possible.
“Be thankful you don’t have to wear a skirt,” Lois says with a laugh.
“Don’t tempt them,” Candace says from behind me, “I mean the guys already seem to consider you one of us.”
“Nah, he’s not pretty enough,” Steve says.
“I don’t know,” Lois responds, “with a little makeup, and some padding.”
“Har-de-har-har,” I say, but I’m smiling. I like Lois. She’s a good friend, and although I haven’t spend much time with Candace yet, I can tell she has a wicked sense of humor.
“You’ll be going in as army personnel this time.”
“There are people still alive in there,” Andrew asks.
“Our last team said there were,” the supply sergeant says, but then clams up. We go and get dressed. I tie my hair into a low ponytail and tuck it into the back of the shirt. I could get it cut, but I’m hoping for people to overlook it, since we’ll be appearing in the midst of a crisis. Those are the best jaunts, in my opinion, since we’re usually able to move around unnoticed, if not unseen.
We shuffle into the room and take our seats again, looking suddenly anachronistic amidst the modern fixtures of the room. When we’re in our seats the General again enters the room. “You are to keep interaction with operatives to a minimum.”
“Did you say…”
“Yes, we’ll be sending you back into the same timeframe as the other two teams went back into. You can’t tell them the outcome of their mission. Any action you take with a member of a previous team will likely mean a shift in local time.”
“What in the hell were those people thinking? They actually created a flux point in space-time?” Andrew blurts out.
“Unfortunately, yes. So, keep that in mind, and hopefully the program will still be in one piece when you get back here. From what the previous team said, the computer system had been completely wiped by the time they got there. We’re not sure what happened to cause the problem, and since we’ve never been able to send anyone back to before the event began, we have limited knowledge, comparatively, over everything before the event.”
He spends the next half an hour going over the plan we’re to execute when we get to the other side of the link, including where to go, and all other related information. Luckily for us, as long as we were inside and wearing the proper uniform it was unlikely that we’d be stopped and even asked for our papers, even if those papers were in perfect order.
We were given one last bit of information from the General before we went out to the link platform, “From this moment forward you’re under strict operational security. No information about the mission is to be passed to anyone outside your group. You are restricted to the sphere for the duration. Communication with anyone outside your group is to be limited to the absolute minimum necessary to do your job. Before we return you to the past, you’ll key in the offset, in minutes, for your return trip. Under no circumstances are you to speak to control until your announcement that you are done. Provided the math is correct, you will have a total of 3 days, 8 hours and 23 minutes available to you upstream.”
We nod solemnly and walk through the black door at the back of the room.
As we take our places on the platform at the center of the spherical chamber that gives the building it’s name I wonder, not for the first time, what this would look like in a big budget hollywood movie. I’m sure there would be streams of ‘chronitons’ flooding the room as they saturated the environment with them in preparation for punching a hole through reality.
I’m sure they would be blue-white and stream around in ever faster circular patterns. We’d be illuminated by them and then the door would open, a black only ever imagined and never seen. It would suck us in and disappear with an audible pop...or something like that. I’ve come up with many variants over the years.
In reality, technology is sort of boring. We stand there for a few minutes and then from one instant to the next we’re somewhen else.
“Meet back here in sixteen hours,” I say to the group and we head out to accomplish our various tasks.
The area isn’t anything like I expected, but should probably have. It’s in a giant sinkhole. There are trees, both on the rim around the camp, as well as all through the base where we are currently located. The sounds of people moving around can plainly be heard, and it feels like a living breathing military base.
“Well, shall we,” Steve says, gesturing toward the processing center.
“Let’s,” I say with a chuckle. As we walk, I notice a number of things that just feel wrong about the base. Everyone else mentioned, the sun was always stuck at noon. It is just rising over the edge of the sinkhole as we walk across the compound. I notice a man I’ve never seen before in a WWII uniform, but using an iPod. As we walk, the iPod shifts to a walkman, and then a transistor radio, and then disappears completely.
I consider bringing it to Steve’s attention, but dismiss it as an overactive imagination.
That’s not the only thing that changes as we walk toward the center of the compound, but the closer we get to the center, the more everything settles down. I begin to get worried, but for a different reason.
“Steve, I think I might be slipping.” I say in a worried whisper.
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah. I was seeing anachronisms all over the place.”
“It’s settled down now, though?”
“Yeah.”
“Relax. I’m sure it’s nothing. Let’s get this overwith and then we can get you all shrink-wrapped at home.”
I snort and put it out of my mind. It might just be all in my head. I’m not the first operative who’s thought they were slipping. It could easily be the stress of this operation as well, or the fact that we know there are only four other people we can rely upon until we declare the mission complete. The sun seems to be moving, though, which is truly a cause for concern.
“Steve...I think we might actually have arrived a few hours before,” I say, gesturing toward the sun.
“All the better. If this is really a flux point then we could just stop the event in the first place..”
“Steve, don’t even joke about that. We have to ensure that there is as little change as possible. The event has to occur as planned, the computer has to be wiped, the other teams have to fail, and we have to do it.”
“Are you trying to say..?”
“It was us all along. We’re the reason that it all happened. We’re the reason all these people are going to die.”
“We’ve got to tell…”
“Who? Who are we going to tell. We’ve been cut off intentionally. If we attempt to contact anyone else, then it could break things even worse.”
“I have just one question,” Steve says after letting it all sink in.
“What’s that?”
“How did General Haynes know what was going on well enough to institute the protocol?”
I don’t have an answer for him so I let it sit in the air, hovering between us. We enter the processing center and I come to a dead stop, just staring at what’s in front of me. I turn to look at Steve, who’s looking back at me.
As typing is my only skill, I make damn sure that I know what I might run into, the types of systems or machines, that might possibly need my skill. Sure, I can mix a mean vodka and tonic, I can speak fluently in six languages, make myself understood in another ten and swear in another fifteen more. I can fire and service any handheld firearm. I can even make a siege weapon if pressed. There are certain skills that you pick up when you’ve spent eight years in the past, going from one hotspot to another.
But typing is the one thing I do better than just about anyone I know. Because of that, and the knowledge that I have in my head, I know that the first terminal server with a monitor and traditional keyboard wasn’t likely to appear in 1944 in the US.
That being said, a teletype terminal with what had to be a combination of a number of different early electronic computer models into something that was, apparently, electronically programmable from the terminal.
Nothing like this machine ever existed. Nothing like this machine should have existed, especially since some of the part that I noticed integrated into the amalgam were being currently developed...in Germany.
Sat down at the terminal, and received an even greater shock that the one that this room represented. There, on the bottom line of the paper, was something that wouldn’t be implemented for another thirty years, at least.
C:\>
“Steve,” I said in a hoarse whisper.
“What is it?”
“Please, tell me I’m not seeing this. Please tell me this is a hallucination, or better yet, that I’m slipping free.”
He walks over and stands there, looking over my shoulder and says, “So, it’s a DOS prompt, I don’t see what the big deal is.”
“It’s 1944.”
“And?”
“MS-DOS, the one most people call DOS, wasn’t first released until 1981.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah...but I wonder,” I say and then began typing DOS commands into the terminal. The print head moves slower than I do, so I had to modulate my speed a little. A part of my mind, just along for the ride while I’m trying to get a listing of the operating system calculates I’d likely slowed to about ninety words a minute so I didn’t get ahead of the terminal.
“Lieutenant!” I hear a barking voice behind me and I leap to my feet and turned around. Upon seeing the general’s stars I salute. “Sir!”
“You’re obviously new at Camp Pit, so I’ll cut you some slack. that being said, the next time I see you, I expect you to be in the proper uniform.”
“Sir? I am in uniform.”
“Yes, you are in a man’s uniform. The women under my command are to be properly groomed and in the women’s uniform.”
“Sorry, sir, it won’t happen again, sir,” Steve says from the back of the room.
“Can’t the lady answer for herself, Lieutenant...Mace?”
“It’s just that she has certain...feelings regarding equality in the armed forces, sir,” Steve says with a smile that turns into a smirk as soon as the General’s back is turned. “We’ll Lt. Lewis, I can understand that. I have a feeling that some day both men and women will be allowed to wear pants in this army. That day, however, is not today. I assume you know the proper female uniform you should be wearing?”
“Yes, sir,” I say, with a sigh.
“Good, and make sure your hair doesn’t extend past your collar. While comfortable, I’m sure, you shouldn’t be tucking your hair into your shirt. It’s just not done...also, make sure you’re wearing the proper WAC patch the next time.”
“Yes, sir,” I say saluting again.
“So, is there something that I can help you with? You obviously have training on the directory system, and from what I can see you seem to be looking for something.”
“We were told to find the...operating system I think it was called,” Steve says, trying to draw attention away from me.
“My, but you are well informed, and I can see why you have an Army officer accompanying you.” The general walks over to a cabinet off to one side and opens it up. There is a rack of black vinyl discs that look like nothing more than records.
“I assume that this is about the orders to lock them up for safe keeping during the test today?”
“Yes, sir,” I say, visibly relieved.
“Well, good. Lt. Mace, if you could carry these for the lady, then I think you’re done here for the time being.”
“Yes, sir,” I say and we both salute.
After the general leaves Steve leans over to me and whispers, “so, did you notice who that was?”
“No, someone famous?”
“You could say that. Sure, he’s a couple of decades younger looking that that was General Haynes.
The maximum that can be transported between two points in time at any single time is equivalent to the amount that can be comfortably carried by the individuals being transported. We’re not exactly sure why it is, but it seems to be impossible to transport inanimate objects on their own. That includes inorganic intelligences. Some of the AI devices in recent history have actually surpassed the intellect and learning capacity of a dog, but while a dog can be sent back in time, the dog-simulacrum can’t.
What that means is that we should be able to take the operating system with us to the future when we head back. I’d love to see how it’s encoded since my inner geek is working overtime on it. You can encode data in any medium, it’s just a matter of being able to read it back. One of the first computers used movie film to encode and read its data, or at least the programs that it ran.
“Hey, Steve?” I say as an idle thought comes to me.
“Yes, Ray?”
“Do I look like a girl to you?”
“No more than you usually do.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I say, getting incensed.
“It means I still think you have a cute ass.”
I don’t know why, but instead of getting angry, I blush instead. Maybe it’s that, this time, instead of it being a joke, or him being drunk, he is sober and he actually means it. Maybe it’s because I had General Haynes, if only a young version of him, mistaking me for a woman.
And maybe it’s because I like being complimented, even if it is something that has always been a sore point between Steve and I.
“Why do you ask?” he says.
“It’s just that the General thought I was a woman, even when I turned around.”
“Ray, you have narrow shoulders, especially for a guy. You shave two to three times a week, and even if you let your ‘beard’ grow out it is sparse and wispy. And you know it’s not the first time that you’ve been mistaken for a girl.”
I grimace at the reminder. The difference is that the last time I was intentionally sneaking into a seraglio, and I didn’t want to be mistaken for a guy. It doesn’t change the fact that I successfully snuck in, retrieved our target, and got back out again without any problems.
And then there was the time that we’d masqueraded as a married couple so that we could mingle with the guests and an imperial party in rome…
“You jackhole. How many times have you gotten me to dress in drag just because it was ‘necessary’ for the mission?” I say as I spin on him.
“Um,” he says coloring, “well, you see…” He refuses to meet my eyes and something occurs to me. I can feel my eyes go wide as the shock of this thought stuns me. My cheeks begin to flame and I turn my back on him quickly so he won’t see.
That is impossible, I think to myself. There’s no way that he...that we… I forcibly push the thoughts aside and begin walking forward again. Before I’ve taken a couple of steps I stop and say, “Stop staring at my ass.”
“Sorry,” a modified voice says behind me and I feel my world shatter.
“Shit,” I say under my breath. This is so much worse than anything else I could possibly conceive. Steve...likes me. Sure, we get along, but that’s not what I mean. He is attracted to me, and part of it is because he, to a certain degree, sees me as a girl.
Everything starts to become clear now. The nickname that was passing around the boys, the idea that they might think of me as one of the women. He was hoping beyond hope that maybe, some day…
“How many people have you told that I dress in drag?”
“You don’t…”
“Damn it, Steve, just answer the question.”
“Everyone…”
I turn on him, hurt beyond what I should be at such a simple thing. I mean, it’s not like I’m really a girl, but...and then I see his face. He’s miserable, and I hate it when he’s miserable. Regardless of anything else that is happening here, he’s my best friend. I’ve relied upon him to keep me alive more times than I can count, and the number of times that I’ve saved his bacon are innumerable.
In the past ten years we’ve been together we’ve spent eight of them upstream. We are somewhere in time five times as often as we are in our own time. The organization never sends people to the past to take vacations, so we are moving from one death trap into another.
I can feel tears come to my eyes at the thought of the hurt he’s caused me, without me knowing it, and the hurt I’m causing him now.
“I’m sorry, Ray, I am. It just…”
“You’ve been hoping for ten years that I felt the same way you do.”
“What?”
“You’re attracted to me.”
He’s bright red and won’t meet my gaze. It’s all the confirmation that I need. I’d make him look at me, or hug him, or something right now if we weren’t one hundred years in the past, if we weren’t standing in 1944. PDA wasn’t really approved of, let alone between serving officers, in 1944.
To distract myself I take out my hair band. I’d hidden it below my collar because it was an anachronism, and I really shouldn’t have brought it with me. I begin working my hair up into a tight bun, and then tuck the hair band around it to secure it in place.
Then, with an impish smile I begin walking ahead of Steve toward our designated meeting spot on the edge of the compound.
“Damn,” I hear him say wistfully from behind me, “that is so cruel.”
“Oh? What’s so cruel?” I say in a little singsong, adding a slight sway to my step.
“I hate you, Ray.”
“I hate you too, Steve.” My smile could have lit up a room, it’s so big; My face hurts, but I don’t care. Steve likes me...
My smile disappears from my face and I do my best to think about anything else, because the though if him liking me shouldn’t make me happy. And even worse, I shouldn’t have an inkling of a thought that this emotion might be returned.
“Ray?”
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“I’m sorry for sharing our stories without your permission. We just have so many of them, and I’m so amazed by you.”
“I amaze you?”
“Before I joined the organization, I was training in two martial arts, judo and aikido, at the same time and my dad dragged me out to SCA events. I learned my skills the hard way. I learned how to sneak and how to disappear in plain sight. I learned tactics and strategy. I was eight when the organization was formed. My entire life I have been working toward becoming a member.”
“I didn’t hear about it until the day of that mixer.”
“See, you came in with basically no skills, nothing to recommend you, and you keep up with me.”
“Steve, I surpass you most of the time.”
“Oh really? Name one thing you’re better at than I am.” I begin to reply and he interrupts me, “I mean except for Computer and Communications Systems. You really should stop degrading your skill set by calling it typing.”
I stop and think for a bit and then I’m reminded of this one time in medieval England, “Archery.”
“Really, when did you ever...oh.”
“Yes, oh.”
Creating legends was sometimes something that we were called on to do, and Steve was still upset with that shot that I made. Personally I think he was still pissed that Arthur was a real figure and he couldn’t make his legend. An anachronistic blade would have made a perfect Excalibur in 5th century England.
We got to the concealed area where we’d appeared earlier. Steve set the tray down on the ground, out of the way, and settled down to wait. It had taken us about a quarter of the time we had allocated to us for our portion of the process. Frankly, it had taken us a lot less time than I’d been afraid it would. I was worried that we’d have to copy the entire OS by hand. That would have eaten up a lot of time, all things considered.
“Steve?”
“Yeah?”
“I think I need to expand into Signalling.”
“Signalling..? Oh, you mean Heraldry, Flags, and Semaphore?”
“Yeah,” I say chuckling.
“Why do you simplify things so much?”
“Because I hate the designations the organization uses, especially for your job, what was it again?”
“Weapons, War Machines, and Tactics.”
“See, sneaky stuff is so much better than that.”
“How does someone as imprecise as you learn six languages, let alone six languages in ten years.”
“Five.”
“What?”
“Five languages. I’m a native English speaker. come to think of it, can you really count Middle and Old English as separate languages?”
“So, now you’re saying you only know Four languages?”
“Yep,” I say with a grin.
“Fine, well, since you speak Latin and Romanian I’m upgrading you to every romance language ever spoken, and since you have Old English, you might as well count German as a language you can speak fluently.”
“Old English and German aren’t…”
“You didn’t argue about French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese.”
“Yeah, that’s because I see your point. Well, as far as your argument goes. From personal experience, while I can understand basically anything spoken in the languages mentioned, making myself understood...takes practice.”
“This will be the longest.”
“Longest what?”
“Period of time you’ve spent dressed as a woman. Can you handle it?”
“Yes. It’s not a big deal, really.”
“It’s a huge deal. I mean you’d never catch me wearing clothing like that.”
I begin laughing. “you’d look really funny in women’s clothing, Steve. You’re too much the manly guy to look anything else.”
“I don’t know. Maybe if I put on enough makeup.”
I snicker at the thought. Steve would look like a clown if you put enough makeup on him to hide his very masculine features, or so I personally think.
“Are we good?”
“What do you mean, Steve?”
“”You and me, are we going to be okay?”
“We just need a vacation, Man. I mean, we haven’t really had a break from each other for...ninety days or so?”
“I don’t need a break from you.”
“You just need to go find a nice girl and get laid, maybe more than one or more than once. You’re just missing sex.”
“Ray…”
“No, I’m serious. I mean, we can’t...I’m not…”
“You’re a guy, is that what you’re trying to say?”
“Yes,” I say vehemently. “I’m a guy. You and me, we’re just not going to happen, Steve.”
“Ray…”
“No, Steve.”
“Why not?”
“Why not? Because I’m not interested in guys that way.”
“Not interested in guys, or not interested in me.”
I sit there quietly, not answering him. Something I promised a long time ago, near the beginning, was I was never going to lie to him. I might not answer, but I’d never lie. He promised the same. I’d never caught him in a lie, and neither had I lied to him. Unfortunately, now that I really wanted to, I couldn’t lie to him, because I just couldn’t betray him like that.
“I can’t be interested in you, Steve.”
“You’re the only woman that I’ll ever love, Ray.”
“I’m not a woman, Steve.”
“Why are you the only one who doesn’t see it? You are the more feminine in most of your actions that many of the other girls, yes other girls. You even do girl-talk with them.”
“I’m just being friendly.”
“Whatever, fine, you win, happy? You’re just a manly guy who no one ever mistakes for a woman, and you might as well cut your hair into a nice, short, manly style and make sure the rest of the world knows it.
“Are you happy? Is this what you want? You want me to hate you?” Steve is actually crying now, and it’s like a punch in the gut. Steve isn’t one of those repressed guys who feel that crying isn’t manly, but he also doesn’t cry all that often. He is my rock, the one person in this world that I can actually rely upon never to fall apart on a mission, and I’ve just driven him to tears.
I scoot over next to him and try to put an arm around him, but she shrugs me off. He’s never done that before. I held him for over an hour while he cried after his mother died.
“Ray, don’t do it unless you mean it.”
“What..?”
“This,” he says gesturing between the two of us. “You can’t tell me you don’t want to be the girl in this relationship and then act like the girl in this relationship. If you’re just my bud, just my friend, fine, but if that’s all this is going to be then I done.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It hurts too damn much, Ray. You are my family, and for some stupid reason I thought, eventually, you’d realize you loved me as much as I love you. So, if you’re just my friend, just this guy I’ve been hanging out with for ten years, then you can go to hell and I’m quitting.”
“That’s not fair, Steve.”
“What’s not fair is you leading me along for the past ten years.”
“Fuck you, Steve. You’re telling me that unless I become the proper housewife for you that we’re done?”
“I don’t expect proper…”
“You just expect a wife,” I’m getting angry now, and I’m spitting my words out at him, “so fuck you kindly, but no. I might, and I mean might, be as feminine as you claim, but that doesn’t give you the right to dictate who I’m going to be. Have you ever considered that I don’t want to be a woman?”
“Why not?”
For the first time in minutes, Steve is absolutely calm. He’s not angry or upset. That question uttered in the absolute deep calm of his current voice hits me hard. I don’t have an answer for him. It’s not something I’ve thought about. It’s just something that I was. I was a guy. Sure, all my friends are girls, but that’s normal, right?
Guys have female friends. So what if I never thought about any of them sexually…
Come to think about it, I can’t think of the last person I’ve thought about sexually...except for Steve while we were walking over here.
My mouth opens, and I work it trying to find the words, but they aren’t there. “There is no reason. I can’t think of a single reason that I don’t want to be a woman.”
His eyes light up a bit, but I cut him off, “that is a long way from wanting to be, or even believing I am, a woman.”
“But it’s a step.”
“No, it’s a question, Steve.”
“What’s a question?” Lois says as she enters the copse of trees we’re hiding in.
“Why Ray doesn’t want to be a woman.”
“Oh, that’s easy,” David says. We all stare at him and even under his dark complexion we can see the flush.
“And why’s that?”
“Well, if he admitted that he was a she, then she wouldn’t be able to talk about the cute guys at the organization anymore cause she’d be taken.”
Lois and I blush matching shades of red and I glare at her.
“What?” she says with false modesty.
“That was a hypothetical.”
“It’s always a hypothetical, or at least you say it is.”
“And what’s this about me being taken?” I say looking even more intently at Lois.
“Oh, well, you see, remember about three prime-months ago?”
I did a quick calculation, figured the missions I’d been on, and came to a value a little over a year ago relative. “That would have been more than a year ago for me, Lois.”
“I keep forgetting. Of course it starts making sense why you seem so flighty sometimes. While the rest of us got together somewhere between one and three weeks ago relative, you wouldn’t have seen us for, what, a month and a half?”
“Usually? Yeah, it’s about that long.”
“So, anyway, three prime-months ago, you got completely smashed. Said it was a really difficult mission.”
“Wasn’t that the Anastasia Job?” Steve says and I go pale, “Oh, shit. Sorry, I promised never to mention that.”
“Anastasia?”
“You don’t always get to be the hero,” I say really quietly.
The silence stretches out for a bit, growing uncomfortable. I’m lost in my thoughts about a little Russian girl. Steve is whispering to the two of them, saying things about ‘accident’ and ‘unintentional discharge’ and all the other boilerplate that they put onto the after action report. I know that in reality I’d always been the one to end that life. There was never any other option since that hadn’t been a flux point.
Steve had gotten me home, and I’d been so grateful to him, that I’d kissed him full on the lips. I could still feel the pressure, and I absently fingered my lower lip as I thought about it. I’d been in costume, again, as one of the maids, but I’d had a modern firearm for my own protection.
“I tried to change history, but that never went into the report. Steve didn’t tell them, and I was in shock and raving so they sedated me for my own good.”
“You did what?” David says. “Are you an idiot?”
“Until you meet that little girl, that Tsarina, then you don't have the right to judge me. I saw what Russia would have become under her rule, and if she’d survived I can tell you that she would have ruled. There was iron in her and a force of personality. She was seventeen, but she made the criminals who came for her quake at her command.”
Steve was looking at me with a strange sad look in his eyes and Lois came and put her arm around me, “You fell in love with Anastasia.” There wasn’t any condemnation or reprisal in her voice and I just nodded.
“The thing is, the more I thought about it afterward, the more I realized that she reminded me of Steve. He has a strength of personality like that. When he pulled me out, I thought, for a moment, that it was her, that she’d survived, and I kissed him. He kissed me back.”
“I’m sorry, Ray,” Steve says quietly. David grabs his arm and drags him off.
“Why?” I begin, but Lois puts her finger on my lips to silence me.
“Ray, why are you punishing Steve for kissing you back?”
I sit there quietly refusing to answer. I try to glare at her, but I can’t stay mad at her.
“Ray, I remember what you told me, even if you don’t. You might have been drunk, but I doubt you lied to me. I’ve never once caught you in a lie, so I tend to believe that you haven’t lied to me yet.”
“What did I say?”
She takes a deep sigh and looks me in the eyes, “are you sure? You might have…”
“Just tell me, Lois,” I say. I’m feeling very tired all of the sudden.
“You told me that Steve was the only man you would ever love, and that there wasn’t a woman left alive who would have you.”
“That’s just sappy enough that I might believe I said it. I must have been drunk.”
“Do you love him?”
“I don’t know. He pisses me off so often.”
“Guys are like that.”
“Me too?” I say, hopeful.
“Oh, Ray, I’m sorry but none of us actually thinks of you as a guy.”
She puts her arms around me and holds me and I just lean into her.
The only worry I had right now was that Candy and Andy hadn’t come back yet. Steve was still sneaking furtive looks in my direction so I turned my back on him. I snuck to the edge of the copse to keep watch, hoping to see them come over any minute.
“You know,” Steve says, startling me. I turn and punch him on the arm, he catches my hand and doesn’t let it go.
“We’re not going to be able to finish this today.”
“Hmm?” I say, distracted. When I realize he’s holding my hand I pull it away from him. “what were you saying?”
He chuckles a little at me, “I was saying that we can’t finish this today.”
“Why not?”
“Because the other two teams were over here for thirty-six hours and forty-two hours respectively.”
“So, we just jump forward forty-three hours and finish it then.”
“You know we can’t do that. You usually love being upstream. What’s wrong with this mission?”
“I have to dress like a girl.”
“It doesn’t usually bother you. I mean, your hair is still up in a bun,” he says gesturing toward my head.
“It’s comfortable,” I say, coloring.
“It’s because someone you didn’t know assumed.”
“No, it’s because General Haynes, the same person who thought I was a girl, mentioned in our briefing that he didn’t originally pick me for this mission because I wasn’t a girl...and it terrifies me because I think I know why. I don’t to come back here, I don’t want to finish this mission. I’m scared.”
Steve puts his arms around me and holds me. I push him away because of how much I want him to hold me right then.
“Steve, I’m slipping.”
“No, it was just a hallucination.”
“I’ve never had a time induced hallucination, not in ten years. You know that. I know the symptoms, Steve. I’ve been feeling them.”
“It’s just your mind, or this place.”
“Steve, they started the machine twenty-four hours ago so they could build up enough chronitons.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I was here, even though I wasn’t here.”
“Ray?”
“I never kissed you, but I did.”
“What? You kissed me?”
“Lois remembers me telling her about it. After you pulled me from the rubble of the palace.”
“That never happened, you walked out of there on your own.”
“I know, Steve...because I had the upper body strength to do so.”
“What are you talking about?”
“A wall fell on me, Steve. After they were all dead, I rushed back into the palace, looking for my brass. You know we have to police it and take it back with us. There was an explosion and one of the walls came down on top of me. I was able to push it off and get out.”
“Then how…”
“Because there was another version. In that version I hit my head, and I was dazed and I couldn’t get a good grip on the wall. you pulled the wall off me and I fell into your arms and kissed you.”
“You did what?”
“You kissed me back. Thoroughly.”
“It’s got to be another hallucination...doesn’t it?”
“No, Steve. It’s another me, an alternate me, and I’m remembering what that Ray remembers.”
“And now?”
“Now, I’m remembering being here for two days. We were there when they turned on the machine. We got trapped because the chroniton radiation prevented us from being pulled back to the sphere.”
“Then how will we get back?”
“We assume that when they fire it, that it will give us the ability to go back, since the other two teams were able to come and go as they pleased.”
“Ray, you’re scaring me.”
“Why, because I know things I shouldn’t?”
“That, and you’re making me believe you might be telling the truth.”
“Can you do me a favor?”
“Sure, what?”
I kiss him for the first time. It’s been a hundred times before. It’s the last time because he’s dying. It is the most amazing kiss I’ve ever had and it lasts across every version of myself that I have contact with in that moment.
Millions of me are kissing millions of Steve. Then all of the awareness of my other selves fades out and it’s just Steve and I and we’re kissing. I can feel my heart race and I’m holding onto him as he cradles me. He pushes me up against a tree and I just leen there, my arms lightly on his. I can feel something hard pressing against my hip and for a moment I think it’s his gun, before I realize what it really is and I giggle into his mouth. He takes that opportunity to slip his tongue in, and then everything really does go away. It’s just him and me, and we’re floating in the vastness of the universe. I want more of him pressed against me, I need to feel him consuming me, filling me, completely, so I put my hands to the waistband of his pants. Something grabs my hands and gently pulls them apart and away from him and then he’s pulling back and I’m struggling against him a little, trying to get to his pants again.
“Ray?”
“Hmm?” I say with a playful smile.
“Ray.”
“What?”
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to undo your pants, silly.”
“Why?”
I begin to answer the obvious and then it hits me and I go completely still. My heart is racing for another reason now. My whole body goes cold, and my vision closes down to a single point. Theres a ringing in my ears. I can feel Steve holding me up. In a moment or two everything returns to normal and I can stand up on my own again.
I don’t want to, but I gently push Steve away and turn away from him.
“What’s wrong?”
“Everything.”
“Come on, it can’t be that bad, can it?”
I close my eyes and take a deep breath. Then I just nod.
“How can it be that bad. We’ve been through worse than this. We’ll get through it.”
“I’m not sure we will. Or I should say I’m not sure I will.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because the other me? The one that I’m afraid I’m slipping into? That other me is a woman.”
And then again, it’s not.
Now, I’m neither a mathematician, nor am I a physicist. I’m a field agent, regardless of the fact that I’m categorized as Mental rather than Physical due to my primary skill. Lucky me.
As I sit there, waiting for something to happen, waiting for the world to end, or maybe just waiting for Steve to kiss me again, I ponder what it is that I’m facing here.
One of the problems that can occur with a chroniton imbalance is Slipping. The physicists talk about quantum entanglement and string resonance, but those of us in the field know it as slipping out of time, or just slipping.
Time travel requires making an individual’s chronon energy signature equal to the location where you’re sending them. That includes the specific vibrations, spins, and so on of the chronons in the area. Using chroniton radiation is the only way that we know how to do it. You bombard the individual with chronitons from specific directions at specific speeds and you synchronize the person with another time.
While it is possible to send someone to any time you can pinpoint using this method, it takes a lot more energy when to locations are out of sync than when they are in sync. This is a Bad Thing.
You see, the more chroniton radiation that you bombard a target with, the more unstable that target becomes, temporally speaking. Remember how I stated before that objects like to remain at rest? Yeah, it’s one of Newton's laws. Time is like a giant stream, that moves everything along at the same rate. It’s an entropic force.
Everyone resonates in time with their distinct current of time.
The problem is, that time isn’t really a stream. Time is really a giant ocean flowing from The Beginning to The End. And infinitely broad ocean with a finite length.
The secret that they never tell the public, if they ever told the public about the project, is that everyone slips. Usually, it’s a minor shift to the right or left to a world that is basically indistinguishable from the one you started from. Usually, you’re personal resonance will self correct these minor slippages and you’ll eventually find yourself back where you started from.
However, the more chroniton energy that builds up in your body, the greater the energy that you have, and therefore the easier it is to slip more than just a little. So, they try to minimise the amount of chroniton radiation that they bombard us with when they’re sending us either up or down stream, mostly because everyone wants us to reach our destination more or less intact.
A sync-wave basically halves the amount of chroniton radiation required to send someone upstream. Each additional concurrent wave halves it again. So, theoretically, it should have required about 1/8th of the normal energy to send us here compared to sending us without a wave present, or about one quarter of what a normal sync event would require.
The problem is that the area is infused with chroniton radiation. For it to be hitting me as quickly as it did, I would have to have been just below the assumed danger area when they scanned me before I entered the sphere.
Or even worse, I was above the threshold and the sent me anyway.
“Steve,” I begin, but am interrupted by a flash of light toward the center of the base. I’m barely able to see again when I see Andy running toward us screaming, “Recall now! hurry!”
“Where’s Candace?” I say, still a little dazed.
“She’s gone,” he says, his voice absent of hope.
I don’t get to ask anything more because he dissolves into a pile of ash right before my eyes. “No!” I scream. I’m trying to move toward him, futilely trying to help him, but my brain knows it’s too late, and staying here just got a lot more dangerous for the rest of us. Steve picks me up and runs back to the clearing. David has already placed the recall beacon and he’s holding tightly to lois.
“The discs,” I say and Steve looks around the clearing for them. He grabs the case and I grab onto him and hold onto him like my life depended on it.
Physical contact isn’t ‘necessary’ during a transfer, but it is necessary for me. Steve has no free hands to hold onto me, so he kisses the top of my head and I smile. I’ve never been more glad than at this moment to be so much shorter than steve.
There are screams of anguish coming from the direction of the camp, as well as sounds of gunfire. We’ve only been here for about six hours, even with an extra dose of radiation, and we’re already beginning to slip. Candy and Andy are gone. People in the base have a dose four time higher than we do. I can only imagine what sorts of horrors are only now appearing before them.
In an instant that I wasn’t ready for, the sun, the screaming, everything cuts off and we’re again in the sphere. Lois and I collapse to the ground, holding onto each other while Steve and David look uncomfortable.
“She’s really gone,” I whisper.
“I know. They’re both just gone.”
It’s not rare to lose people on a mission. The thing is, Andrew and Candace were our instructing dyad. Lois and David and Steve and I had all been on the same first mission together. That was the last time Steve or I had been out on a mission with them, but I considered them a permanent fixture here at the organization.
And like that, they were gone. Not only that, but depending on how far reaching the effect was, everyone else might think they never existed.
Steve gently helped us to our feet and we made our way out and into our common room. I collapsed in the alcove that was assigned to Steve and I and I fell asleep.
Opening the room into the diagnostic suite I grabbed the portable chroniton detector and ran it over myself. Just as I thought I was well into the red. The clock on the wall tells me that I’ve been out for about six hours, which means that I’m in serious trouble. I scan the other three remaining members of my team, and the results are confusing. Steve, having been in close personal contact with me has the highest reading, but it’s well within the green. Lois and David are basically reading at zero.
Why am I so much higher that anyone else? I wonder. I’ve never been especially susceptible to chroniton radiation in the past, and starting now just seems like an exceptional waste.
Putting my worries aside for the moment, I head to the supply closet, I mean office, to get a new issue of uniforms. The sergeant doesn’t even blink when I request female attire. “We seem to be missing some of your measurements, Ms. Lewis. If you’ll step into the closet please?”
I step into the closed and disrobe. The lasers they use for measurement are invisible to the naked eye, so I just follow the supply sergeant’s directions until he tells me that I can get dressed again.
The gaffs I expect, as I’d worn one in the past to better masquerade as a woman. The bras on the other hand are completely unexpected. It’s embarrassing enough to be issued bras that I don’t need to heighten the embarrassment by arguing with a supply clerk about them.
It’s not until I’m halfway back to the common room that I realize that he’d referred to me in the feminine. I rush back and went into the bathroom. I turn on the light and lock the door, and then, after a deep breath, I disrobe. My back is to the mirror while I do it. I don't even want to look at my own body while I’m stripping.
I then turn around and look at myself in the mirror. The counter blocks my view of my crotch so there’s nothing to spoil the effect of what I see in front of me. I’m a little under-developed for a woman my age, but there’s no mistaking that I look like a woman. My face is softer, though still recognizable. My hips are just slightly wider than I’m used to but my waist is significantly smaller making my hips look huge. They’re still narrower than my shoulders, if only slightly.
The most damning bit of evidence is, or should I say ‘are’ since there are two of them, are my breasts. Putting on one of the bras, which fits perfectly, only brings home what my eyes are telling me. I put on a gaff and then pull on my vintage-looking stockings. Looking at my leg I just as quickly took them off. There was no way I was wearing those sheer stockings with leg-hair showing through. while I’d personally never researched the subject, a timely thought picked up from the other me told me that, while not universal, some women during WWII did shave their legs.
I sat on the edge of the tub, just holding the razor, trying to calm my racing heart. Shaving isn’t what scared me. What scares me is that I’m still slipping, and by wearing this clothing, by shaving my legs, I’m bringing myself closer to the edge. Logically, I know that my attitude doesn’t mean anything, just like my attitude wouldn’t move me through time no matter how hard I focused.
It doesn’t feel that way, however.
Again, I take a cleansing breath and apply the peach scented shaving gel. I’m careful and quick about it, and somehow I complete the task as if I’d been doing it for years. The thoughts of where I might have gotten this skill are pushed away. The fear that accompanies those thoughts is pushed away as well.
Finally done, I pull on the stockings and the rest of my clothing. While still a uniform, it fits me like a glove, much better than they would have traditionally. It was, of course, tailored for me specifically, but I look at myself in the mirror and smile. I put on the makeup that came in an overnight bag with the uniform with an again scarily proficient hand.
These cosmetics are at least period in style if not in composition, and I wonder, for the first time, if maybe Beauty Secrets through the Ages isn’t it’s own skill that is underrated by my male counterparts in the organization.
The thought brings me up short. It was my thought, not my others, and in it I thought of myself as female...I accepted myself as female.
I turn out the light and head out into the common room. After putting my clothing away in my closet space, I sit down at the foot of the bed I shared with Steve and just sit there, watching him sleep. A feeling of peace suffuses me, and whether it is my own personal peace, or the others peace, I don’t care in that moment.
It is peace, and it is the most peace I’ve had since waking up at 5 this morning. There is a stirring behind me and I turn to see Lois crawling out of the bed she’s sharing with David. She gestures for me to follow her and we cross into the kitchen area. The light there will be shielded from the people in the main area of the room.
“I’ve never asked you, Lois. Are you and David married?”
“Not for lack of trying,” Lois says.
“What do you mean?”
“I’d love to marry that man, but he’s still pining for his first wife.”
“He’s married?” I say, shocked.
“He was. About two months before he applied to the program, his wife and daughter died in a car accident. The two of us had been friends for a very long time, since we were kids actually, and he asked me if I wanted to join him.”
“You thought he meant something more, didn’t you.”
“Yeah. But he’s never looked at me that way. It was a shock to him when he found out that we were paired.”
“You knew already?”
“I still remember the first time I saw him. I remember the complete mind destroying power of that moment. He just sort of remembers me coming over to him on the playground and asking to play.”
“He didn’t feel it?”
“It’s apparently stronger for girls than it is for guys.”
“No, it’s sometimes the same, because I can remember how powerful it was for me. It felt as if the orbit of the galaxy suddenly shifted and it began to move around Steve.”
“Ray, have you seen how you’re dressed right now?”
I blush and Lois laughs, “I always knew you were a girl, you know that?”
I just stare at her in shock.
“It’s true. I knew, intellectually, that you were a guy before...whatever this is, at least physically, but mentally, socially, emotionally? You were a woman just like the rest of us. That’s part of the reason we welcomed you in.”
“Don’t welcome any of the other guys paired with guys?”
“You’re the only one I know of.”
I was about to mention another three that I was aware of, but then I remembered where I’d met them, and I wasn’t to even think of that mission again. General’s orders.
That reminded me of something. “We ran into General Haynes.”
“Where? Here after we got back?”
“No, he’s there, in The Pit.”
“What?”
“It’s part of what prompted this,” I say gesturing at myself.
“Do you have breasts?”
“Way to change the subject.”
“Sorry, it’s just they look so real.”
“I’m slipping, Lois.”
“I don’t understand.”
“It looks like I might survive it, but I’m...merging?..with an alternate version of myself.”
“You have alternate versions who are female?”
“Yes, and you have alternates that are male.”
“But close enough that you could slip with just a little excess radiation?”
I grab the scanner and run it over myself and hand it to Lois. Her mouth drops open in shock.
“I’m the only one with any amount of radiation. You, Steve, and David are all safe.”
“Wow, you could swap with a version of you that isn’t even human with this much radiation.”
“So, at least I’m lucky just to be turning female, right?”
“But your mind is the same?”
“For now. I’ve had some...leakage. Also, it would seem that I pulled you along on one of my shifts. The whole drinking-confession-thing? It never actually happened.”
“But I remember it?”
“I know. A different me, and a different you, had that conversation.”
“So, you never kissed Steve?”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” I say, blushing.
“You little tramp. When?”
“In the forest while waiting for...them to return.”
“Oh, well, nothing like running for your life to dampen the mood.”
“Or realizing you’re randomly swapping genders?”
“You seem to be adjusting well?”
“That’s because I can’t tell. I have to focus to realize that it’s happening. It all feels so...normal.”
“It’d think that you would be able to tell if something that drastic was happening to you.”
“You’d think, but I am merging with an alternate version of myself, which brings memories along with it.”
“You’re losing yourself?”
“Worse, I’m gaining a whole new life. I’m going to have two full sets of memories when this is over.”
Lois has nothing else to say, and frankly I’m about talked out as well. We spend the next little while cooking dinner for the four of us. The smells of cooking wake the boys and the wander over to the bar and stand there talking to us. I can't help but appreciate the glances that Steve sends my way. It reminds me of something.
“David, do you love Lois.”
“What?” Lois exclaims, but I put a finger over her lips and repeat the question.
“I don’t know,” he says.
“It’s an easy question, David. Yes, or no.”
“Well, I like her, and we never argue, we feel like two halves of the same person. How do you say you love your arm or your hand or your eye?”
“At least he didn’t call you his foot, Lois” Steve says with a chuckle.
“Hush, hon, the adults are talking,” I say to him with a smile.
“So, what you’re saying, is that you literally couldn’t live without her, right? That you’d be lost if she wasn’t a part of your life?”
“Well, yeah, that sounds about right.”
“Then ask her to marry you, damn it. She loves you and always has, and this game you’re playing is killing her.”
“What?” David says looking at Lois and she just nods at him, tears in her eyes.
“You never said anything.”
“But I hinted at it a lot. You sure are dense sometimes. I mean, I joined the program because of you.”
“I thought…”
“David, here’s a hint. Kiss her,” Steve says, grinning like a fool.
David takes her in his arms and kisses her so thoroughly that I’m melting. Steve walks up to me and puts his arms around me from behind. I put my hands on his arms and lean my head back into his shoulder.
“Marry me?” Steve whispers in my ear and I just nod, “sounds good to me,” I say, and then my words register and I pull away from him and run out into the other room.
“Rachel?”
“My name’s Ray, Steve. Ray. I’m your best friend.”
“You’ll stay my best friend, Ray. It’s just that we’ll become more than that.”
“I’m a guy, Steve.”
Something flashes across Steve’s face and then he looks at me in horror. “I completely forgot, how could I forget.”
“Because she’s completely irradiated, Steve.”
“How? When?”
“You all need to keep your distance, Steve, Lois. This is getting bad.”
“Ray, I don’t want to keep my distance.”
“I’m slipping, Ray.”
“I don;t care. You saw what happened to Andy, you saw the anguish when he said Candy was gone. That’s not going to be me.”
“Please,” I say, tearing up a bit, “I can’t lose you, Steve.”
“Why, Ray? Because we’re friends?”
“No, because I’m only just realizing that I’ve been in love with you since the first moment I saw you. I can’t lose that just because I’m slipping. Let me become a woman. I can live with that. But I want you to stay you. I want the you that I spent the last ten years with, not the one that was with this girl me.”
“Ray,” he says, taking a step toward me but Lois and David hold him back.
“Don’t Steve, listen to her, him...listen to Ray,” Lois says.
“Ray finally admitted he loves you, Steve. Let him be. Let him protect you as best as he can.”
I hear a sob escape from Steve’s lips. More than anything I want to go to him, to comfort him, but when how things are going, it will be no comfort.
“I think we need to go back to the point we left from,” I say.
“Why?”
“We need to do this right. Also...I think we need to save General Haynes.”
“What are you talking about,” Lois asks.
“Apparently General Haynes is in 1944, or at least a version of him is.”
“Well, then let’s go back to 1944 and get him,” David says.
“It’s not that simple,” Steve replies and I nod my agreement. “It’s like this,” I continue for him, “the General Haynes that we met in 1944 doesn’t know us, so it’s an earlier version of General Haynes.”
“Then how..?” David begins, but Lois completes the thought for us, “So, we have to get the General back with one of the other groups, but we don’t know which group he should be going back with…”
“And we don’t know the other groups itinerary, since we were just supposed to avoid them.”
“Well, that’s fine, we’ll try to get him off from the group 1 point in 36 hours, and if that fails then we just get him off with group 2.”
David chips in at this point, “Hon, it won’t work. It’s a flex point. Normally, yes, because we wouldn’t be able to do something that hadn’t already happened, we’d be fine to just shove him through the first available portal to the future.”
Lois gets thoughtful. Time is resilient. More so than most people who understand time travel would be willing to allow. Think about the so called Grandfather-Paradox that most people try to use to disprove time. The theory goes, that if you go back and kill your grandfather, then you never existed to go and kill your grandfather. It usually get’s extrapolated from here to say that time-travel is impossible because this sort of thing would just about have to occur, or would likely occur whenever someone time-traveled, ignoring for the moment the morality of killing your own grandfather.
If you attempted to go back and kill your grandfather, either the person you killed wasn’t your grandfather, just someone you thought was your grandfather, or you will simply fail to carry out the task. Your gun will jam, or you’ll have a last minute change of heart, or you’ll be struck by a car and killed while crossing the road to kill your grandfather. The options are truly limitless, but it ends up being that you’re not able to kill your grandfather.
Because it never happened.
That doesn’t mean that timetravelers can’t do anything in the past. The assassination of President Kennedy, not to mention so many other events that even just Steve and I were a part of, proves that timetravelers can have an effect on history.
Actually, I should say that they already had an effect on history, since it already happened. However, it is possible to create a weak-point in spacetime. This is what we call a flux-point, or even a flex-point, but that is the less common term for the same thing.
If your grandfather lived in a flux-point, then you could successfully kill him. Not only that, but you will continue to exist in the future. You’ve just spawned a reality in which your grandfather wasn’t your grandfather.
If this seems dangerous to anyone else, then you’re not alone, because this terrifies the holy living hell out of me...and we’re voluntarily heading into one of these, again, with the intent of trying to make no changes to reality.
“We can’t do it,” Lois finally says.
“Do what?” Steve replies.
“We can’t go back and not change anything. Going back, almost by definition, is changing things. Neither of the first two groups saw us.”
“That we know of,” I say quietly.
“What do you mean?”
“The four of us have only been with the organization for two prime-years. The first time they sent someone back was fourteen years ago. The second was, what, four years after that?” None of the others know, and they just shrug. “Anyway, the point is, none of the people on those teams know us yet.”
Steve smiles and David begins to grin, “so, we can walk around in the open, and as long as we never mention the organization or the project, then…”
Lois finishes it, “...then we will never be noticed.”
“The only ones who they might have recognized are dead,” I say quietly.
“We’ll mourn our dead when we’re done,” David says firmly, and I nod in his direction.
“So, are we ready for this?” Steve says.
“Eat first,” says Lois.
“Yeah, we slaved away in the kitchen for about thirty minutes,” I say with a laugh.
We all head into the dining area and Lois brings the food out while Steve and David set the table. There is none of the normal banter that would have been at a time like this. We’re too worried about what might happen to allow ourselves to be playful. When we’re done Lois and I touch up our makeup and then we head out to the sphere. Steve punches 0 into the panel and we wait.
“Ray?”
“They just killed a T-Rex.”
“Good, come on,” he says and grabs my arm. I quickly pull it from his grasp and move to catch up to Lois and David.
The plan seemed simple enough in the sphere, but now, however, it starts to become obvious that we are out of our depth. If this weren’t a flux point, we’d wander around until we just happened to run into General Haynes, since that was what had to happen.
As it was…
“Lt. Lewis?”
“General Haynes?”
“You have to get out of here, it’s not safe. Go back to your recall point and get out of here. I’ll have to figure my own way back.”
“Wait...what?” David just about yelled.
“You’re not here to save me?”
“Yes, but no, but...it’s complicated,” Lois replies.
“General Haynes, what do you know about time travel?” I say.
“I’m a time traveler from 2028...aren’t you?”
“We’re from 2044,” Steve says, and General Haynes’ face falls.
“But there are two other groups here, one of which is from 2030,” David says helpfully.
“I’ve already been here for eight years, so two years back home isn’t all that bad.”
“What happened in 1936 that they wanted to fix?”
“What are you talking about,” the general asks.
I share a look with Steve and I simply nods.
“General, let’s just assume, for the moment, that you’re telling the truth,” I say, beginning slowly, and calmly, “what were you trying to accomplish here?”
“Well, you see, I invented time travel, or at least here I did. I was trying to get home. They were able to send me out easily enough, but then apparently something went wrong and they weren’t able to retrieve me.”
“What happened to your better half,” Lois says with a little smile.
“My wife is back in the future.”
“No, I mean the other half of your dyad.”
I was shaking my head the entire time, trying to prevent Lois from speaking, but it was too late.
“What’s a dyad?” he says.
“We’ll explain all of that later. How did you know we’re time travelers,” I ask sweetly.
“I saw your hair band. It lifted above your collar while you were leaning forward. I have to say, though, you look much better this way than in that ill-fitting male uniform.”
And then I knew. I didn’t know how, I didn’t know why, but I knew for a fact that this wasn’t me naturally gaining too much chroniton radiation, and I wasn’t the one who was slipping. I was pretty sure that no one else was slipping either, or at least not on their own.
The general was slipping, and he was taking the rest of reality with him. With the sinking feeling in my stomach I realized something else. In order to prevent a paradox of our own creation, we had to somehow make the general normal, bleed off all of his chroniton radiation, and we had to do it in the midst of the biggest chroniton radiation bubble in all of recorded history.
Here is how I see the reference I made to Lois and Clark IE superman:
Comic book characters change, especially after a retcon. Storylines progress, and what was considered “canon” over time changes as well. Consider for a moment that there was a period of time where Clark Kent was a news-anchor on TV.
That being said, I predict four reasons why, over 30 years, there could be enough of a change that this wouldn’t be something ‘everyone’ knows.
Option 1: The comic book craze in TV and movies dies down in exchange for some other fringe media.
Option 2: Superman and Wonderwoman become the assumed pairing. The Lois character is phased out over the course of two retcons and then dropped entirely.
Option 3: They decide to add to their roster of gay superheroes and make Superman gay. Lois’ name is change to Lewis Lane who is still a reporter.
Option 4: They make Superman asexual, having no personal romantic relationships.
While the last one is unlikely, it is still possible.
“We have to,” I reply, “this is our General Haynes. In order for nothing to change, he has to be part of the program for the next fourteen years of his life, which is the last fourteen years of our reality. Can you really imagine the damage just dropping him from the program would cause?”
We’ve moved to a nearby building. The sound of gunfire has receded a little, as have the thunderous footfalls of dinosaurs and other, less recognizable, creatures. If I hadn’t been sure that they were fantastical, I would have assumed that I saw a dragon appear in the air for a moment or two before plummeting to earth.
“But we’re...but he’s…” Lois begins, but is unable to formulate an accurate description. I can’t blame her. How do you describe something, without a lot of math, that just doesn’t make any sense to the rational mind.
“I can hear you,” the general calls from the other room. I walk out to join him, since our conversation is getting us nowhere.
“How much do you know about the theory of time travel, General?”
“Call me Chris…” He pauses as if waiting for me to return the favor. I don’t and he finally continues with a sigh. “Well, apparently not as much as I thought, since what I’ve already seen here shouldn’t be possible.”
“What did the device that you used to get back here look like?”
“It was a platform in the mojave desert. We thought that...I thought that putting it out there would keep it away from not only prying eyes, but keep it from adversely affecting the surrounding area. Same with this pit of a base. The walls rising all around it channel the energy…”
I smile as he comes to the same conclusion I did earlier.
“The energy waves are rebounding from the rock and multiplying, aren’t they. Like bad acoustics in a concert hall. It goes from music to noise in a fraction of a second.”
“Yes, and unlike sound waves, chroniton waves propagate in four dimensions instead of only three.”
“Wait...that means...what have I done? I only planned…”
There is a sudden sinking feeling in my gut.
“You were standing at the center of the Pit, weren’t you, when you turned this on.”
“And except for the time that I spent with you in the processing center, where I went to shut the computer down by the way, I have spent the entire time there as well. That’s not a good thing, is it?”
“What do you know about the side effects of excess chroniton radiation?”
“There are side effects?” he says almost tongue in cheek, and then he sees my expression and sobers, “How bad?”
“Well, you saw the dinosaurs out there.”
“Hallucinations?” he says, hopefully.
“It is one side effect. Someone here has so much chroniton radiation that they are punching holes in reality so big that dinosaurs are stepping through from a timeline where there never was a mass extinction.”
“But that is so unlikely. If it hadn’t been a meteor, it would have been a virus, or a natural ice-age or…”
“But not impossible, right?”
“Of course it’s not impossible.”
“Every possible outcome of every decision since the beginning of time and until the end of time already exists out there, and this person is either consciously or unconsciously punching holes to those realities.”
“It’s me, isn’t it.”
“Or one of your assistants.”
“I was the only one in the center. I thought I set up the coordinates properly.”
“You were trying to go back to where you started?”
“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
The more that I learned, the more I realized that we had an impossible task. Not just an unlikely one. That first experiment, the one that failed, should have been the end of this program, since even if they’d brought him back, he would have been the chroniton equivalent of walking nuclear waste.
Hell, he was that equivalent now. With how much energy he was generating here...how hadn’t he punched a hole in reality before this? He would have to have been a walking flux point for...years.
Suddenly all the anachronisms began to make sense. He was a weak point in time, and the best thing we could do for reality wouldn’t be to take him back with us, it would be to kill him, because as soon as he was inanimate he’d stop being a focal point for all of this craziness.
In all the time that I’d been an agent, all of the missions I’d been called upon to do, I’d never felt the nausea that killing this man brought upon me. I went outside and was violently ill all over the side of the building.
“You know how we were told that it was a simple matter of turning off the machine and everything returns to normal, disaster averted?”
“Yeah,” Steve says warily. Lois and Dave are looking back and forth between themselves, sharing meaningful looks. Lois looks worried when she turns to look at me fully.
“What weren’t we told?” Lois says. She is too calm. This almost seems as though she knows the other shoe is about to drop.
“We weren’t told that the machine is already off.”
“What!” Steve yells and Dave is out of his seat opening his mouth to speak.
“Sit the fuck down. Now!” I say, getting angry. Here they are, acting as if it is the end of the world. What they don’t realize is it is the end of the world, just not for them. “there are going to be no more outbursts of any sort, or I’m going to shoot the offending party.”
“Ray,” Steve mollifies, but I’m having none of it, “I mean it, Steve. I’m this close to just killing all of us and hoping that the timeline sorts itself out.”
“How would that work, I mean we wouldn’t be killing…” Lois began, but then her face went pale, and then a little green. “I think I’m going to be sick.”
“Been there, done that,” I say.
The boys, like usual, are a little slow on the uptake. This isn’t anything against guys in general, it’s just that those of us who have a Mental classification are required to have a lot more knowledge on the theory of time travel than the Physical grunts.
“What’s going on?” Dave says, getting worried.
Lois answers for me, “One of us is the reason that everything is going to hell in a handbasket. And since it is an excess of chroniton radiation, making us inanimate would be an expedient method of solving the problem.”
“No, not one of us, Lois. Two of us, by which I mean the General...and me.”
“We’re not killing Ray,” Steve says rising to his feet again, and I glare at him. He sits back down.
“We may not have a choice,” I say. I will not cry, I think to myself as I watch Steve’s face crumple. I’ve seen him face down a charge of heavy cavalry alone and never seen him so defeated as I see him in this moment.
“We may not have an option, Steve. You saw how high my readings were. I’m basically dead already. You just barely enter the yellow and they don’t send you out for six months. How long do you think it will take for me to be able to go out again. And forget me having children.”
“But...wait, the other you can have children?”
“There is no other me, Steve. Not anymore.”
“How do you know?” He says. I just glare at him and he has the good grace to blush.
“You’re a girl?” Lois says with entirely too much joy in her face.
“Physically, yes, at the very least. Anything else would have to wait for a full medical examination.”
“Don’t you know, I mean you merged with this other you…” Steve says. He is hoping that all of his dreams are coming true. How do I tell him that our story isn’t a fairy tale? How do I tell him that it shares much more in common with horror.
“It’s not that simple. I’m not this other person. I don’t know what’s going to happen. All I do know, is that there are two people causing this right now and the other one is the General.”
The import of my words is sinking in and I smile sadly at them. They haven’t reached the next logical conclusion, the one that I already knew. I sit there quietly, waiting for them each to come to the understanding of the core problem.
There is something that they don’t realize, however. What they don’t realize is something that I’m only now beginning to realize, and it defies logic. I’m hoping that my theory is wrong, but I have a feeling it isn’t. If it’s not wrong, then killing the two of us isn’t just the easiest option, it’s the best option.
“Wait,” Steve says. This is a flux-point. We can alter the outcome. We just have to figure out how. There has to be an action we can take that will…”
I shake my head and try to speak, but nothing comes out. Lois speaks for me, “It can’t work that way, Steve. Even if we get her back to our time, she’s done with the program. There’s no way she can ever go back again, and with the levels we saw it will be lucky if she doesn’t end up living for the next decade or so in a concrete bunker somewhere while she bleeds off chroniton energy.”
“So, we kill her, you know, suffocation or something, and then revive her,” Dave says.
“How long does it take for a formerly living organism to bleed off Chroniton energy, Dave?” I ask quietly. “A second? A minute? Five minutes? How dead do I have to be to speed the process, David?”
“That’s enough, David,” Steve says stepping between the two of us. David looks helplessly in Lois’ direction, but there are no answers there.
“It get’s worse,” I say.
“How could it get worse?”
“Well, we could completely end the project if we kill both the general and myself.”
“We’re not killing you, Ray.”
“Why not? It would solve the problem.”
“No, it wouldn’t. I can’t live without you.”
I smile through my tears, knowing my makeup is running, but not caring. I love this man, and I just hate that it took me this long to realize it. If I had a chance to do everything over then I’d make sure that we made the most of every opportunity before us. I wouldn’t allow my own hesitation to take away all those little moments that we could have had together.
I’d be a better person.
Unfortunately, that’s a losing proposition because I think that I know how this all ends. There won’t be a fairy-tale ending for me. Not this time.
“Ray, promise me something,” Steve says, a blatant desperation in his voice.
“Steve…”
“Promise me that you’re not going to just give up. Promise me that you will keep fighting until the end. None of this fatalistic crap. This point in time hasn’t been written yet.”
I nod. I can’t voice it, but I nod for him, and he kisses me. I push away as fast as I can, “You can’t do that, Steve. It’s not safe.”
“Damn safe, Ray. I want to spend as much time with you as possible.”
“We’ll have the rest of our lives together.”
“Ray, you’re lying to me. For the first time since we met, you’re lying to me. I don’t know what you know, but I know that you’re lying through your teeth. You know that you can’t make it through this alive.”
“Steve…”
“I want to change it, but if I can’t I’m not missing another moment of what we could have together.”
On some unspoken word of agreement, David and Lois leave the room. Steve takes me in his arms and kisses me like it’s the end of the world. The very fact that it is the end of the world doesn’t lessen it in anyway, but it does make it more bittersweet.
After his initial force, he becomes perfectly gentle with me, and I melt into him. It is the best and worst moment of my life and in that moment I forget all about what I know and what I assume and I am just Rachel and he is just Steve and we are one.
Steve made me feel like a woman as well, but that thought destroys the smile on my face. I love Steve, and I’m afraid that I’m going to break his heart. There is a pounding on the door and I open it to find Steve standing there with General Haynes. There is a huge smile on his face.
“There is an industrial freezer on the base, in the mess. It’s probably still running, or at least cold enough.”
“Cold enough for what?”
“Well, I figured since the general built his own chroniton generator that he must have more than a passing knowledge of the theory behind it.”
“But…” I begin, but then shut up. That first group did successfully send a person back in time, so they had to have at least part of the theory right.
“The rate that chroniton radiation leaves the body is accelerated by dropping the temperature of said body,” Chris says.
“Right, but there is so much chroniton radiation in the air…”
“It’s lined with lead,”Steve says.
“Wait...they lined a freezer with lead? Why in the world…”
“To protect the food from chroniton radiation,” Chris says with a grin.
“That has to be the stupidest reason to do something I have ever heard,” I say in shock.
“I agreed with you, but the brass didn’t believe me when I told them it was only animate creatures who can really be affected by chroniton radiation. My theory is that it has to do with the electrical field that a living body generates.”
It didn’t explain why a robot couldn’t be sent back, but I let it pass.
“Regardless, the faster that the body drops below seventy degrees, the faster that it will shed it’s excess chroniton radiation.”
“Faster, yes, but how long?”
“No longer than about fifteen or twenty minutes,” Chris says. He knows what that means just as much as I do. This isn’t a magic bullet. This is a virtual death sentence. Without a modern trauma center, both of us are probably dead. Even with one, our chances aren’t that good. Our core temperature has to drop below seventy degrees fahrenheit or about twenty degrees celsius. We would be dead as soon as our bodies dropped much below ninety fahrenheit or thirty celsius.
And we had to stay below that temperature for about twenty minutes, just to be sure.
“It’s not going to work,” I say, sadly.
“Yes, it will. Lois and Clark went back alone to get Michael and Michaela. We’re breaking protocol, but to hell with it. We’re not losing anyone else.”
Steve wraps me in his arms and holds me, but the general and I share a look. Both of us know that this will likely mean a grave, and not salvation, for either of us.
“When do we leave,” I ask, trying to sound hopeful.
“I gave Lois and Clark the location of the mess, so they should be able to meet us there, especially since they’ll be coming back at the same time they left, again. I’m sure the controllers are wondering what in the world is going on.”
“Nah, I spent four days in the control center, remember. Mostly they’re just trying to stave off boredom and finish with their shifts so they can go home.”
He laughs at that, and I’m glad that I can continue to bring him joy. We step outside the building and I make the mistake of looking up. I see a warped reflection of the ground. It’s as if a metallic dome had been put over the top of the sinkhole. It is likely that the first team, and possibly the second, are on site. We are on a timer, now, and every minute counts, or so it seems.
I see a flicker of motion out of the corner of my eye, and turn to look, but there’s nothing there. I see a bush moving gently, but that could as easily be a breeze as anything else. I ignore, for the moment, that the air is completely still.
There’s movement to my right and I turn that direction just in time to see a grey, scaly, tail move around the corner.
“Guys,” I say, quietly, “I think we have company.”
“Another dinosaur?” Chris asks, bouncing a little like a kid in a candy store.
“No, I think,” and that’s the last thing I say before I let out an eep of surprise. I’ve been lifted off my feet and yanked backwards by something strong and ropy feeling. My arms are pinned to my sides and I look down. It’s a tail. Up close, I can see the scales are black and white, but so fine for something this large that the blend into a grey at any distance. My view is whipped around and my hairband breaks loose. I don’t have any time to worry about it because a large triangular head comes into view.
“Mmmm,” a sibilant bass voice says, “a tasty little morsel. And blonde too. It’s been ages since I could eat a natural blonde.”
“What in the hell?” I say. My shock seems to have worn off to be replaced with perplexity.
“Oh, so you humans are the only intelligent beings on the planet?”
“I don’t believe in dragons,” I say with a little smile.
“You can disbelieve gravity, but it will still kill you.”
“Oh, so you’re a learned dragon?”
“When you’re alive as long as I am, you tell me that knowledge won’t become the only thing that gets you up in the morning. There are only so many sunrises that you can see without it all becoming a little blase.”
“Oh, well, then you know all about time travel,” at his nod I continue, “and chroniton radiation?”
“Well, of course...why do you ask?”
“I was born male.”
“And? You’re not the first trans-woman I’ve eaten.”
“This body was, as far as I can tell, born female.” While not strictly true, it had the desired shock value attached and the dragon, for that’s what I assumed it to be, dropped me to the ground.
“Well, excrement.” the dragon says and I can’t help but laugh. The thought of something the size of this monster saying a euphemism is just humorous to me for some reason. Steve and Chris come running around the corner and stop in their tracks.
“Well, one of those two I can eat, I assume, unless everyone here has been overdosed with chronitons,” the dragon hisses.
“Run, Steve!” I scream, realizing too late the danger he’d just put himself in. I pull out my side arm and begin firing at the dragon’s neck. He casually turns his head to look at me and I stop shooting.
“Don’t think I won’t kill you, little morsel. Just because I can’t eat you while you’re still wriggling and fresh doesn’t mean I would pass up leftovers.”
The casual tone with which he says this is more chilling than the words that he speaks.
“Only humans would be so arrogant as to assume that just because they’re the only ones to have achieved time travel that they’re the only ones who understand it. Some of us aren’t quite that reckless,” the dragon grumbles and slips around the corner so quickly that it would almost be possible to assume that this was a nightmare and not a living breathing...something. My mind fails to come up with a metaphor strong enough to describe the hell I am living in.
There are some sounds of gunfire from around the corner and I run to see, hoping that Steve is still safe, and that he can survive long enough for something, anything, to save him. Like a meteor, or a laser pistol, or something.
A squad of soldiers has formed up in the next intersection over and is firing as fast as they can work the levers on their rifles. The bullets aren’t even penetrating the beasts hide and I wonder, idly, what it could be made out of. The thought makes me chuckle darkly. Here I’m looking at a beast out of myth and legend, a being that heavy cavalry was said to be able to kill, provided they hit the right spot, and I’m wondering if a few ounces of lead can penetrate it’s hide.
The dragon wins, of course, and decimates the squad. One second they’re there, firing at the dragon. I think I see a smile split it’s face, and then it launches itself into the intersection and bits and pieces of bodies are flying in every direction. Miraculously, there is one soldier still standing, unharmed, in the middle of it.
In the next moment I realize that it wasn’t happenstance but planning as the dragon picks the soldier up by it’s tail. Oh, do struggle and scream,” the dragon says in it’s deep sibilant voice, “it makes the meat taste better.”
I turn away from the scene just as the soldier begins to scream. The sound is cut off by a resounding crunch. I turn to see a leg hanging from the beasts jaws. Just as I turn it disappears with a slurp. Somewhere inside me I know he was watching me, waiting for me to turn so he could show me that. I dry heave and collapse to the pavement while the dragon laughs. I’ll have nightmares for the rest of my life that feature that laughter.
“Where was I,” the cold cruel voice of the dragon intones.
“Fire!” I hear David’s voice call out behind me and four guns sound as one. Holes appear in the dragons head, and he lets out a bellow of shock that shatters windows all around us. My ears are ringing so badly that I can’t hear the follow-up shots, but the dragon jerks as shot after shot pierces it’s body. It turns toward us, all of it’s lithe motion missing in the painful jerking motions it attempts to make. Still, the hail of fire passes all around me and I drop to the ground. My eyes are locked on the form of that beast as it’s ripped apart. A little smile splits my lips and I say, “Fuck you very much, asshole.”
Distantly I hear some laughter behind me and I turn to see Lois and Clark and Mike squared holding the large fifty caliber rifles that are standard for any mission to a time before mankind began trying to tame the universe.
Steve appears out of nowhere and helps me to my feet and Michaela walks over to me. “Ray?”
“Hey, Mif.”
“You’re a girl.”
“Yep,” I say with a smile.
“You slipped.”
“Um, well, didn’t you guys explain what was going on?” I say turning toward Lois and Clark.
“Well, we sorta forgot that time wasn’t of the essence,” David says.
“And we rushed when we didn’t need to,” Lois finishes.
“You should have at least waited the customary four hours,” I say and they just look embarrassed. “I assume one of you two brought a portable scanner in your bag of tricks,” I say looking at each of the Mikes in turn.
“Of course, Rachel,” Mim says and I glare at him. Mif laughs.
“What’s this whole ‘Mif’ thing?” Steve says.
“that’s easy,” I say. “Mike, female, can be shortened to Mif and Mike male can be shortened to Mim, so we just call them Mif and Mim, at least the other girls and I do.”
“Finally admitting you’re a girl,” Steve asks and I punch him in the arm. “As if you had to ask, asshole.” He’s just grinning at me and I can’t help but return the smile.
We make our way to the mess hall. The power is still on, something at least I was worried about. Apparently the base is large enough to have it’s own power generation. Mike squared check out the freezer and then verify the radiation levels on the inside, which were negligible, and then on each of us. Steve was a little high, but nothing that a little time in the freezer with me wouldn’t cure. Everyone else was fine. Well, everyone excepting the general and I. We were still ridiculously high in the red.
“You’re sure about the math on this,” Mim says.
“Yes, I’m sure,” Chris replies.
After that they close the door. Steve only needs to be in here for about five or ten minutes to be within the safe line so he stays over by the door. To speed the hypothermia process the general and I are soaked completely through. I’m shivering within seconds and I can see Steve straining to come over and hold me, to try and warm me.
“It’s going to be ok, Ray.”
“I know,” I stammer out.
“You look so cold right now.”
“That’s just because I’m freezing,” I stammer, but jaw chattering uncontrollably. Chris laughs but Steve looks like I’ve stabbed him in the gut. After a minute or so, the shivering stops. It doesn’t feel as cold to me anymore. Steve leaves around that time and I realize I’m losing track of time.
“This will be an adventure, huh?” Chris says, but I don’t have the energy to reply. I lie down on the floor and close my eyes. I don’t want to die with my eyes frozen open. It’s been a long time since I prayed, but I do so now. I pray until my thoughts begin to wander and then quickly close it. I’m feeling tired and I just begin to drift. I can imagine the flurry of activity that is about to occur, or at least will twenty minutes after my core temperature reaches seventy degrees.
Logically, I know I should have time. It is frozen in here, well below zero, and they cranked the thing as low as it would go. A small portion of my mind wonders if this is an anachronism. I’m not sure since I’ve never studied refrigeration technology.
It’s possible that it is, but then again possible that it isn’t.
Steve’s going to miss me when I’m gone. I’ll miss him, too, but I’ll be dead. I’m not sure if I go on after death, but I am sure that people have been doing it for years and I’ll have to be able to get over him. There would be more ghosts otherwise.
I just wish that I could make love to him one more time.
I wish I could have his children and grow old with him.
I wish...
Just trust me. Have I ever let you down in the past...when it really mattered :)
There’s something important I have to say, but I can’t remember what it is. There was something, something that I was thinking just a moment ago, and I can’t remember. All this pain. It’s too hot. A cloth seers my face and my eyes and they can open again. I blink and bring everything into focus. Steve is standing over me. I remember what was so important to say.
“I wish I’d married you when I had the chance,” say and he laughs.
“Her core temperature is coming up nicely,” a voice says. My mind is still waking up and I’m not sure who it is. It hits me then. I was dead. Actually, truly, dead for somewhere close to an hour. Someone is massaging my my limbs, I assume to improve circulation as quickly as possible.
“That hurts, you know,” I say to whomever is torturing my poor extremities.
“Can’t be helped,” Lois replies. “Not if you want to walk again.”
“You’re just making that up,” I grumble and there is laughter in the room.
“What are my numbers?” I ask. I have to know if it worked.
“You’re lower.”
“Where?”
“You’re at the top of the green, but you are in the green.” Mim says. There’s something in his voice that worries me. I look at him with concern in my eyes. The next thing he says is supposed to assuage my fears, “We haven’t revived the general yet.”
“Then go get him,” I say as forcefully as I can. Leave Steve here with me. He can raise my core temperature some.”
There is a shocked gasp and a couple of chuckles.
“Wait, I said that aloud,” I say. I’m still a little out of it, apparently.
“If certain parts of me wouldn’t freeze off if I tried it, I’d be all for the excuse, my little popsicle. We’re just going to leave you in the thermal blanket for now.”
“Go, save the general,” I say again and amazingly they leave. I think that I fall asleep because the next thing I remember is Steve kissing me on the lips.
“Good morning, Sleeping beauty.”
My arms and legs don’t feel like they’re on fire anymore. I feel alive, if still a little lethargic. It’s something hard to describe. There’s a knowledge that I intentionally stepped over the edge into the abyss and then was pulled back by my loved ones.
It’s a heady feeling, especially since I’m no longer slipping. It means I’ll likely be stuck in this body for the rest of my life, but remembering the moment or two that Steve and I stole, it is something that I can live with.
As of yet, I don’t know if there’s been any permanent damage, but I wouldn’t be able to tell. I’ll have to wait and see if anything crops up to prove to me that the damage is there.
I hear them talking in the other room. There’s a tension to their voices. They are trying to revive the general. It’s not that there’s any specific problem but we did something the human body is simply not designed to withstand. Freezing kills you. Freezing is supposed to kill you. I hear them call for this drug and that drug. The steady tone of the heart monitor turns into a beep and there is a sigh of relief from someone.
I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding in.
The hard part is over. Since I know the general has never been on a mission, he should be fine as long as he is somewhere near the middle of the yellow. If he’s in the green, all the better, but as long as he is out of the red then we should be fine sending him back with team 1.
I look at the clock on the wall. We have another thirty hours to get him imbedded with team 1, or more specifically, we have thirty hours to discover team 1’s recall point so that we can shove the general into the midst of it at the last possible moment. He’ll go back with them and that will be that.
I hear the rest of my team congratulating each other in the other room. They don’t realize what I have yet. We’ve only solved half of the problem, because the bubble still exists, and if the machine really is off...then I’m afraid that this might actually be unresolvable.
All we’ve done is prevent time from unraveling from this point. We cauterized the wound, but there is still a gaping scar. It’s not going to heal if we leave it the way it is. Well, I can live with that. Almost I just want to find teams 1’s rally point and then leave the general to his own devices. I would if I wasn’t certain that this was still a flux-point.
I hate knowing more than anyone else. If I make it through this, I promise that I’m never going to have the most knowledge about any of these missions. I’m going to be fat, dumb, and happy...maybe not the fat part. I’m going to live a long time, and I’m going to be deliriously happy with Steve.
Much sooner that I thought possible they’re releasing me from the restraints and I move into the general’s room. I wonder if I looked that bad while I was recovering. I grab the scanner and run it over his body and take a look at the reading. He’s just a little into the yellow and I heave a sigh of relief. Neither of us is in danger of slipping anymore. We shouldn’t, either of us, be traveling any time soon, which means that Neither should Steve be traveling without me.
“Where is the base housing,” I ask the general.
“On the north end,” he says a little groggily. “Why do you ask? You can just take me back now, right? That was the point of this?”
“Chris, you’re not going back with us.”
“What? I need to go back…”
“Relax,” I say, putting my hand on his shoulder. “We’re taking you back, or I should say we’re sending you back. There are two other teams operating in the Pit right now. One of them will go back in about twenty-eight hours, and the other will be going back in thirty-four. We want you to go back with the first group.”
“Why?”
“Because they will be going back fourteen years earlier than my group will.”
“Oh,” he says, and he smiles. We’ve explained this to him before, but I know how loopy you feel while everything is still waking up. It’s a little like coming out of anesthesia.
“So, because neither you nor I can travel right now, you more than me, we need a place to hole up while we wait.”
He provides direction to his house, and I mentally jot them down. It’s not that hard to follow, this was a purpose build army base after all; straight lines wherever possible. In a couple hours, when he’s ready to move, we make our way out of the building. We make our way through the blazing sky and the abnormal entities. It seems that they are dying out since two of the foci have been removed from the equation.
I idly wonder, as we walk, whether it was he or I who called the dragon into being.
There are still strange things happening, but they are of a more normal variety. I see a man pull a phone out of his pocket and then put it away. As soon as he does he points his group in a different direction.
He’s wearing modern combat fatigues.
“Steve,” I say, quietly, and point in their direction.
“One or two,” he asks.
“If I had to guess, I’d say team 1, but that’s only because team 2 would have to have been sent in stealth like us.”
“Why?” Chris asked.
“Because of something you haven’t discovered yet, and we won’t tell you,” Mim replies.
“Fine, leave the old guy out of the loop,” he grumbles and the rest of us laugh. The team is almost out of sight.
“Steve and I will follow team 1, or at least long enough to find out if they are team 1. Lois and David, get everyone to the General’s place. We’ll meet up with you there.”
They move off and Steve and I move toward the direction that the assumed team 1 went. I link my arm with his and lace our fingers together.
“Not that I’m complaining, but why did you do that?”
“Well, Romeo, because you are a big strong man, and there are monsters about.”
He laughs but doesn’t let my hand go. For the moment I ignore the fact that this ‘wasn’t proper’ in 1944 and play off the preconceptions that the other team will have. With the fact they’re using modern gear out in the open, I have a pretty good idea that they have no plans to blend in. They have a mission and they’re going to accomplish it.
They were at least in pairs...if it wasn’t in obvious dyads. I’d only seen two women in the sixteen man squad. For whatever reason same sex dyads were less common than the already uncommon pairings that existed.
Only about one in ten people have the possibility of pairing with any one other person on the planet. Only about one in eight of those will pair with someone who is geographically close. We still haven’t figured out how to make someone realize a pair remotely, so trying to get them with all of other people on the planet is an unlikely proposition, so we rely almost entirely on that one percent who can pair with someone from the same relative area as they are.
The problem is, only about a half a percent of people who can pair with someone in a relatively close area has skills that the organization is looking for. For the mathematically challenged, that means that about 6 in 100,000 people can pair who also have skills the organization is looking for.
It’s amazing that they have as many teams as they do, really. Gotta love volunteerism. Still, the disparity in same sex couples is even worse. Out of every one hundred dyads one will be same sex.
With my gender swap, the odds will go down just a bit. Maybe, they aren’t really as low as we think they are. Maybe there are other factors in play. Maybe people who already have to deal with a society that still can’t accept them as people aren’t as ready to volunteer to save it.
Maybe it’s not even that. There are a large percentage of the people who apply to the organization who never find matches. The thing is, all of the ‘matching’ parties that they throw are voluntary attendance. Maybe it’s just that most people who are actively searching for someone of the same sex don’t attend a party that is catering to connections with the opposite sex.
Maybe there are a lot of transgender people out there who would be happy to attend if they knew that people like me, people who never knew what they really were because they were in denial for so long, were already in the program.
So many maybes and I have no real answers. My thoughts have distracted me from the task at hand. Steve pulls me around into an embrace which startles me out of my reverie. “What’s going on?” I whisper to him.
“They’re taking out a deinonychus.”
“Really,” I say, turning him a bit so I can just barely peek around his shoulder. “They really do have feathers,” I say in a bit of awe.
“You always were a dinosaur nut,” he says with a little chuckle.
“How come they never sent us that far back?”:
“Because our skillset doesn’t really translate well,” he says and I listen to the rumble of his voice in his chest. It distracts me enough that I don’t really listen to what he’s saying. As they’re taking down the one in front of them, another sneaks up behind. It must have been something about the T-Rex, or about the guns, but it’s taking a lot of shots to actually take this much smaller dinosaur down than it did the much larger.
It also might be that they got a lucky shot on the larger creature. I always did think those huge holes in the skull would be a weak point.
“Behind you,” I scream out, and half of the squad turns and looks just as the lizard leaps on top of one of the soldiers. I’m feeling sick to my stomach at my realization that this gives them an odd number of people and the soaring I felt when I realized the implications.
“We need to get the general down here, now.” I whisper to Steve.
“What are you talking about?”
“They aren’t in dyads, just pairs. They just lost one.”
“Damn, but you’re cold,” he says, but his smile takes any of the possible sting out of the words. “It will have to be you. It will look a little less weird if I’m by myself than if you are.”
“I can get that,” I say with a smile, “and when you walk over to talk to them, as soon as they take out this pack, let them know I’m bringing our commanding officer back.”
“Our commanding officer?” he says confused and I just look at him for a moment with an eyebrow raised. Then he rolls his eyes, “stealth, got it. All we are is local soldiers. The general is the one going back with them. He’s the timetraveller.”
I give him a peck on the cheek and then go running off toward where the general is located. After about a half block I take off my heels and run barefooted, knowing that I’m destroying my nylons by doing so. My heels are only about two inches, nothing really vertiginous, but it is much easier to run without them.
I’m out of breath by the time I get to the general’s house. I make a vow to myself to spend more time running when I get home. I do so every time that I have to run somewhere on a mission, but I never do. Part of the problem, I am sure, is the fact that I spend five times as much time upstream as I do in prime-time. With how high my radiation levels currently are, that’s not going to be an issue for the next six months or so. I fully expect to be in the yellow by the time I return home.
“General,” I call out as I enter the door, having caught my breath.
“What is it,” Lois asks, concern painting her features.
“We have an opening for him with team 1, but we need him there as soon as possible.” I slip my shoes back on as I wait for them to get the general. He is sleeping in the back room. Apparently dying affected him more severely than it did me. Who’d a thunk? I can die with grace and vigor.
Mif directs me to a jeep in front of the house. They used it to get the general here. It wouldn’t do for a lady to be seen driving a general about. Mim is wearing no rank insignia, so he makes for a perfect private driver. I groan at my own pun. I make sure not to voice it aloud.
The silence of the streets is erie. There are none of the animal sounds, strange as they were, or gunfire that were so common even a couple of hours before. I assume that team 1 has successfully fought off the deinonychus attack, at least I hope they have. When we drive up, they are bandaging the survivors. The one I saw attacked looks to be the only death.
I whisper furtively to Chris, “general, we are just soldiers as far as that team is concerned. You need to tell them that you know they are timetravellers. Do whatever you can to get them to understand and take you with them. Now, I want you to command us loud enough that they can hear, to go back to your house and wait for me.”
The General gets out of the jeep and straightens his uniform. “Lt. Fields,” he calls out.
“Sir?” Steve replies from his spot next to the squad.
“Return to my house, take these two with you. I want you to wait there for me, or until all of this strangeness passes.”
“Yes, Sir,” Steve responds and salutes. The general returns his salute. The last I see of the general, he’s approaching the squad. I have a feeling that he already did this in our timeline. He is already having done this? Timetravel almost requires it’s own verb tense.
We drive back to the general’s house. We’re not going to wait there.
“So, we’re done then?” Mim says as we go through the door.
“You dropped the general off with team 1,” Lois asks.
“Yes,” I say, “we’ve accomplished everything we intended to.”
“Then let’s go home,” Steve says and wraps me in his arms. “We have a wedding to plan.”
There are general congratulations all around and I accept them as graciously as I possibly can. We pile into the jeep. It’s a tight fit, but neither Lois nor I have a problem with sharing a seat. Mike squared laugh at us. They’ve been married for...three prime-years? Sometimes the math is difficult for me.
We laugh and carry on as if we were just as carefree as we appear to be. Everything from this point on is anticlimax. We arrive back at the rally point and signal for a return request. While waiting for the return I happen to stick my hand in my pocket. There’s a piece of paper there with the general’s signature on it. I have no idea when it appeared there. It’s likely it’s been there since I picked up this uniform. I wonder if all of my pockets have this message in them, just to make sure.
The note says: the lockout code is #99832467. It will allow you to enter a negative number into the return panel. Enter the negative number twice in confirmation. Good luck. I’m sorry.
My stomach sinks. All along, I have been hoping I would be able to avoid this. I had been hoping that I would be able to go home, and that it would all be over. My other self..my self had been telling me that it wouldn’t work that way. The moment I slipped over to this individual, my life became a closed loop.
The individual that I slipped into was the individual that I was now. I am a walking talking paradox. My life will last forever. My life ends the moment that I use the code that the general just gave me.
I slip the code back into my pocket and I reach out and grab Steve’s hand. He holds my hand and smiles at me. I smile back, able to be happy for him. His life will go on. He will find someone else. He’ll likely not have the same connection, but he will be alive. That makes me feel so happy that I feel like my heart will burst. The transfer is over faster than I want it to be, and they all move toward the door to the common room. I hang back and watch them go. As soon as I begin using the panel, the doors entering the sphere will lock. I’m relying upon that. There will be no long goodbyes. There will be no ‘Death of Spock’ moment with Steve pressed against the glass as I disappear.
The moment the door clicks shut, however, he’ll know.
I begin crying as they approach the door. Just before it closes I yell out, “I’m sorry,” and mash down the # key. I punch in the code and a panel I’d never noticed before opens up. There are four buttons there. One of them is a - sign. I hit that, and then I type in a rough amount of time for when the machine was actually activated. I punch the time in a second time, as the note said, and then I wait.
It’s the longest wait I’ve ever had. I’m beginning to worry that I did something wrong, but then everything flashes and I’m back in the copse of trees. My stomach lurches and I vomit in the bushes. It’s not anything to do with the transition. It’s the knowledge that I’ve effectively trapped myself in the past. Sure, I could try and hitch a ride with team 3 when they go back...but that would be a truly awkward meeting...also, I know it won’t be possible, since in about 24 hours I’m going to cease to exist, merged with my younger self.
It’s sort of nice being temporarily omniscient. I already know what I did. I already know what I have to do. I make my way across the compound to the machine. I see General Haynes walking around in the control booth, but I know, somehow, he’s not who I came here to see.
I make my way into the guts of the beast. It is a weird amalgam of the refined and the rough. Some things here were obviously off the shelf, and others were custom made, some of them looking like they were build in place. It is a mess of wires and pipes and catwalks. There, in the center, is a mass of flesh that could only charitably be called human.
“Hello, Chris,” I say quietly. The almost boneless face turns so it can see me.
“Who are you?”
“We never met, although for me I already killed you. I’ve killed you so many times. I’ve never killed you, or met you, before. I’m tired of this. I’m tired of the running around. I want it all to end.”
“Then kill yourself.”
“Never had enough courage. Never had enough despair.”
“I don’t want to die,” the thing says.
“You won’t. You have a life after this. You cloned yourself, remember?”
“I did?”
“Yes, you did. It wasn’t intentional. The radiation caused a disease called time-slipping.”
“Please, what will happen to me when I die?”
“Even I don’t know that, and I’ve been killed more times than I can count.”
“Will it hurt?”
“I hope not,” I say and shoot the wretch in the head. I shoot him a couple of times through the body to make sure. I feel so disconnected from my actions at this point. There is one more thing I can do before I can rest. This has been such a long life. It’s only at this point in the circle that I can remember everything, remember every different cycle through the loop; remember the times I twisted and ankle because I refused to take off the shoes while I ran; remember the times that Steve died because the dragon ate him; remember the times that I didn’t fully slip and Steve still loved me. Those are the most painful for me to remember, because it reminds me that Steve and I were made for each other.
I walk into the control room and over to the general.
“You’ll not understand why I’m giving you this for a long time, General Haynes, but keep it in mind, and when the time comes it will make sense.”
He pulls me into a corner away from the other techs.
“You’re from the future, aren’t you?”
“Yes, and you’re going to meet me again, tomorrow, but I won’t have met you yet. No matter what you think, no matter what you see or hear, I am a woman. I’ll be typing on the teletype. If asked, you know I’m a timetraveller because you saw my hair band.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because it’s important.” I kiss him on the cheek and then walk out of the room. I head into the woods on the periphery of the sinkhole. If I am going to try to end it, I want to do this in the woods that I’ve grown to love over the years in a single day I’ve spent here.
I take out my weapon and I stick in my mouth. I know, that not once have I ever thought to try this. Maybe it will end this. I can taste the gun oil. I put my thumb on the trigger and begin to apply pressure.
The thought makes me laugh. I got the surgery six months ago on my eighteenth birthday. Even if I’m read, it shouldn’t matter anymore. Physically, I am the woman that I’ve always been. I am woman hear me roar…
It’s just a glance, but in that glance, in a chance meeting of our eyes, I know that everything in this world has changed. I can feel my heart pounding in my chest, and I’m sure that everyone around me will hear it over the music.
He’s tall. So much taller than I would be in stocking feet. I’m glad I’m wearing my four in heels. We might, just might, be somewhere approaching a parity in height. He’s wearing a uniform. It’s not military, something I would recognize having been an army brat my entire life. Dad was a general, and he would never have let me live it down if I couldn’t at least recognize the ranks and branches of the people that he had to entertain occasionally.
There’s something dangerous about the way that he holds himself that sends a thrill through me. If the world revolved around me before, it doesn’t anymore. I can feel a gravity pulling me from across the room.
I stand and smooth out my red dress and casually walk over to him.
“Hi, I’m Rachel,” I say, offering my hand.
“Steve,” he says with a glorious smile and takes my hand gently. He doesn’t shake it, like I half expected, but he doesn’t let me go either. He just turns to an older man standing next to him and says, “She’s the one.”
“Did I win something?” I say playing up my blonde locks.
“In a manner of speaking,” the general says. He’s wearing a standard Army Class A uniform.
“Well, lay it on me, General,” I say with a coquettish smile.
Something about trying to end myself brought on something I can only describe as inspiration. I know, not just assume, I know how to fix this. The problem was never in the Pit. The problem was with me. In order for the General to get back to the future, I needed to be the woman he assumed that I was. Slipping is linked to your emotional state.
As long as I was already a woman, it would all work it’s way out. We’d only have to ‘kill’ the general. The rest of us would be safe from over-exposure. It would all work out, as long as I was a woman before the mission started.
From what I’d read about the subject, and believe me there was a lot of literature about it in the organization, I was transgendered. The issue, was letting myself know early enough to make a difference. I had a feeling that I’d be able to do that, I just needed a little preparation first.
It was a little wooded park outside of Washington DC, and a favorite location for agents to materialize into when they had a mission in DC.
“She’s yours, both of yours,” I say, handing the child in my arms to myself.
“What are you...wait, Ray?”
“You still let him call you that?” I say looking at my alternate self.
She blushes but nods. I have to smile at how pretty I look. Not the same as the face I see in the mirror every morning, but still pretty. At least I know that this plan of mine will work. In the nine months since that moment of clarity, I’ve had my doubts.
“It’s a good thing you all left that scanner behind in your rush to leave the Pit. I was able to verify that she’s in the green.”
“What...how...who…” Steve says, but my other me is engrossed in the baby. “She’s ours, Steve,” she says reverently. “She’s an alternate me, aren’t you,” she says, looking at me.
I nod.
“Are you coming back with us,” Steve asks, and Rachel uses her free hand to punch him. “Don’t get any ideas, Steve. No matter how twisted you think I am, I’m not having a threesome with myself.”
Steve looks sheepish and Rachel and I laugh.
“Take in the sights,” I say, “You’ll likely never get a vacation in the past again. You do have four hours...or so,” I say, smiling. I show them where the stroller is, and I hand my diaper bag to Rachel. As I watch them walk away, it feels like a hole has been ripped through my heart. She is such a small thing, so beautiful, but she needs parents. She needs her own parents.
“What’s her name?” Steve calls back.
“Gloria,” I say and Rachel laughs. It’s the name we’d already decided we should name our first daughter, if possibly for different reasons.
In actuality I likely look younger than eighty, but I can live with that. I knock and a little boy answers the door.
“Hello, Ray. Is your mother home?” A woman I remember so well, even if I haven’t seen her in over ninety years, answers the door.
“Can I help you?”
“My name is Gloria, and I’m here to help you.”
“Come inside, then, Gloria.”
I enter and sit down. It’s like being transported back in time, and I have to laugh at the thought.
“Can I get you anything, Gloria?”
“No. I’m not staying very long, or I won’t unless you want me to. What I have to say is going to be a little hard to understand, and it may not be believable, but your son is transgender.”
“Well, you don’t pull any punches,” my mom says with a little laugh.
“When you’ve been around as long as I have, you can either decide that you have all the time in the world to beat around the bush, or you can realize that every moment is precious and just get to it. I noticed that you’re not surprised?”
“I was thinking something like this. I have a degree in child psychology after all.”
“Well, then, I’m going to have to try a different method. Your daughter needs to transition before she turns eighteen. She’s going to be joining the Preservation of Time Authority then, and if she doesn’t transition before that point, she will die.”
“What?” my mom says, truly shocked for the first time and then she really looks at me.
“Ray? I should have known. You look so much like my Grandmother.”
“It’s easier if you call me Gloria,” I say, the tears coming fast. My mom moves onto the couch where I’m sitting and puts her arm around me.
“How long have you been waiting to come and tell me this,” she says in an awed whisper.
“Eighty eight years.” I say, silently crying. I’m sure I look like a mess. Old women never look beautiful when they cry.
“Well, Gloria, you are my mother from now on.”
“Didn’t grandma die?”
“No, she just got lost for a very long time,” my mother says and hugs me tightly.
“Mommy, what’s wrong?” Ray says as he...she comes into the room. I’m not too late, I see. She might be genetically and physically male, but that outfit screams female. It’s a wonder that I never noticed it before, when I went through this the first time.
“Ray, this is your Grandmother. She’s finally come home.”
“Oh, do we?” she says with a sly smile that I return. I haven’t told her, much, about her life, but she’d have to be a fool to think that there isn’t something special about tonight and one thing I never was, was a fool.
“You little imp, of course we know that. You’re eighteen, you’re fully healed, and from this moment forward you are what you have always been, a woman.”
“Oh, gran,” she says, tearing up a little.
“Don’t give me that. You don’t want to ruin your perfect makeup.”
She hugs me and we give air kisses and then we head out the door like a couple of old cronies...which in a way we are.
We get to the club and part company at the door. I take a spot at the bar and settle my old bones down.
“Can I help you, ma’am,” says a man who has walked up to me. It’s sort of obvious he wants me to leave. He’s wearing the uniform of the organization.
“Oh, no. I’m just here to watch my granddaughter. She’s about to join you all, you know.”
“You know the odds…”
“Let’s just say I have inside information and leave it at that,” I say, staring the man in the eye with all the weight of my 124 years. He just swallows and leaves me alone. I can almost feel the moment when Rachel sees Steve for the first time. I quietly make my way out of the club and go home. The smile on her face was harder for me than I thought it would be.
I experienced the history of this country, the last hundred years of it, first hand. I saw the return of the soldiers and experienced my own portion of the baby-boom. I went to woodstock and I saw the moon landing...on TV of course. I was at the cape when the challenger disaster happened, and in Houston. I’ve swum naked in the ocean and I helped to organize the technological revolution in silicon valley. I’m a programmer after all.
I have lived, and the 126 years of my life are catching up with me.
I settle on one of the seats in General Haynes office to wait.
“Hello, Gloria,” he says, startling me awake.
“Hello, Chris. How are the kids doing?”
“They’ve just returned from the Pit. It’s finally over, isn’t it? This is the last time you’re coming in?”
“I’ve done what I could to guide their lives here, more than I should have,” I say, quietly. “There’s just one more thing that you need to do. They need to go to Washington DC on the time and date and this paper. I’m not even sure that I remember it well enough to tell it to you,” I say handing him the slip of paper in my hand. My hand is shaking. He meets me more than halfway, for which I’m grateful.
“What’s there?”
“Their child,” I say, quietly and Chris gasps. “Still have things that can shock you, do I my old friend.”
“Well, you certainly came here the long way, Ray.”
“It’s Gloria,” I hiss.
“No, Ray. I know who you are, and so do you. There’s no one in this office, and you deserve to be known.”
“There will be no-one to know. Let my two girls know I love them.”
“Ray?”
I don’t respond. My thoughts wander. I smile thinking of the life I’ve lived. I think of my daughter in the arms of my granddaughter. I love you, Steve.
“You have a lot to live up to, little Gloria,” I say. “Your namesake really lived life. She was in the WAC during WWII. She traveled this country from sea to sea after the war. She was a programmer for most of her life, and made some significant innovations, things that improved the lives of many. She was a deep sea diver, and a horseback rider. She tells me that she only ever loved one man, and that I can believe, because I love your father like that.
“She tells me she went over the Niagara falls in a barrel, but I’m not sure I can believe that. She lives life to the fullest, my little Gloria, and I want you to meet her, because I’m sure she can impart some wisdom to you before she leaves us. I know she left me with my fair share of it.”
“Rachel,” General Haynes calls out. I smile for a moment, but then I notice his face, how distraught he looks and my smile fades.
“We didn’t want to tell you before, because of how important this mission was,” he says looking at Gloria, “but your grandmother died telling me about the mission. She fell asleep and we couldn’t wake her.”
“She’s dead?”
“Yes, but she wanted you to have this little girl. I think she stayed alive this long just for that purpose.”
I nod, crying, but these are tears of joy. I knew my gran was amazing, but before this moment I never knew that we were the same person. Somehow, the way that the way the general had said that phrase, the way he was looking at me, maybe even some little hints that she’d given me over the years, I knew that we were the same person.
Everyday, for the rest of my life, every moment I got, I would tell our daughter what a wonderful mother she had. And everyday for the rest of my life, I would try to live up to my own example.
“Hey, Steve,” I say in my most cute voice, “can we learn how to scuba dive?”
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I blame my daughter for this one. She loves princesses, and while I've told her some stories that I made up on the spot, she prefers the classics. Well, if any of you know me, which I should say that many do, then you know that I can't just tell a classic. I have to make it my own. Now, I have no plans for anything TG in this story, since that's not the story that is coming to me this time.
I hope you'll not hold it against me.
Tell me, should I continue this, or not?
Not that it happened the previous time while she’d been in high school. Her mother had been a beautiful woman, even when she had lain there in the hospital bed, unable to get up.
They’d thought everything was fine when Karen was born, and for Karen it was, but the strain had been too much for her mother’s heart. A defect that they hadn’t known about earlier had failed, and for six years her mother had been in and out of hospitals before her heart had finally stopped altogether.
Even though Karen had known that her mother was dying, nothing truly prepares a six year old for that moment. She remembered crying when they lowered her mother into the ground and thinking that she skies should be cloudy and rainy and not the beautiful clear cloudless blue that they displayed that day.
“I hate the sun,” she said as she walked away with her father.
“Why, Karen?” her father asked distracted by his own grief.
“Because it’s smiling. It should be sad just like us.”
Her father had taken her into his arms and just held her as she cried.
“Who’s going to hold me now?” she whispered quietly to the glass.
Behind her the well wishers talked quietly to her stepmother, but Karen didn’t pay attention. The Woman, which is how she called her stepmother in the quiet of her own mind, was smiling and greeting all her friends.
This wasn’t supposed to be a party, but for the Woman it was. At thirteen Karen never really thought about how her father made a living. He went to work and provided for her. She loved when her dad had been here. He’d always had time for Karen, even after he married the Woman two years ago. He didn’t have any time left for her because the drunk driver had stolen all of his remaining moments.
The Woman ran a website. Karen’s friends thought that she was so lucky to have the creator of Mirror Mirror in her home with her. Karen got to see the ugly side of the person some people called ‘The Most Beautiful Woman in the World.’
Like how she was treating this solemn occasion as if it were her own personal coming out celebration. She wasn’t even wearing black.
“Karen, you know how washed out the color black makes me look. I have to keep up appearances.”
As far as Karen was concerned, the Woman had no shame.
Karen scowled at her stepmother for a moment or two more, but then gave up and looked back out the window. At least today it was raining.
Karen looked up at the sky through her tears as the rain continued to come down, “It’s not enough,” she said to the sky, “the rain, I mean. From now on, the only weather I like is snow. It’s cold and pure and maybe, just maybe, it will stop me from caring that everyone that I loved is now dead.”
“Well, that didn’t really work out, now did it, Jean,” she said with a rueful smile. Her computer was up to the desktop so she started the chat program and logged in. Mephistopheles was already in so she joined him in a private chat room.
QueenMab: Mirror-Mirror, on my site, who is the prettiest tonight?
Mephistopheles: Well, my lady, so it seems, that you’re the queen of ‘memes’.
QueenMab: I’d prefer to be the queen of dreams, Meff.
Mephistopheles: Not something I can do for you, directly, but the site is truly putting you out there.
QueenMab: Good. The money from the insurance will go a long way toward giving us a persistent advertising presence.
Mephistopheles: You are pretty cold hearted, you know that? Didn’t you just put him in the ground today, and already you’re talking about how to spend his money?
QueenMab: It is the reason he died, after all.
Mephistopheles: LOL. Like I said. Cold. :)
QueenMab: I know you love me.
Mephistopheles: I love the effect you have on my bank account. Nothing more.
QueenMab: Night, Meff. I need my beauty sleep.
Mephistopheles: Don’t we all.
Jean signed out, and shut down her computer. The design of the website was all hers, of course, but Mephistopheles ran the back end. It was always good to have an IT drone to do the dirty work for you.
She changed for bed and shut off the light. For a moment or two she just lay there, smiling at the ceiling. Everything was going according to plan. The police were sure that her husband had been killed by a drunk driver. When he’s a banker, which in some people’s mind is tantamount to a thief today, they don’t look too closely at the circumstances. Especially when said drunk died on the way to the hospital.
He’d been paid in alcohol, so there was no real trail back to her. She was amazed, looking back on it, that he’d lived long enough to run into her husband. Giving him just enough to kill him, but not enough to knock him out...that had been pure magic. The injuries he’d sustained helped. It’s always sad when a seat-belt fails to lock into place.
She smiled even more broadly up at the ceiling.
Truly sad.
She grabbed a black t-shirt and a black pair of jeans. She grabbed her dress shoes, the only black pair of shoes she owned, and put those on.
Her hair was naturally black, so she didn’t have to worry about that. She didn’t wear any makeup.
Unfortunately, her backpack wasn’t black. It was a pale cream color. She searched the bottom of her closet for a while before she found what she was looking for. One of her cousins had given her a black denim bag for her birthday. At the time, she’d liked the style, but the color hadn’t really been something she wanted.
Now, however, the color was perfect. Karen transferred her books from her backpack into the bag and walked out the door to go to school. James, her driver, was waiting for her at the front of the house, the door to the rear seat of the car held open for her.
It had been their little joke for the longest time, even though he was more bodyguard than driver, truth be told. Karen didn’t even smile at it this morning.
“Anything you want to talk about, Kid?”
Karen just shook her head and James slid into the front seat. “I like the new look,” he said, looking at her face in the rear view mirror.
“I thought it was time for a change.”
“I cared for your father a lot as well, Karen. He was one of the best men I’ve ever known.”
“Sounds like you had a crush on him,” Karen said with an almost smile.
“He was like family, and so are you, Kid. It will get better.”
“What, are you going to tell me you were an orphan as well now? That you know what it’s like?”
“No, I wasn’t an orphan, but my twin brother was hit and killed while we were walking to school one day.”
“James, I’m so sorry. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Don’t worry about it. You’re hurting. I get that. It will get better.”
“I’ll forget the pain? I’ll forget what he meant to me?”
“You never forget the pain, Karen. It’s a part of you. It will just, step by step, hurt less. Eventually it will have been a part of you so long that it will just be a part of the background. You’ll be sad, but it won’t take away your happiness anymore.”
“I don’t want to be happy.”
“You say that now…”
“I’m not going to be happy ever again,” Karen said with vehemence.
“Well, my little goth princess. I’ll not interfere gain,” he said with a smile.
“What’s goth, James?”
“Look it up tonight when you get home.”
Karen was going through the motions at school, going from class to class, not really paying any attention.
Lunch passed without even registering itself. She ate food, but there was no pleasure in it. After lunch, in another class that meant nothing to her, an announcement came over the PA into her room.
“Mr. Fielding?”
“Speaking,”
“Could you send Karen King down to the main office please? Her driver is here to pick her up so she’ll want to clean out her locker on her way down.”
The school served grades k-12, so she’d been here for eight years already, and expected to be here for another five. That being said, she’d heard that message before and knew what it meant. She was no longer a student here. Last week, she would have been embarrassed. Last week, she would have had friends to say goodbye to.
This week she was ‘that orphan girl’ who people avoided. It’s not like they had to worry about catching something from her, but children can be cruel, and cruelty never really needs a reason.
She pulled out the few things she kept in her locker and put them in her bag and then went to the front office. She didn’t even notice the look of concern on the secretaries face as she arrived.
“Where will she go?”
James spoke up, “She’ll be going to Wood’s Point Junior High for the next couple of years.”
“The public school,” the Secretary said as if she were swearing.
James just looked at Karen, hoping for some response from the girl. He felt sorry for her, he really did, but there wasn’t anything he could do about it. She needed a parent, not a body-guard. Mrs. King wasn’t any kind of a parent.
“Surely you must be joking. Her father paid for all of her schooling up front, so there isn’t an issue of…”
“Apparently Mrs. King wants a refund of those unused moneys. She is having her lawyer draft a request.”
The Secretary’s face turned sour, and James simply nodded.
“She wouldn’t...couldn’t...be so selfish, could she?”
James sadly nodded.
“You take care of her, then. She shouldn’t be kicked out into the world in this state.”
“Don’t worry. Even if Mrs. King fires me, I’ll still protect her for as long as I’m able.”
James escorted Karen out to the car. She never once looked up as they drove away.
“How about the fairies,” the twins chimed at the same time. Candy and Mindy played up how much they looked alike. Someone who knew them well, as the other five in the room did, could tell the two of them apart. Mindy’s hair was a shade or two lighter. Candy had a small freckle on the left side of her nose. They were consummate actors, however, and made sure that even if you knew there were differences, and what they were, that you questioned which one was which.
“I’m not going to be a fairy,” Brad stated with a scowl on his face.
“Not sure anyone would believe you were gay anyway,” Able said with a grin as he adjusted his coke bottle glasses.
“Well, there are seven of us,” Harry said. The other’s threw wadded up paper at him and he just grinned as he ducked. All, that is, except for Thomas who sat there quietly, thinking.
“Why not?” Thomas said. His voice was never that loud, or never really seemed to be, but somehow it commanded your attention. Thomas was always heard when he spoke, even if he seemed to be speaking in a conversational tone up in the booth and you were on stage doing a check.
“Why not what,” David whined. Somehow, no matter what he was saying, David whined. It’s not that he was an unpleasant person, just that he was unpleasant to talk to.
“Why not the Seven Dwarves.” Thomas said seriously. Of the seven people in the room, only David really looked like the traditional ‘AV Geek.” Candy and Mindy were sporting 80’s chic. It was currently very popular at school and the two girls didn’t look out of place. Thomas wore polo shirts, so on some level he would be considered a geek if it weren’t for his good looks and perfect hair and skin. Brad and Able, even with the heavy glasses, wore standard Skater attire, as that was where they spent their time outside of school and one of the two dragged the other to the first meeting at the beginning of the year. David wore white button shirts, but they were in a heavier canvas material, and he lacked the glasses and bad hair the stereotypical nerd was supposed to wear. Harry was an odd duck, even in this group. He changed his style on a weekly basis. This week he was wearing tank tops and camo pants. Last week had been a duster jeans and a fedora. They had one thing in common, however, their love of the technical aspects of stage and film.
What none of them were, however, was short. A couple of them were average height, but the rest were at least above average, if not outright towering like Harry.
“How can we be dwarves,” David...well...whined.
“It isn’t about how tall we are,” Thomas said, “Dwarves, traditionally, were the crafters in norse mythology. They made the gods look good. They hid in their darkness, under the mountain, and provided the tools, weapons, and wonders that the gods needed.”
“You mean, like we make Angelica look good.” Mindy said Angelica’s name with a little sing-song whine that had the others laughing.
Thomas smiled in a way that made Mindy blush, “that’s exactly what I mean,” he said.
Before he could say something else, Zack stuck his head into the room. “Guys, someone just pulled up in a limo. You’ve all got to see this.”
The seven of them piled out and headed to the front of the school. After hours on a Friday most kids had gone home, especially when colleges weren’t looking at your extracurricular activities in Junior High...yet.
The driver got out of the car and walked to the back. It was like what happened in one of those movies, where the famous person shows up at some normal place. A girl of around their age got out. She didn’t seem to be a goth, she wasn’t wearing any of the makeup. Maybe she was a proto-goth, though, as she had straight black hair and every stitch of clothing she wore was black.
“She’s hot,” Harry said to general laughter. “Well, she is,” he defended.
“Let’s leave the girl alone,” Thomas said and the twenty or thirty people at the doors began to disperse. People like her usually didn’t go to school at places like this. Not that it was an inner-city school by any stretch of the imagination, but she had a driver, and Thomas was willing to bet that her clothing, simple as it appeared, all sported designer labels.
“You sure about calling us the Seven Dwarves,” Able said quietly to Brad.
“It seems cool to me,” Brad replied, “why do you ask?”
“Because I think that we just met Snow White,” Thomas said thoughtfully. The rest of them looked at him with varying states of shock showing on their faces. When comprehension dawned he gestured for them to follow him inside.
“You’re going to be okay,” James said over his shoulder.
“Hmm?”
“At this school. And if it doesn’t really work out here, you’ll be going to a new school next year.”
“Do normal people really change schools this often?” she said, a little bit of her former life filling her words.
“More often, actually. They go to the same elementary school, usually, go to a middle school for 6th and 7th grades, a junior high school for 8th and 9th and then high school for 10th 11th and 12th.”
Karen actually smiled at this. “Forgive me if I’m wrong, but I’m in 8th grade now.”
“Some school districts work it a little differently. They have junior high school start at 6th grade and go through 8th grade, and then have 9th through 12th in the same school.”
“Why the differences? Doesn’t it make sense to have everyone follow the same division?”
“Oh, you mean like just putting everyone from kindergarten through twelfth grade in the same building?”
“Sure…”
“When you’re asking about a private school, yes, it makes sense, of course your private school controlled how many students there were. There aren’t many schools that want to do that, though. Too much opportunity for abuse. When you mix things up, or so the conventional wisdom holds, you limit the possibility for dangerous cliques forming and continuing for long periods of time.”
“It all just sounds silly to me,” Karen said.
“Me too, but then again, I’m just the bodyguard.”
The walk to the office wasn’t that long, and they were there quickly. The secretary, who had her purse and coat at the ready, handed the map of the school and her schedule to Karen and then walked out.
“That was it?” Karen said. She looked at the map and schedule in her hands in confusion.
“What did you expect? An interview with the principal? Some one on one counseling?”
“I don’t know...maybe?”
James laughed. His was a pleasant laugh that involved his entire body. Karen began to smile. “There’s my girl.”
“James, does any of this ever get any easier?”
“Dealing with death? No, it doesn’t.”
Karen sat down in the dark office and just looked into space.
“You know who I was before your dad hired me?”
“A soldier of some sort.”
“I was an army Ranger, and proud of it.”
“Did you kill people?”
“Karen…”
“Sorry, it’s just…”
“You want something to take you away from this pain you’re feeling. I am a ready target for hate…”
“No, I wouldn’t hate you,” Karen said with a frown.
“Hero worship, then. You need to connect with people your own age.”
“They don’t understand,” Karen said, with a bit of a whine in her voice.
“Then make them. Show them how difficult life is, and help them to really see what you’re going through.”
“It hurts too much to talk about it.”
“Well, you can’t begin to heal until you get the thorn out. All leaving it in does is to make the flesh around it all red and puss filled...really nasty.”
Karen giggled a bit. She really wasn’t the sort of girl to stay down for a long time, which caused James to worry about this depression she was forcing herself into even more.
“Your father wouldn’t have wanted you to feel sorry about yourself.”
“We’ll he’s dead and doesn’t get to have a say in my life anymore,” she said with a little bit of anger. James just shook his head and smiled.
“Hi, I’m Thomas. Would you like me to give you a tour of the school?”
James almost dropped into a defensive stance before he realized it was just another kid. He shook his head at his own reaction. It’s not like he was back in a battle zone with Mr. King.
All of the animation bled out of Karen’s face. “Hello, Thomas, that won’t be…”
“Necessary? Of course it’s necessary. You’re new here…”
Karen looked at him, wondering why he paused.
“I think he wants your name,” James prompted.
“Karen King,” Karen responded in a dead voice.
“I’ve got it from here, Mr. King,” Thomas said as he smiled up at James. Thomas wasn’t a short kid, for a fourteen year old, but James towered over him.
“I’m the bodyguard. Will you be ok, Karen?”
“Sure, just go wait for me at the car, James.”
“Ok, Miss,” James said with a smirk. Karen giggled again before turning her attention to Thomas. Again all emotion fled from her face and she just nodded imperiously toward the hall.
Thomas just shook his head. He could tell from the few unguarded moments he’d seen that she was...alive. The thing was every time she turned away from her bodyguard her emotions seemed to shut down completely.
As they wandered the halls, the rest of the AV club joined them in ones and twos. Without Karen ever realizing it, she was in the center of a group of smiling and laughing teens as they walked her through the halls, telling her trivia about the individual rooms.
“Who are all these people?” Karen said quietly to Thomas.
“We’re the Seven Dwarves, of course,” Harry said with an incorrigible smile plastered to his face.
“You’re not short,” Karen replied, confusion suffusing her features.
“No, we’re not short,” Brad said, “but we make up for it with behavior. We’re subterranean.”
“You live underground?” Karen said getting more confused.
“In a manner of speaking,” Candy said. “I’m Candace, by the way. Everyone calls me Candy, though, I don’t know why,” she said just before tossing a hard candy into her mouth and beginning to suck on it.
For a moment Karen thought to laugh at what she assumed was a joke, but David shook his head slightly with a scared look on his face. Apparently Candy really was that clueless about some things.
“Who are you all?”
“We’re the AV club. Well, after a manner of speaking. Each of us have skills that we bring to the table,” Thomas said, smiling at the others and Karen equally.
“We’re seamstresses and designers,” Mindy said. “I’m Mindy.”
“They’re more than that,” Thomas continued, “they’re the art portion of our group. We don’t often have any sets to make, but they do those as well.”
“Abel and I are brute labor and lighting,” Brad said.
“Harry and David manage wiring and networking.”
“And anything electrical, like the microphones and such,” David whined.
“So, that’s them, what about you, Thomas?” Karen said.
“Me, I’m the ringleader. I make sure everything comes together.”
Karen smiled.
“So, that’s the school,” Thomas said,” see you in school tomorrow?”
“Why not?” Karen said getting more serious once again. Like most rhetorical questions it went unanswered, as expected. She waved goodbye and then walked out to the front of the school to meet James.
The problem is, with no friends or relatives willing to go out and spend time with her doing anything everything becomes a chore.
New clothes, however, were definitely something that Karen liked. There was something about the ability to reinvent your image with every new outfit that Karen could easily get into. Her closet was filled with clothing of different styles. She had workout clothing in three styles. She had light skirts and denim skirts. There were the dresses of varying cuts and fabrics. Each outfit said something to the people around her about who she was and what she was feeling.
There were the happy outfits in pastel colors with flouncy skirts and flirty tops. There were the comfort outfits that encased her in a hug.
The clothing that she hung up now wasn’t anything like the other clothing that was there. It wasn’t different in cut from really anything that she had in her closet, at least not in any extreme way, but the colors were different. It was burgundy and black and bruised plum. While a pink or two might have crept its way in there occasionally, for the most part is was a shadow across the sun that was her wardrobe.
When she was done adding the new clothing she went about clearing up her makeup table. She packed it away in the drawers. What wouldn’t fit in the drawers she slid into boxes and banished to the darkest corners of her closet. When she was done she placed a single lipstick onto the table in a deep blood red.
For now, with the girl being thirteen, there was no real worry that she would be competition. Luckily most people were still a little disgusted with the idea of a young teen being desirable. Her outfits had been detestably normal. Sure, they might have been a little perkier than other girls her age were willing to submit their peers to, but at least they screamed kid.
These choices were something else entirely.
“You already separated her from her friends. Isn’t that enough?” James replied. This type of behavior was baffling to him, which could explain the reason he’d never kept a girlfriend more than a few months. He had a tendency to dismiss any behavior he couldn’t understand as irrelevant. No one wants to be considered irrelevant.
“That isn’t the point,” Jean sneered.
“Then what is, Jean?”
“You’re being rude. Have you forgotten that you work for me now?”
“Actually, Jean, no I don’t. You and I both know that I am provided for out of a trust. Mr. King wanted me here to guarantee the safety of his daughter no matter what happened to him.”
“I could lock up the funds legally as I pursued having the will overturned.”
“You could try, but what would it really accomplish? You and I both know that when you have a federal judge and a former governor witness a document like this you have a certain amount of assumed clout that even your high priced lawyer friends would be unwilling to challenge.”
She glared at James. Legally, he had a point. The people you had witness signatures shouldn’t matter. As long as you had witnesses then it should be fine. In practice, however, when you have someone currently sitting on the bench of justice, someone whose legal opinion was well respected, then it tended to alter how people viewed that document.
Sometimes it was a good that she had friends that had no qualms about pursuing illegal methods.
“We’ll James, I guess you have a point,” she said with a large smile. It was one of her practiced ones. She even allowed the happiness she felt about the death of her late husband to color it.
“I’m glad you see it my way.” James said and walked out. Jean screamed at his retreating back. It wasn’t enough that he was flouting her authority, but he was so smug about it.
She booted up her computer and logged into the chat program. The person she was looking for was already online, so she created a private chat room and he soon joined her.
Mephistopheles: Well, things are going quite well, your majesty.
QueenMab: Can it. I have a problem.
Mephistopheles: What sort of problem?
QueenMab: More a complication, actually. Apparently the idiot bodyguard my late husband hired is more of an enabler than I assumed.
Mephistopheles: Do tell.
QueenMab: He took the brat out shopping today. They spent close to a thousand dollars on clothing. $1000! What thirteen year old spends a thousand on clothing?
Mephistopheles: Yours, apparently.
QueenMab: That thing isn’t related to me in any way, thank goodness. I may have to take care of her sooner than I thought.
Mephistopheles: School plan not working out like you thought? She only changed schools today, after all.
QueenMab: that is 10% of what I pay for a year at that school, and this is only the first day.
Mephistopheles: You told me she isn’t a big shopper.
QueenMab: She’s not. I tried to bond with the gutter-snipe over shopping when I was first dating her dad.
Mephistopheles: Then you have nothing to worry about. Pay $1000 to save $10k.
QueenMab: But, what if she does this tomorrow...and the day after
Mephistopheles: Then deal with it when it happens. In the mean time get an insurance policy for yourself and the girl.
QueenMab: Myself? Why would I get one for myself?
Mephistopheles: Because if you insure both of you after an accident that killed your husband it is less suspicious than if you just insure her and she dies.
QueenMab: I like the way you think.
Mephistopheles signed off
The individual known as Mephistopheles online sat there in the darkened room, the smile that played across his features illuminated by the screen in front of him. Manipulation was an art form. Sometimes, telling the absolute truth was better than a thousand lies.
Especially if that truth was one that served your own ends more than the other persons. The months he’d spent cultivating this individual were beginning to pay off. The paycheck wasn’t all that bad. Jean was more than willing to pay him to do the types of things he would do willingly for fun. Jean. He shook his head in wonder. The woman was convinced that she’d kept her real identity a secret, but he was so much better than even she gave him credit for.
It had taken less than two hours for him to first find out her real identity. The ‘Jean’ alias had taken no more than ten minutes. He saved the latest chat to his cloud server and shut off the dedicated machine that he communicated with her through.
Given enough time, he knew that she would forget all about Karen and would focus entirely on her own work. Truly selfish people were like that.
No, to meet his own ends, he needed Jean to take a more active role. After all, if he took the money from her account while she was still at large she’d know exactly who to go after.
If she was dead or in jail on the other hand…
There was a lot to do before anything like that could be arranged, and while he was a criminal by any definition you were prepared to apply, killing people was something he didn’t really approve of, so he had his work cut out for him.
Now, how to make his money coming and going, he thought as he opened the file dedicated to Karen King.
So, I removed the 3 year progression I had planned and moved things to Forest High School. Some of the story elements will remain from what I had planned at Wood’s Point Junior High, but for the most part the story will be progressing to the older Karen.
I will eventually be pushing my edits of chapters 1 and 2 out. when I do I will delete this note.
“What, this old thing?” Karen replied. The grin was missing from her face, but she was trying, and there was a bit of the bubbly personality underneath that shone through. It helped that the only makeup she was wearing was the lipstick. It was shocking in it’s contrast to her pale skin, even more so as she was still a young teen, but it fit with the rest of her outfit.
Her clothing was unrelieved black. There were some black lace accents to the overall design, and the cut was such that it left room to move. At first glance, it seemed to almost fit into certain Japanese goth designs, but it didn’t have the over-the-top little girl look that those strive for. It was, in a word, perfect.
The skirt came to mid calf and was a flowing cotton. The blouse was in three quarter sleeves with a slight puff at the top. It was somewhere in that middle ground between being skin tight and loose and seemed to fit the skirt perfectly.
“What gave you the idea for the whole ‘goth princess’ theme?” Mindy said as she slipped in on the other side.
“It just felt right,” Karen said as she just stared at the tray of food in front of her.
“Well, it looks good on you,” Candy said.
Karen looked up and that and realized that it was only Candy and Mindy sitting next to her. “Where are the boys,” she asked.
“Oh, they’re over at our table in the corner. No one sits at the folding tables if they can avoid it. We have the round one over there,” Mindy said as she pointed at the table where the five boys sat. Harry, who was wearing what looked suspiciously like a navy flight suit, waved and smiled. Karen just stared.
“Something the matter?”
“What’s with Harry?”
“What do you mean?” Candy said with false innocence.
“His clothing. It’s so...outre,” Karen says with a small smile as if the word is silly to her.
“What does ‘outre’ mean,” Mindy asks and Candy laughs. “It means ‘out of the ordinary,’ you goof,” Candy replies.
“Oh, why didn’t you say that then, Karen.”
“Because I sometimes like to use uncommon words. I think that they feel lonely on the outside so I like to bring them into the conversation.”
Candy and Mindy looked at Karen as if she were weird, which in a way she was. Karen just smirked at them and all three of them began laughing.
“So, the flight suit?”
“Is that what it is? I thought it was mechanic’s coveralls.” Mindy said.
“Flight suit...so that’s why he’s been calling Thomas ‘Goose’ all day,” Candy said.
Karen just looked at the other girl as if her statement didn’t connect, because it didn’t.
“We’re the AV club...sort of. We’re tech crew, and a lot of other things that no one really cares to do. When there are no productions at the school we do a lot of film work, which means we watch ‘the greats’ for inspiration.”
“And what does this have to do with Harry?”
“Well, we watched Top Gun a couple of weeks ago.”
“I’m still lost.”
“It’s about Naval Aviators in their Top Gun program.”
Everything came clear and a look of understanding crossed Karen’s face. “He...imitates actors. This is cosplay...at school? They let him get away with it?”
“There aren’t any uniforms so what are they going to do? It’s not like he comes to school dressed like female anime characters…” Mindy said with a shudder.
“And what would be wrong with it if he did?” Candy said a little incensed.
“I’m sure I’m coming into the middle of a huge argument, so for the moment let’s just say you had your argument and we can get back to Harry.”
Both girls just looked at Karen as if they were seeing her for the first time and then they began to laugh.
“Fine. Harry likes to be creative in his clothing choices. He figures…”
“He figures that it’s better to make a scene that to fade into the woodwork,” a male voice said from behind the three of them. Karen turned around to see harry looming over her.
“Hi, Harry, we were just talking about you.”
“Yeah, Mindy suggested you come to school dressed like sailor moon,” Candy said with an evil grin on her face.
“I did not. I said nothing of the sort, Harry.”
“It’s fine, I don’t have the legs for it,” he said with a gleam in his eye that set the girls off laughing.
“It’s simple, Karen, I like clothing. Not just well fitting clothing either. I like different styles and like to play around with conventions. Each era had it’s own strengths and weaknesses in the male clothing arena, and I like to explore those in a safe environment.”
Mindy and Candy snorted at this and Harry just grinned.
“What am I missing?” Karen said, looking lost.
“Hey, look at the girls,” a voice said right before a loud and fake laugh broke out. The voice was attached to a truly immense boy in a football jersey. He was easily over 6 feet tall and built like a brick wall. He looked over at a table where other football players were sitting and grinning, as if looking for support.
“I’ve told you before, Leo, I don’t date guys. No matter how nicely you ask, I’m not going out with you,” Harry said with an impish grin. Leo’s face suffused with blood and a look of hatred entered his eyes. Still laughing Harry took off at a run out of the lunch room.
“Is he going to be okay?” Karen said. She was worried about what the larger boy might do to Harry.
“Sure. Harry’s on the cross country team. He runs ten to fifteen miles a day just to warm up,” Candy said with a far off look in her eyes and a grin playing on her lips.
“Candy has a crush on Harry,” Mindy said, exasperation coloring her features.
“I do not,” Candy said, coloring slightly.
“Girls,” Karen said with a grin of her own and the twins turned to look at her, each one looking a little sheepish. Karen continued, “So, I take it I was missing that some of the football players are meatheads?”
“That’s putting it lightly,” Mindy muttered.
“Not all the football players are like that…” Karen began but both Candy and Mindy looked at her as if she were insane.
“They’re jocks,” Candy said as if that answered everything.
“And I’m a goth,” Karen said pointing to herself and smiling sweetly, “which should mean I’m moody and depressed with a preoccupation with death.”
“I thought that was Emo,” Candy said in a stage whisper to Mindy.
“They’re moody and depressed, but without all the death imagery,” Mindy said in a knowledgeable tone. The three girls giggled at this.
“What I’m trying to say is that people are more than any one group that they associate with.”
“Karen, that may be true in the real world, but this is high school.”
Karen looked at Mindy for a moment and then gave a little resigned shrug, “Just because it happens doesn’t make it right.”
The boys bussed their trays and then stopped by the table where Karen and the other girls were sitting. “Going to join us this evening, Karen? We’re getting ready for the fall musical.”
“There’s a musical?” Karen asked, an eager look in her eyes.
“One in the fall and a couple more in the spring. We also do a regular play in the fall and one more in the spring. This year the musical is first.”
“When are tryouts?”
They all looked at her, some of them with visible shock on their faces.
“You can act?” Brad said.
“Well, I don’t know about act, but I can sing, and I figure that I can do at least something I love even if I’m in the chorus or whatever.”
Although he’d only really known the girl for a couple of days, Thomas was beginning to get a feel for her personality. She didn’t say anything she didn’t mean, and if she said she could sing…
“They start tonight and go for the next couple of nights. I have to tell you, though, that the next couple of nights are usually for call backs.”
“That’s fine. I have a piece prepared.”
“We’ll be there tonight at six to cheer you on then,” Able said.
Shortly after he finished speaking the warning bell rang and they all headed off for class.
The teacher stood there waiting for the laugher to die down a bit before continuing. “For those that don’t know me, I’m Mr. Leif. That is spelled leif, not leaf. I hope each of you picked up a form at the door. I’ll give you a moment or two to get them now if you forgot.”
A couple of the students got up and picked up pages from the chair next to the door. As they went back to their seats Mr, Leif continued. “We have the Seven Samurai with us…”
“Seven Dwarves this year, Mr. Leif,” Thomas called out.
“Really? I like Kurosawa.”
“Really, it is more relatable.”
“So, we have the Seven Dwarves. Pay attention to who they are. While I am the teacher advisor, and the director, they are the crew. This will be the only warning you receive. If one of the Dwarves gives you a command, no matter how crazy it is, you obey it or you’re gone.”
“What if they tell me to…” began a girl in the front row before Mr. Leif rudely interrupted her.
“Angelica, what did I tell you last time?”
“That it would never happen.”
“And the time before that,” he said again, allowing his annoyance to come through.
“That it would never happen?” she said, getting a little smaller in her seat.
“And the time before that? And the one before.”
“But it could. I’ve seen the way that David looks at me.”
“David, stop staring at Angelica.”
“Sorry, Mr. Leif, but I’m still sure she wears contacts and I’m just trying to prove it. No one’s eyes are that blue.”
There was general laughter and Angelica colored. “David, this is your last warning. Stop tormenting Angelica.”
“Yes, sir,” David said and gave a crisp salute.
“Now, Angelica. Can we move on and not revisit this issue every time.”
Sullenly the pretty girl in the front row nodded.
“It is serendipity that the AV crew have renamed themselves, at least for this first play of the season. We’ll be doing a fairy tale. As many of you already know, I have an affinity for Rodgers and Hammerstein. We did both Carousel and South Pacific last year. While I doubt we’ll be doing anything like that this year, we will be doing…”
“You’ve got to be kidding me. We’re doing Cinderella?” Angelica said.
“You’re welcome not to do the leading role this year,” Brad calls from the back. Angelica glares up to where he is sitting. He blows her a kiss and the other Dwarves laugh.
“None of that, Brad,” Mr. Leif says with a smile. “Are you telling me you would prefer not to try out for the leading role?”
“What other roles are there?”
“I’ll take that as rhetorical. We’ll begin in about 5 minutes. Take the time to fill out the forms and pass them in. I’ll call you up one at a time. Judging by the number of people here I’ll likely need all of you for at least a minor part. For those that I am considering for speaking roles, expect your names to be posted on the auditorium doors tomorrow morning.”
The theatre was quiet save for the rustle of paper and the scratching of pens. One by one and group by group the students turned in their papers. Then the auditions began.
Contrary to heavily edited talent shows and other television programs, most people who try out for a play are decidedly mediocre. That’s really not a bad thing. You need people who are right there in the middle. You get a good group of them, especially when they know how to listen to each other, and it’s called a choir. In that instance, they are better than the sum of their parts.
The chorus in a musical is simply a choir that can dance.
Every once in a while, there are outliers. Some of those are very very bad. Angelica was not one of those. Thomas watched the people in the auditorium as they listened to her sing “Castle in a Cloud.”
All things considered, it is a simple song with a really simple tune. That being said, if you can emote through your voice, if you understand the emotion of the piece, there is more to it than just the lyrics. It is a song about longing and fear. Longing for a relief from the constant misery of day to day life. Fear that this life that you know is never going to change.
Angelica, for seeming to be a prima donna was, in a sense, a true Prima Donna. She was the first lady of this stage, and she knew it.
There was a smattering of applause when she finished and she smiled and waved at her friends.
There were a few more auditions and then Karen was called out onto the stage. She stood there in the center of the stage, and everyone waited for a moment or two for the music to start so they could tell what it was she was singing.
The music never started. She simply looked out at the audience for maybe thirty seconds and then she began to sing, accompanied only by her echo off the bare walls around her. Her voice was pure and full and she hit the notes that you expected with her rendition of “Somewhere over the Rainbow.”
This was also a song of longing, but where Angelica’s song held nothing but a little girl’s fear, this held a young woman’s hope. Both songs were about an unseen world. Doth talked about dreams, but only one of them believed that they could achieve their dreams and Karen sang that song and every person in the audience believed that she would be able to achieve those dreams. When she ended, she walked off the stage in silence. After a moment, when people realized what had happened, they broke out in spontaneous applause.
Karen stood back watching the pageantry with a slight smile on her face. The Dwarves were there around her for support and they joked a bit as they all waited for the press to die down. Angelica was about to push in when she noticed Karen standing back. With a toss of her head she moved over to stand at the other side of the crowd. If Karen noticed anything, she didn’t let on as she waited for the students to thin out and make room at the front. Almost as if it were choreographed Karen and Angelica stepped forward as one and stood almost shoulder to shoulder looking at the list.
“Congratulations,” Karen said with a genuine smile when she noticed Angelica’s name on the list. Angelica made a noncommittal grunt as she looked desperately for the other girls name on the list, hoping that she wouldn’t find it.
Karen smiled and walked away, nodding to the Dwarves. Her name was there. She was getting a call back. Angelica huffed and walked away. Karen looked appraisingly at Angelica as she walked away.
“Who,” Karen asked. She’d been lost a bit in thought, wondering what she’d be singing tonight, if she was even called to sing.
“That little witch Angelica. I mean, just judging from your performance last night you’re sure to get the leading role,” Mindy said.
“I don’t want the lead,” Karen said with a smile.
“Why not, Karen? You’d be a great Cinderella?”
“I don’t want to be ‘that girl,’” Karen said simply. “I mean like Cinderella.”
The twins looked at her like they’d lost her completely.
“Cinderella is so passive. She lets life happen to her. Sure, some of the remakes were designed to give her some degree of control of her life, but she lets her stepmother turn her into a servant, and then her fairy godmother turns her into a Beauty Incognita. The only action she personally takes is to run away, which in a story which is trying to tell us that love conquers just adds to how passive of a character she is.”
“And when the prince finds her and she tries the shoe on?”
“The prince found her, not the other way around. Let me be the stepsister instead. This is acting isn’t it? I don’t want to just go up there and be the same person I am. I want to be evil for once, especially since I can leave it behind when I leave the stage.”
“You’ll pretend to be evil and Angelica will pretend to be good,” Mindy said with a smirk on her face.
“Mindy! Be nice. Just because you don’t like her,” Karen began.
“It’s not that we don’t like her,” Candy began.
“It’s that she doesn’t like us,” Mindy finished.
“Hey, Snow!” Harry said as he sat down next to the girls.
“Snow?” Karen said. He seemed to be looking at her so she assumed he was talking to her.
“Yeah, Snow. Apparently Angelica says you are a bit of an Ice Queen so they’ve taken to calling you Snow.”
Karen looked a little confused at that.
“Why snow, though? Why not Ice or something like that.”
“That’s actually my fault,” Thomas said as he sat down on the other side.
Karen had to laugh, “I thought you all sat at that table,” she said pointing to the table in the corner.
“We normally do,” Harry said. “Thing is, we are your friends.”
“And friends don’t let friends eat alone,” Mindy said in an announcer voice.
Karen just looked at her as if she were insane and she blushed. Everyone else at the table laughed and it was Karen’s turn to feel a little embarrassed.
“Getting back to Snow…”
“Well, with your black hair, pale skin, and blood red lips you have to admit that you’re sort of the spitting image of a certain Fairy Tale heroine.”
“Better Snow White than Cinderella, right Snow?” Mindy said innocently. There was an impish gleam in her eyes.
Karen glared at her for a moment before her gaze softened.
“I can live with that,” Snow said after a moment or two, “especially since she was considered to be the most beautiful in the land,” she finished with an impish grin of her own.
The others at the table joined in the laughter.
“What’s so funny,” Brad said as he walked up.
This started a fresh round of laughter as Brad and Able just stood there looking confused.
Snow had assumed, incorrectly, that today would be singing again. The reason that she’d tried in the first place was that singing shut off the world for her. When she sang, she wasn’t the girl who had lost both parents. While she was singing there was just the next note and the one after that. Singing put her into a space where nothing in the world mattered except for the pitch and tone of the words that she sang.
Acting was obviously Angelica’s world and one in which Snow was a novice. For a moment, when she was giving her lines Angelica became another person. Angelica wasn’t reading her lines. She had already memorized the part and was simply up there acting the role.
While it was true that Snow didn’t really want to be Cinderella it wasn’t for all the reasons she’d mentioned earlier. While she’d have liked the leading role she didn’t feel like she’d be able to do a credible job at it.
She was here, though, and she would give it whatever she had.
“Thank you, Angelica. Karen, you’re up next.” Mr. Lief called out.
Snow took a couple of calming breaths and walked up on the stage. It was the same scene that Angelica had just done. She was about to give her lines, read from the page, when she had a thought. She didn’t need enemies, especially if they were going to be in the same production.
“Mr. Lief? Would it be okay if I read for the part of the stepsister opposite Angelica as Cinderella?”
Mr. Lief considered for a moment and then called out, “Angelica, if you’d kindly join Karen up on the stage?”
“Why are you doing this?” Angelica hissed. “Are you trying to make me look bad?”
“How would I do that by reading the other part? You already know Cinderella’s part.”
“I don’t know it know it, but I know the lines.”
“You know the part, Angelica.”
“Anytime you girls are ready.”
Karen was not perfect, but she read well. She interacted with Angelica, moving around the stage and making the other girl look good. When they were done everyone could see Angelica in the leading role. The students in the audience clapped and hollered for a moment before Mr. Lief had enough.
“If I have to I will make this a closed audition,” he said in a stern voice. The grin on his face let people know he was joking, mostly.
“Why did you do that, Karen?” Angelica said as they walked off stage.
“Because I could and because I don’t want to be Cinderella.”
“No, really. Why did you do it?”
“Really. Though there is another reason. You’re the best one for the role.”
“Seriously? You think I’m good?”
“You’re better than good, Angelica. I thought you knew that with the way that you act all the time.”
Angelica looked a little angry at the comment but then the anger faded and she just looked sad, “I know I’m difficult to work with. I try, but I’m so worried about failing that I push everyone else as hard as I push myself. I’m terrified that people will figure out that I’m not that good.”
“Angie, your singing could use some work, but no one will ever say you’re a bad actress.”
Angelica looked shocked. For a moment Snow was worried that she’d said something wrong.
“I didn’t mean…”
“Oh, about the singing? No, I agree with you, but then I’ve always been critical of everything I do. Why did you call me Angie?”
“Because I like it more? And if I have to call you Angelica one more time I’m going to scream. Do you realize how big that word is? It’s like having to say antidisesablishmentarianism every time I want to talk to you.”
Angelica giggled, “my name isn’t that bad.”
“No, but it feels that bad. Besides, if we’re going to be friends then I’m calling you Angie.”
“Ok, Karen,” Angie replied, exaggerating the name.
“Snow, please.”
“Snow?” Angie said a little unsurely.
“Yes, Snow. I like the nickname. The Dwarves think that I look like Snow White.”
“Oh emm gee, you’re Snow White and the Seven Dwarves,” Angie said loudly. The auditorium burst out laughing and Snow just smiled. Angie blushed and tried to hide in her hair.
“Come on, let’s go have a seat,” Snow said and walked toward where the Dwarves were sitting.
“I can’t sit over here,” Angie said holding back.
“Why not?”
“Well, they don’t like me, and they’re a little weird.”
“Have you seen what I’m wearing?”
“Yeah, you have this whole goth fairy tale thing going on.”
“And that’s not weird?”
Angie chuckled and followed behind Snow to the Dwarves’ seats.
“Guys, this is Angie,” Snow said when they arrived.
He respected Karen’s father, and wanted to be there for him more than for her, but there was only so much of this he could take. None of the other students had bodyguards, and Karen seemed to be able to take care of herself.
Karen seemed to be able to get anyone together. She was integrating the other girl, Angelica, into her group of friends. The new girl seemed to still be a little uncomfortable, but was by steps relaxing.
Karen was called up another couple of times to read for various roles, but more often than not she was asked to read for the role of the elder stepsister. Angelica was asked to read a couple of other times, but she was always asked to read the role of Cinderella.
James was a little sad about that, but he had to admit that the girl could act, and you wanted a strong actor in the leading role. It wasn’t that Karen was bad. It was more that Angelica was just better.
“Thank you all for coming in today. We’ve simply run out of time. Tomorrow I’ll post the cast roles as well as those I would like to come back for further readings. If those of you with cast roles could come tomorrow as well it will greatly speed the process up.”
Karen said goodbye to her friends and walked over to where James was sitting.
“Hello, James,” Karen said with a glowing smile.
“Hello, Karen.”
“Actually, could you call me Snow?”
“Snow, huh, Any reason for that,” James said as he gathered his things in preparation to leave.
“I just like it. It’s a nickname they gave me today.”
“Whatever you say, Snow. It does seem to have a certain ring to it,” James said thoughtfully.
Snow just smiled at him as they walked out to the car. James opened the door for her and then closed it behind her before climbing into the drivers seat.
“I take it that you had a good day at school?”
“I had a wonderful day. So, you know I got a callback, of course, but…” Karen proceeded to relate the events of her day to James. He nodded and paid attention to her, trying in some small way to replace her father. He wasn’t going to be able to be her father, he knew that, but at least he could be a strong parental figure. He was going to be here for a long time after all.
Also, happy news, this is a completed story in one shot. There might be a sequel to this one, but I have no idea of the story I would tell yet, so we'll have to see.
The voices talking above me weren’t really within my scope of understanding. They should have had meaning to me, but the last thing that really had meaning was when the anti-tank round had passed through my right shoulder. It shouldn’t have even been an issue then. If my armor had been buttoned up right...but then I’d told the mechanic that he should have replaced the support structure under the right pectoral plate three skirmishes ago.
“That’s not altogether true, doctor,” a quiet, and strangely enough female voice says. That gets my attention. Men and women are treated in different wings of the hospital. Not due to any sort of segregation bullshit, but because there are different procedures in place for each one. Each male soldier had frozen a lifetime supply of our sperm before we’d shipped out. Because a soldier just doesn’t have the time necessary for it, egg donation just isn’t an option. They want to ensure as many fertile survivors as they can so...
“Oh, hell no.” private Donovan say. Not sure what he’s getting so up in arms about.
“Oh come on, Donovan, don’t think a woman can lead?” Corporal Parks asks. Parks is one of my youngest corporals. She can also bench more than Donovan. The question doesn’t make sense to my drug and pain addled mind.
“We’re losing him,” I hear another male voice say, and then the world just goes way.
I don’t know if a human being has a soul, but I do know that whatever is the essence of me, that spark of life, can’t be duplicated. They’ve tried, but the second they transfer you, the old body becomes completely brain-dead. Personally, I like to believe that our soul knows what’s good for it, and heads down the electron pipe with the rest of our personality.
I sit up. I can feel the weight of my hair, and I grab onto it. It’s a lot longer than I’d have thought, longer than it should be. I pull it over my shoulder and it just pools in my lap.
“Someone forget to give me a haircut before I woke up?”
My voice gives me pause. The spares are designed for two things; keeping you alive while they prepare a custom job for you; keeping you from going into rejection shock. As such, the spare picks up as much as it can from your memories so that it can adjust the minor things for you and make transition as simple as possible. It reads how your brain controls things like your muscles and your breathing. It even modulates the vocal chords so that you sound the same to yourself when you speak. You always sound a little weird to everyone else but that’s because sound reverberates differently in the synthetics that make up a spare’s head.
My singing voice was a baritone, and my speaking voice wasn’t all that much higher. There’s no way I should be sounding like a freaking Alto right now. My voice has the right tonality, it’s just too high.
I try a couple of bars from La Traviata, and even though I’m singing the songs I’m used to I sound a lot more like a ‘Flora’ than a ‘Giorgio.’ I start to sing scales. This spare hasn’t been properly locked down...or possibly it’s just that it doesn’t mesh properly with my memories, but I find myself singing an A two octaves above high C before the thing actually runs into a block. I can’t get much below G, but that gives me an impressive range none the less.
“Nevermind Flora, I’ll be able to go out for the part of Violetta,” I say and then I giggle. I meant for it to come out as a chuckle...but it was so comfortable to just, well, giggle. It had been a habit I’d been trying to break myself of for years, my habit to giggle. Ever since I’d turned thirteen in fact. It was hard enough being a young opera singer without the added stigma of sounding gay. Unfortunately it had been a persistently hard habit to break.
I stop it immediately, but I can feel something moving on my chest. I put my hand up to touch my chest...and punch myself in the breast. “Son of Beelzebub, that hurt!” I say as I massage what is most definitely a breast of the female variety.
“Up to your creative swearing already, Sarge?” a voice says from the doorway.
“Captain Anderson!” I say and make a move to get out of bed.
“Stop right there, First Sergeant. You’re on mandated bed rest.” He only uses my full title when he wants to get my attention. The order doesn’t make any sense to me.
“I was swapped to a faulty spare, I’m sure…”
“There is nothing wrong with your spare, Sarge,” the captain says. I think there’s a note of sadness in his voice that I simply can’t place. Why would he be sad? Sure, they’ll have to grow me a new custom, but it’s not like that will take more than a couple of weeks at most.
“I mean, sure, it’s got a high pitched voice synthesizer, and it has breasts...no…” horror washes over me. This isn’t possible. This shouldn’t be possible. “No, this shouldn’t...this can’t…”
He walks over to me and takes my hand, something he only does for the female soldiers and I snatch it away. It’s a little too much for me at the moment. “Captain Anderson!” I say blushing. Why should I be blushing?
“We’re worried about how you’ll handle the new spare, Sarge.”
“That’s not the greater concern. Why am I in a female spare?”
“Well, Sarge, we had two choices, and one of them was to let you die.”
“Why were we out of male spares?”
“That is the question, now, isn’t it? The enemy has begun targeting rebirth facilities.” There is an icy pit in my stomach. The one thing that we’d always had on our side, since we never had numbers, was that there was no end to our numbers. You kill one of them once and they’re through. They had a limited number of people that they could throw at us, while as long as we were even technically alive we could be brought back. That precluded any really suicidal charges, but just about anything short of that…
“How many?” I said quietly.
“How many what?”
“How many did we lose. How many of my soldiers aren’t coming back?”
“Our company is fine. You were the last of your soldiers that we needed to transfer. I still think that’s a stupid thing to have put in your standing medical orders. I could have overridden it you know,” he says looking at me kindly.
I don’t know why I want to blush. I never have in the past. Then it strikes me between the eyes: he’s not looking at me like he normally does.
“Captain, you really can’t...I mean I’m still an NCO even if I’m…”
His face goes red and he stands up and turns his back on me. “Sergeant, are you gay?”
“You can’t ask me…”
“Come on, you flirt with me, so just tell me the truth. You’ve never been effeminate or dated...you know...men…”
“No, what I meant, Captain Anderson is that you really can’t be asking me that. And I can’t answer you.” No matter how much I want to, I finished in the safety of my own thoughts. I decided to toss him a bone, “I like flirting with you because it’s safe. You’re never going to take me up on it, because you’re not...I mean you weren’t attracted to me. I guess that’s going to have to change now…”
“Stow it, Sarge. The men and women under our command wouldn’t know how to handle it if mom and dad stopped teasing each other.”
“Wait, you knew about that?”
Behind his back, a lot of the soldiers called him Dad and to my face they called me Mom. It’s funny because I’m 6’6” and two hundred seventy pounds of muscle. I was…
The thought propels me out of bed. The Captain’s back is still to me, I stand up straight and push my back into his. He is...Six...two, so that should leave a couple of inches difference in our heights...which is does. At least my height is correct.
I look down at myself...and squeak. “Why in the outer realms of hades and I naked?” I can feel Captain Anderson begin to turn and I reach around and grab him behind me. I try not to think what my hands are near. “Don’t. This is hard enough as it is,” I say.
“You have no idea,” he says and I feel a slight stirring.
“Horse-monkey flying excrement,” I say and release him. I grab the sheet from the bed, the thing I should have done the first time, and wrap it around myself toga-style. My hair get’s caught in the folds.
“I have way too much hair,” I say.
“That’s not possible,” the captain says turning around.
“No, I mean, I have so much hair. See, it’s all caught up in the sheets…”
“You’re not dizzy, disoriented, anything like that?”
“Why should I be...it’s my body after...shit.”
“Let me go get the doctor,” he says and walks out the door. I think it was me actually swearing more than anything else.
Fifteen years in a mixed-gender army and you pick up a couple of things, especially when you’ve spend a few years in the training cadre. I’d picked up how to french braid my own hair. It had been helpful to demonstrate as it was the accepted hairstyle for women. I’d been able to get away with being a man with shoulder-length hair because I was a Drill-Instructor...and I kept it properly braided.
So, I proceeded to braid my hair while I waited for the captain to come back with a doctor. As I was braiding, I realized that my hands were smaller than I was used to. It was a subtle thing, but I knew what I was capable of, and I found my hands making adjustments almost on their own. I say almost because I knew the adjustments I needed to make.
It shouldn’t be this easy.
Being slammed into the body of the opposite gender is a traumatic experience, or it’s supposed to be. Everything changes, and not for the better. Different center of gravity, different voice, different everything. It’s supposed to be more difficult than this. Sure, there were the rumors, but no one ever believes the rumors.
I start humming an aria I’d always liked but had never had the range for. I don’t know the words by heart, but at least I know the tune. I begin gently rocking with the beat and continue braiding my hair. It’s in front of me and still going.
“You’re right. That is more hair that is allowed in the regs.”
“Captain,” I squeak and pull up the sheet from where it had fallen around my waist.
“You can still sing, I see.”
“None of the old pieces that I knew.”
“You’ll just have to learn new ones,” he says.
“Not like I have time. Couple of weeks and…” his smile slides off his face as I’m talking and a horrible realization strikes me, “the facilities…”
“It’s going to take almost a month just to get a basic facility up and running…”
“And they never trade you spare for spare.”
“Not when they can avoid it.”
A spare was a one use temporary body. They were customized for the user, and once you were transferred out, the circuitry began to degrade. Not even you could be returned to a spare once you’d left it. So, if you were in a damaged one, sure, they’d transfer you, but never from a fully functioning one like I was in.
A basic facility could only produce spares. Mentally I said it with the sneer that most people gave to them.
“Frea’s Garter on a Pike! What am I supposed to do now.”
“Never heard that one before.”
“It’s new,” I said with my normal lopsided grin.
“Don’t do that,” Captain Anderson said turning away from me.
“Do what?”
“Smile like that. That smile is like...pure sex.”
“My smile is like sex”
“Well, it seems that you two are keeping yourselves entertained,” the doctor said as he walked in.
“Hadley…you did this to me?”
“I’d insist on you calling me ‘Major Hadley,’ but I know you’d just refuse.”
“Sorry, Major,” I said backing down for once, “I’ll try to be a little more...proper,” I said and thrust out my chest while letting the sheet fall. Captain Anderson barked out an explosive burst of laughter and walked out of the room. I picked up the sheet and lay back against the bed. The Major was stock still with his head half cocked, just standing there.
“Captain? I think I broke the Major,” I say in a singsong. His laughing gets more intense.
“First Sergeant de la Flora, could you refrain from joking until I finish my examination.”
I just begin to think, why he checks my reflexes and asks my general condition. It’s something I learned to do a long time ago. It’s not that I can really think about two things at once, or maybe it is which makes me such an excellent armor pilot, but I’m able to put most of my actions on a sort of autopilot while my higher brain functions work through a problem.
I’d always had a problem with the girly last name. No, let’s be accurate; I’ve had a problem with other people having a problem with it. I loved my last name. I loved my name period; Antonio de la Flora. “Guess I should go by Antonia for a little while,” I say with a giggle.
The Major looks up at me sharply. I bite my lips and try to hold in my mirth. “We’ll have to get you some suitable attire, but you seem to be in working order,” the doctor says and walks out of the room.
“So, apparently I’m shipshape and Bristol fashion,” I say in my mock cockney accent as the captain returns.
“Apparently so,” he says with a worried smile.
“What’s wrong?” I ask. It’s not my normal gruff tone. I put more feeling into it because it felt more...right to me and he looks at me sharply. “What?” I say.
“You’re sure taking to that form really easily.”
“Yeah, well, um…” I say and begin to blush. This really isn’t going to be a subject that I bring up now, or ever.
“She’s got a full bill of health,” a female doctor says as she enters the room. I’ve never seen her before, of course.
“Why did the Major examine me?”
She looks startled, “I, well, I…”
She’s a lt. colonel by her rank insignia. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I shouldn’t have been so rude.”
“Oh, don’t be. Major Kreiter has always had a stick up his ass. As for your other question, it’s because the captain went to the wrong desk,” she says and glares at Captain Anderson. He pales visibly. “Would you mind giving us some privacy, Captain?”
I’ve never seen the captain move so quickly, not even when we had a tank platoon charging at us from over that hill in...never mind. Not important.
“How are you feeling, First Sergeant de la Flora?”
“That is a mouthful.”
“I know it is, so if you promise to call me Jenae, I’ll call you Antonio.”
“Not in this body you wont. Antonia, please.”
She looked at me strangely for a moment, “You’d prefer a feminine name? Interesting…”
“Not really,” I say and try to hide my embarrassment.
She gets a shrewd look on her face and then says, “I can understand your ability to manipulate your limbs well, since they’re basically the same, proportionally. The different in center of gravity, and your ease with it…”
“Apparently it’s like riding a bike,” I say, a blush invading my cheeks.
“What is?”
“Oh, this is so embarrassing. Can we do this some other time...like the day after never?”
“I need to know your medical history if I’m going to…”
“What? Oh, I’ve never, I mean, nothing like…I used to be a girl.”
“Wait, what?”
“On stage. My voice didn’t break until I was seventeen. My opera company was a small one, and we were always missing the female cross dressing roles because I was the only one who could sing mezzo-soprano. You know how prudish some audiences can get, even though originally those were played by boys…”
“What female crossdressing roles?”
“You know, where a female actress plays a young boy, of course in Marriage of Figaro Cherubino is often played by a woman who plays a man who dresses like a woman…”
“You’re making my head spin a little. What does this have to do with…”
“I had to be a girl any time I was in or around the theatre. It wasn’t just the pants roles that I was doing, you see. I could still sing soprano, and so I got some female roles as well…”
“This doesn’t explain anything. It seems a little thin. If people would have been fine with a woman playing as a man why wouldn’t they…”
“Because a woman wearing men’s clothing is sexy and a man wearing women’s clothing is a pervert.”
She opens her mouth to speak and then just begins laughing, “it’s because of your peers wasn’t it.”
“Yes,” I say quietly.
“You performed at your school occasionally?”
“A couple of times a year. One of the biggest bullies in the class had a crush on me. He didn’t know it was me when he was pounding my face into the sidewalk. Oh, there were so many times I considered telling him just to get back some of my own.”
“How did he not know if you had the same injuries to your face…”
“Oh, he was dense, and I was good. I even spun a story about the dickless sod monkey who beat me up when he came with his sympathy…” I stopped and thought for a moment and then my face grew pale and I began to be nauseous. “I’m going to throw up.”
“Spares don’t vomit.”
“Oh yes they do...it’s just a psycho-somatic…” and then I was dry heaving and leaning over the railing on the bed and Jenae was holding my hair for me, just as if I were really flesh and blood instead of wires and tubes.
“Learn something new every day,” Jenae said almost to herself.
“Yeah, this is my…” I stopped and did a quick calculation. “Well, this is my three hundredth spare.”
“Three hundred?” She looks shocked at my declaration. “You’ve died that many times?”
“Point of the spear, ma’am.”
“Oh, you’re one of those guys,” she says with a look of distaste.
“123rd Armored Infantry,” I say with a grin.
“We get more of you all DOA than any other division, you know that right?”
“Not from G company. Never had a single deadhead among us.”
Her mouth dropped open as if something had just clicked for her. “Tin Plated Bastard...that is you”
“Not so much a bastard at the moment as a...nother B word.”
She chuckles at this, “Yeah, I can see that. And it sounds as though the rumors are true.”
“What rumors,” I say growing a little cold.
“Well, that you refuse to swear, can plait a better braid than nine tenths of the soldiers in your company, including the females, and that you try your best never to take anything seriously.”
“Now wait a minute, I take a lot seriously.”
“Relax, Antonia. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
I snort and then sit looking at the end of my hair. “So, can you get me a scrunchie?” She hands me a bright pink lace one and I look at it as if it were a snake. “I can’t wear that back to base.”
“It’s the only one I have, Sergeant.”
I sigh and roll my eyes and then take it. I finish the last couple of feet of my hair and then tie off the end with the scrunchie. I have to admit, it looks good there on my honey-blonde hair. When I look up I realize the doctor is gone. It’s a little upsetting but I live with it. There’s a little ensuite, as there is with most private hospital rooms, so I head in to get a good look at myself. I leave the sheet at the entrance to the bathroom and enter the room completely naked. The first word that comes to mind is statuesque.
After that I realize that I’m still in here. The face is softer, but it is mine. The shoulders narrower, the hips more pronounced, but it is me, or as close to me as they could get with a female spare.
“Antonia?” I hear Jenae’s voice say from the other room.
“In here,” I call and walk out.
“Usually we have your measurements and can get you a new set of clothing easily, in this case…”
“Hey, we’re all in virgin territory here, Doc.” At her glare I amend it, “sorry, Jenae.”
“I’d think this familiarity would be easy for you?”
“Why’s that?”
“You’re the sergeant who’s never saluted an officer.”
“Not exactly true. I didn’t earn the medal of honor until my third week out of basic. Saluted lots of officers there.”
She snorts at this and I smile. The hands me an assortment of seven or eight bras and I look at them in a bit of horror. “What do you want me to do with these?”
“Well, you shouldn’t have too much trouble with them, especially with your background.”
“Could we keep that between us? And it’s been eighteen years since the last time…”
“Last time what,” Captain Anderson said as he came through the door. When he caught sight of me he stopped and turned around. I fled back into the bathroom with my braid flying out behind me like a pennant.
“Little yellow bird balls, Captain, don’t you knock?”
“I’m coming to visit my first sergeant, Sarge, I haven’t knocked any time in the last five years we’ve worked together.”
“Well, I’d appreciate you knocking until we get this mess sorted out,” I say from the other side of the door. The bras are white. The only other thing they share in common is that they are very feminine. When I’d been cross-dressing as a teen, the bras and panties I’d worn had been as neutral as they could be. No lace, no ribbons, no frills of any sort. These were something else entirely. They had lace and frills and borders and they were...delicate. I tried them all on, one at a time, and ended up with a demi bra with cups made almost entirely out of lace. It fit the best. I took the remaining bras out with me.
“Do you have any…”
“Still here,” Captain anderson said, and I just glared at him. He turned his back on me again and I just giggled. The officers had the luxury of private showers. We enlisted men and women didn’t. We got used to seeing a little flesh. In the back of my head, a little voice wondered why I’d run into the bathroom then.
“Underwear?”
“Here,” Jenae said and handed me a number of panties. These, at least, were plain, light grey and cotton. The bra might be hidden under the undershirt when all was said and done, but the panties would occasionally be visible so had to match the proper uniform colors. There were a number of cuts, but they were all of the briefs variety. The brass had tried for years to get something of a uniform nature in women’s underwear. So far they had resisted all efforts. At least thongs were completely out of the question, thank goodness. I selected a pair of bikini cut briefs that felt comfortable. The rest of my clothing was more straight forward. It was easy to select the right light grey undershirt. The grey digital camo blouse and pants were the easiest. They’d been picked for length and I used the ties to adjust their fit. I’d lost four shoe sizes, but I felt somewhat human as soon as I got the dark grey wool socks and the boots in place.
“So, how do I look, Captain?”
“Um...like a valkyrie?”
“Well, if you want to be insulting…”
“Oh, yeah, sorry, what I meant to say it that you look very feminine and at the same time you look like you could kick my ass.”
“Let’s go kick some...ass then,” I say. I begin blushing furiously the moment that I say it.
“Wow, the TPB blushing. I never thought I’d see the day,” Jenae says.
“You really are bad at swearing,” the captain says.
“Hush, you,” I say and they both laugh...at me. “This is going to be difficult, isn’t it?”
“What do you mean,” Jenae asks. “Something I haven’t seen already? You seem to be working out well with your new spare.”
“Oh, the spare is perfect,” I say, for once not thinking of these bodies with the normal disdain that most of us feel. “No, people aren’t going to take me seriously in this body,” I say and the captain gets serious.
“You’re still a capable field commander and I’ll…”
“All due respect, but shut it, sir. This is something I have to deal with.”
With that, I walked out the door and into my future.
“Who the hell are you?” George says, climbing out from the insides of the aforementioned armor suit. It’s clear someone told him I would be coming, but didn’t want to spoil the surprise.
“I’m the woman who’s about to make your life a living hell, private Michelson. Whether or not you recognize my face, the device you see here on my lapels should be enough for you to understand that you are in a deep pit monkey turds with the walls caving in.”
“Sergeant de la Flora?”
“He has a brain after all! Afternoon, George, and what were we discussing before you sent me out to be slaughtered by the 1L’s. Did I perhaps tell you that the jointing matters? Did I perhaps tell you that this is life or death? And what, was your response when I said that?”
“There’s always a spare,” he mumbles to himself.
“Sorry, could you say that loud enough so everyone can hear?” I say using my DI bellow. It’s not exactly a bellow, but it is talking with a commanding voice, and it is pitched to carry.
“There’s always a spare,” he shouts. He’s not even using his normal disdain for the synthetic bodies, one like I’m wearing now.
“That’s right. That’s what you said. Well, guess what? There aren’t anymore.” The shock in the rest of the room was palpable. “For once the 1Ls hit us where it hurts, in the replacements. You may have noticed there is a problem with my gender,” I say, directing this to the rest of the people in the motor-pool. “That’s because we are, quite literally, out of male spares. So, unless one of you pretty boys wants to join me on the other side of the fence, then you better get these rigs up to 100% or sure as Pluto is a ball of ice I will make your lives miserable.”
“I thought Pluto was an animated dog,” I hear one of the guys joke with his neighbor. I stalk over to him, as silent as a new pair of boots will allow me to get. I’d broken and shaped my old pair so that I could walk across concrete without any sort of sound betraying my presence. Lucky for me, he didn’t hear the slight clicking sound my boots made since everyone else in the garage was deathly silent.
I’m willing to joke as much as the next person, but there is a time and a place for it, and when you’re getting dressed down by an NCO for dereliction of duty, well, that’s not the time or the place.
He realizes there is someone there about the time I take in a deep breath, “Private, is there something funny about the way I’m talking? Or maybe it’s the egg I didn’t eat for breakfast that is all over this nice new uniform? Could you please share with the rest of us what is so ever living funny that you thought to interrupt me when I was talking?” It begins somewhere around the volume of a firecracker and goes on up to somewhere in the range of a jet taking off. I’m a little red in the face when I’m done, but one thing that my years of opera singing, and training for opera singing has done for me is given me muscles on the diaphragm muscles. And the spare has been configured exactly so that it will produce the same force for the same effort.
“I’m a corporal,” he says with just the tiniest bit of a sneer.
“He says he’s a corporal,” I say with a smile looking around the room at the other grease monkeys. Most of them look like they’re about to be sick. “You better be Odin One-Eye because I am two steps away from having you sent to Leavenworth.”
“Who do you think you are..?” he begins but then the guy he was standing next to hisses, “shut up, Butter. This is the TPB.”
“I thought he…” and then he catches my glowering face, and certain things I’d said finally catch up with him.
“Hi,” I say with a grim smile, “welcome to the conversation. Do any of you know what dereliction of duty is?” As soon as I finish a couple of the pit boys actually lose their breakfasts all over my motor pool.
“Welcome boys...and girls,” I say nodding to a tight cluster of females on one side of the garage, “to the new reality. This is G company. In this company G stands for Excelent. That means, from now on, I expect these suits to be as pristine as they were when they came off the assembly line, and I expect you to keep them that way twenty-five hours a day, eight days a week.”
“But there are…” one of the people began, only to be shushed by his neighbors.
“Private Butters, you will report for an article 15 in my office in thirty minutes exactly,” I say as I glance at my watch, noting the time so that I could know when he was late.
“Not so much that, as you probably shouldn’t have threatened him with demotion. Now, you either end up looking silly for what amounts to a personal insult.”
I will not whine in front of this man. He’s been a mentor to me over the years and I don’t want to let him down. Unfortunately, my body has other things in mind, “dad,” and it comes out as a whine that even I cringe at.
“Oh, don’t give me that young...lady.” This gets me laughing.
“I’m thirty-five, dad.”
“I’m well aware of how old you are, my girl, but that doesn’t change how weird this conversation is, nor does it explain why you called me in.”
“Cause I gave him a thirty minute deadline, ‘cause I was angry, and you were the only one I could be sure would come when I called.”
“If you weren’t my son, er, daughter I wouldn’t have come out here on such short notice. Plus, it’s overkill and you know it.”
“No, it’s not. You know the situation we’re in, and these guys have become lazy. You know what my mechanic said before I went out the last time. “
“Yes, and it’s the same thing that nearly every mechanic has said in nearly every motor pool in this country since the war began. There are entire brigades that have had over 5000% casualties in the past year.”
“I didn’t know. How many of those were fatalities?”
“Thankfully, not that many, but that has put a strain on our facilities. We were barely meeting demand, and then they took out one, just one, of our three hundred facilities and within a week we have shortages all over.”
“Should you really be telling me this?” My heart is fluttering in my chest. It’s not fear that I’m feeling, but it’s the closest I’ve been to it in twenty years.
“No, I shouldn’t, but I’m not going to leave my daughter out here with her damned death wish and not let her know how bad the situation is.”
“Dad, I don’t want to die.”
“Oh, really? Then what is this I hear tell that you refuse to be swapped until every other member of your team is taken care of. I almost lost you this time...no, let’s be honest. I did lose you this time. You’re not my son anymore.”
“Dad,” I say and I can see he’s near tears. He’s never cried since mom died when I was seventeen.
“I understand, Ant. My little Ant...it’s going to be the opera house all over again, isn’t it?”
My face flushes with anger, “I joined the military because of you, Daddy. I’m here, and I’m serving, because of you. I was good...no, I was great. As a soprano I had a future, but who cares about one more baritone…”
“Ant…”
“Dad, I’m sorry, but this isn’t about the opera. This isn’t about singing, and this wasn’t some evil scheme of mine to get into a female spare.”
My dad looks shocked for a moment and then begins to laugh, “can you see that? Calling up the enemy command?”
“Hi, so I want to be swapped into a female spare, I was wondering if you’d bomb one of our rebirth facilities to put everything behind just enough for me to be forced into a female body ‘against my will.’”
“Hmm, just enough...they’re trying to make us desperate.” He gets up to leave and I just look at him. “Your mother used to give me that look,” he says with a pained smile.
“Good,” I say, “It’s about time I reminded you of mom,” as soon as the words are out of my mouth I want to take them back.
He just closes his eyes for a moment and then opens them and really looks at me. “You’re comfortable, aren’t you?”
“For the moment, I suppose, but I know I’ll be going back soon, so I’m trying not to think about it.” There’s a knock on the door. “I need to talk to you about something else, after.”
“Come,” I call out in my command voice.
“Corporal Butters reporting as…” he stops the moment he sees my father. Seeing a five star General of the Army in the flesh is a heart stopping thing, especially when you expected to see just your company First Sergeant.
“Hello, Corporal Butters, do you know why you’re here?”
“I’m here because I wasn’t properly respectful, Sir.”
“If that were the issue, I’d instruct First Sergeant de la Flora to get her head out of her ass and to just get the captain to sign off on a work detail. No, the charge is actually dereliction of duty, of which you are guilty.”
“Sir,” he begins in a mollifying tone.
“Be pleased that I don’t add insubordination to it was well. We could look for everything that you’re in the slightest guilty and skip the non-judicial punishment and go straight to a court martial.”
I feel the slightest bit sorry for the Corporal. He’s white as a sheet and beginning to shake a little. “What the General means to say is that we’re no longer accepting malingerers in this army. Too long have we assumed that superior life-saving devices are enough to make up for failure of the mechanics to send us into battle with working gear.” the General says.
“I’m going to be lenient,” he continues, “and I’m not going to bust you back to private. You are, however, going to be restricted to base for thirty days. You’re going to be on extra duty for thirty days, and you’re going to be docked two-weeks pay.”
“Two-weeks,” the still corporal begins, but a glare from my father stops it dead.
“Your extra duty will consist of making the First Sergeant’s armor absolutely perfect. You will also be required to come up with a new device for the Sergeant’s armor. Saut device is to be no bigger than her left pectoral armor plate and will have to meet with her approval before you are dismissed from the extra duty.”
The General signed the Article 15, then I did, and so did Corporal Butters. He stumbled out of my office shortly after.
“You think that was wise?”
“What, putting him in a position where he can totally screw himself over even further? Yes. I want this war to end, and we haven’t had an offensive mission for over three months. We’re in a defensive position, and people are content to leave it so. This was has been going on for three years. We’re getting used to it. Out populace never sees the front lines. They just know that we’re defending them, and that’s all they care about.”
He looks at me for a minute or two, as I sit there with my braid in my lap, working on how I’m going to say this.
“Daddy,” I begin in the sweetest, softest tone possible. He sits there quietly, waiting. “Do you possibly have that spot in BOLC still open for me?”
“You want to go to the Basic Officer Leadership Course…now? I’ve been trying to get you to mustang for the past fifteen years, ever since you enlisted. Why now?”
“Because I’m in love with my company commander...and he knows it.”
“I...have nothing to say to that,” he says with a huge smile on his face.
“You’re just happy your little girl is finally going to become an officer.”
“Yes, I am, and if he doesn’t keep his grubby mits of my little girl…”
“Daddy,” I say, blushing.
“Sorry, but you’re my little girl, not matter how you came to become so, and even if you’re 35, I’m planning on you remaining pure and innocent until you are eighty.”
I stop smiling and I just look at him and he smiles sweetly at me, “Yes, you can go to BOLC. I held a slot open for you, and it will be waiting for you in six months when the next class with an opening occurs.”
“Dad…” I begin.
“I have to let that spot go eventually, I always have. Even if you became a man tomorrow, would your feelings change?”
“No,” I say quietly.
“And he’ll still know?”
“Yes,” I say, and he holds up a finger. “Then you need to soldier on, girl. Running away isn’t an option.”
“This is a tactical withdrawal until I can come back with something approximating equal footing,” I say blushing even worse than before. I keep my eyes focused on my father, thought and watch as his expression softens.
“I thought you were just exaggerating. You want to become an officer...I’ll see what I can do.”
“Daddy?” I say, confused.
“If there are any earlier spots, then I’ll pull a string or two. You’re more than qualified, and your file more than qualifies you for it. And if he hurts you...but only after you become an officer, you hear me. Fraternization and all that.”
He stands up, and I rise and hug him, “Thanks, dad.”
“You’re going by Antonia again?”
“Yes,” I say and he smiles. “I always did like the sound of that name,” he says and walks out the door.
Something else I made sure to do was get myself a selection of neutral hair bands in black, white, and varying shades of grey. I’m wearing a white one today, and playing with the end of my braid as I read through yet another after action report for last weeks debacle. We still hadn’t actually lost a soldier, but we came close in a couple of instances, and we had just under half of our personnel in spares at the moment. My dad was right, that we were just short of our normal output with the loss of the one facility. What he hadn’t mentioned to me, and I could understand why, is that this loss had happened close to two months ago. In that time, we had slowly lossed whatever surplus we had, which had never been much, and begun cutting corners where necessary.
The fifteen hundred men in the same situation as I’m now in aren’t all as lucky as I am. There are a few, a very small percentage, that are back at work like nothing happened. The majority are in some state between catatonia, a shocking twenty three percent, and unable to get out of bed.
I pinch the bridge of my nose with the hand not playing with my braid and just breathe for a few minutes.
“Got a minute, Antonia?” Heath says from the doorway. Somewhere in between our awkward first meeting back at work and the necessity to move past it we had begun calling each other by our first names. It worried me whenever I lay awake, unable to sleep for the thoughts running through my head.
“What’s up?” I say, trying not to beam a smile at him.
“We’re having a problem down in the motor pool that has you written all over it.”
“So, you think I’ll be able to resolve this dispute in my normal…”
“No, I mean literally.”
“Corporal Butters?”
“Yep,” he says with a grin and I shake my head.’
“I’ll go get this over with. I still have no idea where he already got naked photos of me for that first attempt.”
“Oh, I have some idea, but I’m letting it play out because if I actually look into it then I’ll have to ‘do something’ and...you’re not the only female soldier this has happened to.”
“Heath,” I say. I can feel the scowl beginning to form on my face and he holds up his hands. “Hey, the other soldier asked me not to do anything about it. This time, however, I made mention that if it didn’t stop I’d make it stop.”
“Subtle, sir.”
He stuck his tongue out at me and walked across the hall to his office. I looked back at the report on my display and grimaced. I wasn’t supposed to have to go through this. My job was to ensure the soldiers were ready and then to go out and play in the mud every time we were deployed. It was the Captain’s job to deal with all this big pile of green, half-digested, horse manure.
“Excrement,” I say under my breath and rose to leave for the motor pool. Private Donnelly was standing in the doorway, looking worried, and playing with her, much shorter, braid.
“Looks like we share a nervous habit,” I say pointing to her hair.
“Yes, ma’am, I mean sir...I mean Sergeant.”
“Calm down there, Donnelly. Is there a problem?”
“Well, before, when you were, well, this is embarrassing.”
“Walk with me, Donnelly. I have places to go and foundations to rock.”
“Excuse me?” she said going bright red.
“What did I...oh, sorry, that could be taken in another way entirely...you know I’m not that type of girl, Donnelly. I wasn’t that type of guy either,” I’m blushing myself as I say this. Sure, we’re supposed to be hardened soldier gals in the army, but if you ever really find one, then I’ll give you a thousand dollars. Let me take that back, some of us try to pretend that we’re just as jaded as the guys, but it’s all for show.
I’m not trying to say that we can’t be just as crude as your average Joe soldier. I’m saying that when we’re alone, just the girls, we tend to be more straightforward about what we’re talking about, and don’t do it for the shock value.
“I meant to say that I plan on making some people wear their gluteus maximus as earrings, and I’ll be using my boot to perform the surgery.”
She begins to laugh and I smile. Her laughter fades almost as quickly as it came. “Sarge? I was...I mean I’m being…sorry, I can’t do this.” She turns to leave and I call out to her.
“Private Donnelly, why didn’t you approach Corporal Parks about this. She’s your squad leader.”
“Oh, I couldn’t do that. She’d think that I...never mind Sarge. I can deal with this.”
I come to a complete stop and then turn around and head the fifty or so feet back to my office. She follows me looking a little cautious. “Sit,” I say and she scoots into one of the chairs facing my desk along the back wall. There are no chairs in front of my desk as I usually expect supplicants to stand while addressing me. I close the door behind me and take a chair near hers.
“Ok, so, if I understand the subtext, you think that Parks would be fine with a soldier under her command being sexually assaulted, and that she’d just tell you to soldier on. Is that about the size of it?”
“Yes, Sergeant,” she says quietly and I actually swear. I try not to. It’s not that I don’t know how to swear, as some people in the past have assumed, its that it has always taken me more time to come up with a nice phrase instead of using the thing that first comes to mind, and more often than not it causes a chuckle or two where there could be offense.
This, however, is no laughing matter for me.
“How many,Donnelly.”
“How many what, Sarge?”
“How many women under my command have been assaulted, photographed, or otherwise made to feel inferior while I was wandering along in a daze actually thinking things were working properly?” I have to work hard to keep the anger out of my tone, because I never want anyone in the position that Donnelly is now to think I’m mad at them. I’m mostly successful.
“Well, um, you see, I know of two other girls that were...you know...like me…”
I put my finger up, motioning for her to stop. I get up and open the door. I walk out and shut it behind me. I then walk into Captain Anderson’s office and shut his door behind me.
“Captain Anderson?” I say as sweetly as possible, “When were you planning on letting me know that we’ve had three sexual assaults in this company, and fairly recently from what I can tell?”
“We’ve had what?” he says so loudly that for a moment I’m afraid that my eardrums have ruptured. He has quite the pair of lungs on him.
“Well, good to know that you weren’t in on anything like that.”
“No, Antonia, I’d never…”
My voice is deceptively calm as I interrupt him, “I’ll just go back and check on Private Helena Donnelly.”
“Donnelly?” he says, deflating visibly.
“Yeah, Donnelly.”
What his subtext just said was that we were in a lot of trouble, even if Donnelly didn’t know about it. While she thought this was business as usual, the annual sexual assault seminar that everyone went to notwithstanding, the honorable Senator James Donnelly would recognize that this was an issue if she ever told him about it.
This wasn’t a matter to be swept under the rug, but neither should it become national headlines at a time when we were fighting for our lives.
I walk into the other room and I close the door again and sit down. “Helena, please, tell me everything. I’m going to need the details if were going to properly pursue this.”
“Corporal Butters,” I call out as I enter the garage. He starts and turns around to look at me. Fear suffuses his features. The rest of the grease monkeys continue to head out through the door.
“S-Sergeant?”
“Just the man I wanted to see. Is my armor polished and ready to go?”
He just stands there, looking as if he doesn’t understand the words I’m saying. “Jerry, help Butters. You two have one minute to get me suited up.”
They leapt into action. Of all the things that they may be failing at, and both Jerry and Butters had improved immensely over the past week, they both knew how to do combat prep like nobody’s business.
Combat Armor is armor first and a mechanized suit second. It’s not designed to make you a hulking brute of a thing. They tried that with the walking main battle tanks of the thirties and forties. The problem was, that a single launch man portable anti-tank rocket could still take you out, and the bigger they were, the less maneuverable they became.
Maneuverability and size, the lack of it this time, were the primary concerns of Combat Armor systems. I could do ballet in my suit, provided I knew how to do ballet in the first place.
They’d adjusted my suit beautifully. It added, at most, another six inches to my height and some bulk in general, but it still fit me like a glove. It had to be custom fit to each user, because it had to move with you, almost at the moment you began to move.
My thick braid hung out the back of my helmet, which was completely non-regulation, but I’d still not had the time, nor the inclination, to hack it off. The helmet was a little tight.
“I think someone forgot to adjust my mellon carrier a little. Seems to be a bit tight. You two run off to formation, I’ll be right along.”
They take me literally. I make it to formation before they do, but the ability to run at thirty miles an hour will do that for you. I slow to a walk and move to the front of the company. They’re still standing around, in something resembling the formations that they’ll fall into, while waiting for someone to call them to order. When Butters is still fifty feet away, but running for all he’s worth, I call them to order.
In the twenty seconds or so it takes them to form up both Butters and Jerry are able to get into their places in the squad devoted to the motor pool.
“Company! Apparently, some of you are under the mistaken impression that this is a party dress. Does this look like a party dress?”
“No, Sergeant,” can the reply from five hundred throats. I smiled. “Some of you will notice holes appearing in your formation. MPs are currently arresting some of you in conjunction with some accusations that have been leveled against you.” I release the safety on my main weapon. The weapon cycles and it makes a clunk as it readies to fire. “If any of you have ideas of trying to run...the MPs are fully qualified to slam your fairy-white worthless backsides into my tarmac. If you’re wondering what I’m doing up here, I’m considering whether or not the court martial would be worth it if I decided to just open fire and remove you from my army.” Never once do I raise my voice higher than the command level I’d started at. In a group this large, you could well consider my volume to be conversational. “Please, make my decision for my and even think to protest your arrest,” I say. My eyes meet Parks’ as I’m saying this and I’m holding her gaze while the MPs take her away.
It’s not long after that when the last of them are taken from formation by the MPs and lead away in restraints. There are holes in the formation. When compared to the slightly overstrength number of five hundred thirty seven that we were at the beginning of today, the fifty-three individuals who have just been lead away aren’t all that many, but when you realized that my company has just been literally decimated leaving the formations looking like swiss cheese.
“Guide right!” I call out. The formations shift, erasing the holes.
“Company, these are your new positions. Memorize them. Fall out!” It’s a much subdued company that leaves the formation versus the one that gathered before hand. Many of those left behind know that they were close to being with those who are even now riding to lock up.
I stand for a minute just staring off into space when I hear the voices of some of my soldiers talking to each other.
“Isn’t Tin Plated Bitch with a T? What is S there for?”
“It’s because she’d become Steel ever since her accident,” is the awe-filled reply. I glance in that direction out of the corner of my eye. It was Private Donnelly who just answered.
“What about the flower? The sarge never had no flowers before.”
This I answer myself, “My name is First Sergeant de la Flora. Flora means flower.” They hastily retreat after that but not before Donnelly smiles at me and whispers, “Thank you.”
I walk up to Butters and Jerry Stevens with a scowl plastered all over my face. Corporal Butters, Sergeant Stevens, explain this to me,” I say gesturing at the crest I still haven’t seen yet.
“It was my idea, Sergeant,” Jerry says, but Butters jumps in, “I take full responsibility for it, Sarge. I thought you’d appreciate it, and I thought the rose was perfect, since Flora just means flower, and I could paint all those thorns. I even painted the drops of blood to show that you’re not just pretty...I mean,” he began blushing and I realized I really had to see this.
“Get me out of this armor and we can inspect it together.”
As soon as they’re done, they do something that you only do during maintenance, which is why I didn’t see the device before. They close up my armor without anyone in it. The device is almost the full size of my left armor plate, which makes it about twice the size of a normal device of this type. The rose itself is almost a foot tall and is superimposed over big block letters going from the upper left of the device to the lower right. S P B. The rose is photorealistic and if I couldn’t see the brush strokes I’d have assumed that he’d photo-printed it on. There are some drops of dew on the petals, and it’s one of the most beautiful roses I’ve even seen. The thorns are slightly scythe shaped and remind me of my close quarters weapon. The thought of those sharpened spikes makes me realize that those thorns are based upon that weapon on my armor. The blood drops falling from two of the thorns are shiny and seem to reflect the room behind me.
“Wow,” is all I can think to say. “I think that you’re done, Butters.”
“But, Sergeant!”
“No, I mean it’s perfect. Thank you, Corporal.”
With that I walk out without another word.
“You fucking bitch,” she says and lunges at me. The MP jerks her up short and then clips her ankle shackles to an eye-bolt in the floor. If she really tried she could still get at me. I’m not going to give her the opportunity.
“Why?” is all I say. She looks bewildered for a moment and then asks, “Why what?”
“Why did you feel the need to throw in with these...animals? Why were you pimping out the females in my company?”
“Because they were weak. They needed a little toughening up. They’d either beat off the bastards or…”
“And Donnelly? That wasn’t a single time, Parks.”
“She was a stuck up princess with no business being in my army.”
“It’s not your army,” I say coldly and for the first time Parks really looks at me. She goes pale. “Sarge.”
“I’d suggest you cease speaking now, Parks. Really. You see, I’d like nothing more than to shove my hand down your throat and tear your lungs out with my bear hands. I’m reasonably sure that I’ll be able to do it, to. Not sure if you’ll still be alive when I accomplish it, though. It will take some work, though, and you’ll likely have suffocated long before I finish.
“You see, I’ve read your file, Parks. All of it. I know what your brothers did to you, and what you did to them. I know that people have failed you your entire life. I get that. I’ve lead a blessed existence compared to you.
“You see, I understand what you’ve been through.”
“There’s no way you could understand what I’ve been through. Big strong guy like you? Your not the type to be a victim.”
“Not anymore.”
“Sure, but until that accident…”
“No, I mean I’m not the type to be a victim anymore.” Her face goes pale again and she begins to shake a little.
“Let me tell you about what it was like growing up with the name Antonia de la Flora. No one in my high school would admit my name was really Antonio. No one would accept that I was a good heterosexual male. No, I sang opera. You might have heard me.”
She nods once, but the horror never leaves her face. She can’t look away as I talk. She knows what’s coming, but even so, she physically can’t shut up her ears and so she has to listen.
“You see, in my heart where I kept all that was precious, in my soul, I knew the truth. I wasn’t really a boy. Sure, I would pretend for the world, for high school, but that wasn’t me. I was seventeen, but I looked like a thirteen year old. Sure, I was tall, I’d always been tall, but I didn’t have the facial hair or the bulging muscles of my school mates.”
“No,” she begins to moan.
“Oh, don’t want the torture? Don’t want to hear about my first time with a boy? I can tell you it wasn’t my choice. He thought it would prove something to me. That’s not the worst part of this story, Parks.
“I’ll skip all the parts you don’t want to hear, and tell the parts you must hear. You see, my mother was home early as a surprise for my birthday. She had been preparing all day. She had a special gift for me, one she knew that I’d love. Her surprise would have changed my life, but I came home, bleeding, and my mother bundled me into the car and drove me to the hospital.
“I can remember that ride, eighteen years ago…”
“Shut up, shut up, shut the fuck up!”
“Sergeant Major, would you please gag the prisoner?”
“With pleasure,” he says. There’s nothing like pleasure in his face, but I ignore the pity I see there. I’m going to finish this and then I’m going to go back to my room and cry for a bit.
“It had rained all day, and the lights seemed to shine so much brighter in the clear air. There was that clean smell, you know? Even in as much pain as I was, feeling like my body and soul had been ripped in two, I felt how clean that night was, and my mom was taking me for a ride to the hospital.”
I stop for a moment, and just breathe in and out. “I grew up in New Orleans. Every day is a day to drink there, but I was born on the 31st of December. We saw three people running red lights as we went, and my mom was a careful driver. She’d just turned around to look at me, saying everything would be alright. We were stopped at an intersection when a truck that was jacked up way too high plowed into us head on.
“I saw it all happen because I was lying on the back seat of our sedan. The only reason I’m here today is that I was too low to the ground. The top of the car peeled away, and most of my mother with it.”
I stop for a moment and blink back a tear. This little self important piece of sewage doesn’t get to see me hurt. The anger burns away the tears I still feel. I look directly at her, and I can see her horror. “So, you little gutter snipe, you medusa, you little revenge poisoned rat, you get to pay for your crimes. You get to rot in here, and then you get to be put up on charges fitting the crime. Do you know what you’re being charged with? Desertion in the face of the enemy. In the past three days just over twenty women have come forward saying they planned to go AWOL the next time that we had a call up. Guess what, since you were the root cause, you and your little harem of male sluts...no your slavering pack of dogs, you are getting charged with just over twenty infractions, because you know what we’re called? The point of the spear. We are out here in front, we are the one and only line of defence and you tried to break us.”
“Enjoy the remaining hours of your life, since if you are convicted of even one of those, your life ends.”
She was screaming into her gag as I left. The Sergeant Major removed her gag and I just heard her continue to scream. It gave me no pleasure to do this. That was the sound of a broken woman that I left behind me. She had nothing left because I had taken it away. I only hoped that it would be enough to one day redeem these women she’d tried to destroy.
The Garage is an ant hive of activity as mechanics ran from place to place. I’d never seen the place this clean. It even smelled clean. Usually there was a slight odor of rancid oil about the place. It just smells...ready. I climb into my suit and close all but the final latches myself. Jerry stops by and checks my connections and then closes me in. I’m weapon’s free the moment I close up and I run to join Captain Anderson at the headquarters point. The first thing I notice is that the tacmap is filled with the blinking red icons of assumed tank platoons. “We’re being invaded,” I say quietly and the Captain just grunts.
“”Permission to lead the troops into battle, Sir.”
“Not this time, Sarge. We go together this time.”
Fear suffuses my being as I realize what this means. There’s not going to be a centralized command. We’re already too far into it. We arrive at the garage just as the company is forming up outside it and we move out. We merge with first platoon and take out positions in formation. Even with Overwatch updating the tacmap for us everything is confused. We pop up over a hill directly into an oncoming tank platoon. There are a couple of tentative icons on the fringes suggesting that individual soldiers are filling holes, but the 1Ls have never had our tech base. I send a stream of high-velocity depleted uranium rounds through the first tank in line, designating additional targets to my companions.
“They’re already across the Mississippi,” someone says over the group channel before I spout, “cut the chatter and stick to your assigned targets.”
The tentative hostiles never materialize out of the forest and it’s making me a bit antsy, so I drop a couple of thermobaric rounds out there. A couple of my squad mates, having taken out their own targets, join suit. There is a firestorm that leaves the surrounding vegetation scattered and blackened. Some of the tentative marks change to the black Xs of confirmed kills. All of them fade after a moment or two.
We top the next rise and we see wave after wave of tanks crossing the Mississippi. There have to be more than a thousand tanks already across and at least a thousand in the process. The captain is calling for people to form up and I’m assigning targets on the floating bridges. As soon as I get acknowledgements I begin firing at my own targets. The high-explosive rounds pound down into river and shatter the unprotected sides of the barges. Even a few of the rounds hitting a single barge sends it to the bottom with the tank travelling across it. Unfortunately these tanks are partially amphibious. It may slow them, but it doesn’t stop them. We begin pouring depleted uranium rounds. Round after round pounds out into the tanks and tank after tank is take out. Some of them burn and some of them just grumble to a stop.
Still the tanks keep coming. My first magazine runs dry so I switch to the second. The rounds pound down range. This landing area has become a complete mess. Tanks and parts of tanks are strewn all over across the seven mile front. The heavy pounding sound of the anti-tank guns lessens and lessens as people run dry, and still the tanks keep coming. My round counter runs down from a hundred as I watch it. I keep pointing at new targets and pulling my trigger, trying to stretch out my rounds as far as they’ll go. The counter winds down to zero and I’m out. I was one of the last few soldiers to fire my last round. A sort of silence comes down upon the battlefield. Not once has a tank been able to bring their main gun to bear on us, we’ve been carrying the day. Now, with all of our ammunition gone, the tanks are able to begin sending rounds back out direction. The short lived almost silence is now punctuated by the sounds of their field pieces pounding out. We cover as best as we can on the lee side of the hill but it’s not going to be enough.
People are praying but I can hear the Captain on the radio with someone. He’s barely done and smiling at me when I hear the sound like a thousand bees. Drones begin dropping thermobarics all over the landing area. The river for almost a mile in either direction flashes into steam. I can tell the problem long before the Captain. He’s never been on the ground when visibility went completely to the ninth circle of hades.
“Get down!” I shout on the all-hands channel and tackle the captain. The bombs begin dropping all around us, and I can hear them getting closer. I know this is the end, the last opportunity I’ll have to say anything because no one is going to be this lucky. I’m completely exposed, and these are truly heavy explosives.
“Heath, I love you,” I say on the command net and then the world ends in a continuous roar.
I try to sit up and find myself almost folding in half. It’s as if I’m too light, or off balance. The world spins and sways and I get up out of bed. I can’t find my balance and collapse to the ground. I open my eyes and the pain becomes more intense. “What’s wrong with me,” I say and a voice I don’t recognize as my own greats me. It’s so deep that it has to be subsonic, or that’s the way it feels.
I stand on shaky legs and Climb back into bed, dizzy and exhausted from the pain.
“It hurts,” I call out to no one in particular. My chest feels funny. I put a hand there and realize it’s flat, My breasts are missing. An emptiness opens up in the pit of my stomach and I sob.
“Someone get the major,” I hear a voice that is just slightly off yell. Everything suddenly becomes clear. I’m in a spare and it’s a male one. I begin to sob uncontrollably. “Put me back,” I begin mumbling over and over, “just put me back.”
“What’s wrong with her?” I hear the slightly wrong voice say.
“You’ve just hit the nail on the head. Her mind is rejecting the sensory input from the spare. This is by far the most severe case I’ve seen in a while. You’d think that with how easily she took to a female spare...but that’s likely the exact reason that she’s having so much trouble now. For two weeks, her mind was in a body that fit her gloriously well. She really didn’t know what she was missing. Now, that she knows…”
“She can’t handle it.”
“Let me die,” I say, and I can feel the tears running down my face.
“Antonia, stay there, we’re going to get you taken care of,” Janae says and leaves the room.
“Antonia, stay there, we’ll fix this.”
“How, Heath? They don’t swap from one spare to another.”
“Well, they can just damn well do it this time. You saved over half the company and more than three quarters of the division.”
“Are the rest like me?”
“Oh, Antonia...the rest are dead.”
Pain that is entirely in my head stabs through my heart. People I had known, people I had served with and played with are now dead.
“Donnelly?”
“Alive,” he says and I let out a sigh that I immediately regret. Of the two hundred and fifty who died all I cared about were two people. I hate myself even more for that. “I should have died with them.
“No way am I letting you die now,” he says and there’s this growl of need that comes from him.
“Captain, we can’t,” I say quietly.
“As of fifteen hundred hours you were officially attached to the next BOLC-A group. As soon as we get you resolved here you’re shipping out. You’re not in my command, Cadet.”
It’s not exactly an officer rank, but unless I wash out, that’s exactly what I’m going to become. My mind moves more slowly than his and he pins me to the bed with a kiss that is so fierce that It stops the pain and I’m lost in the feel of his lips pressed against mine. when it ends I simply lie there, looking up at him in wonder.
“But, I’m hideous,” I say as soon as I can find my voice. He laughs. It’s a pleasant laugh full of joy.
“Antonia, you may be many things, but hideous has never been one of them.”
“I’m a man,” I say quietly. I could feel myself stirring as we kissed. It had been a distant feeling, something that hadn’t bothered me as the kiss went on, but now was all I could think about.
“That’s also something you’ve never been,” he says with the kindest smile Ive ever seen. I’m blushing and I can’t think of a single thing to say. We’re still like that when Janae returns. She has a full technical team with her.
“What did you do?” she asks the captain when she notices I’m no longer writhing in pain.
“Distracted her,” he says with a chuckle. At this reminder of what went before I can feel the pain, held at bay by my shock at his behaviour, return. “Ow,” I say in a quiet whimper that I just can’t hold in.
“Seems it didn’t last long. Step back, Captain.”
The wheel in a full diagnostic suite and hook me up to it. It seems that they want to be sure that I’m not just acting before they proceed. We may get our spares for free in the military but they still cost about ten thousand dollars each.
Even untrained as I am, the storm that appears on the monitors is troubling, and it grows worse as I watch. “Damn,” one of the techs says, “this is the worst case of spare rejection that I’ve ever seen.”
“Yeah, they’ll not even be able to use it as a test case,” another says, “since no one would believe that we didn’t just put noise on the set.”
“Verify that it isn’t noise then,” Janae says.
In the midst of my pain one thought surfaces. My mind is attacking my body. They quickly make adjustments, and the ‘noise’ goes down a little, but not by enough and they begin wheeling my bed away and out into the corridor. Janae slams her hand into an alarm button as she leaves my room. Everywhere I can see people scattering out of the way. This shouldn’t me for me is all I can think. I don’t deserve this, but by this point the pain is too severe and I can’t even moan.
“Hold on, Sergeant,” I hear Janae say as she puts something cool against my forehead and then everything goes black.
I just feel...right My body is how it should be. There is no pain and I open my eyes. Heath is sitting next to me in a chair and if his snores are any indication then he’s asleep. I trie to sit up, and realize my hair is pinned between me and the bed. I roll a bit and extract it from beneath me. I slip into Heath’s lap and put my arms around me.
“Will you still kiss me if I’m beautiful?” I ask, my face just inches from his. His sleepy eyes blink and widen and then he just grins at me. Instead of answering he acts. It isn’t as intense as our first kiss, but it is a kiss and that is all I can ask for in this very moment.
I leaned forward to look up through the windshield at the clouds overhead. They were a definite slate gray which did not bode well for any overtures that I hoped to make with the ruling body.
I laughed at myself. Omens and portents were not my talent, and trying to read them would simply get me into a deeper mess than I was already in. It didn't matter what I was escaping from at the moment, it only mattered that I had entered this district without prior passport.
Tearing my eyes from the clouds required a force of will, but I did it anyway. I needed to find the sentry before he found me. Not that he would do anything to me directly, but letting him know I was here on my own, and not at the behest of my former masters would, hopefully, go a long way toward smoothing my transition into this society.
I also needed to pay attention to the other drivers on the road, most of whom would have no knowledge of me or the world that I lived in. This same oblivious attitude to the danger I represented was likely their only saving grace. There are times, especially when I've had to deal with the whims of those I left behind, that I wish that the darkness that inhabits this world did not exist.
Many will think at this point that I am insane. I only wish I were so. Insanity would be such a nice explanation for everything I experienced on a daily basis. Not that it is a bad place to live, my world, but that it is simply more complicated.
I call it my world, but I do not own it.
That is just a conceit I use to differentiate it from the world that you live in. The normal world. While I won't go so far as to say that my world is better than yours, since it is only our perceptions of the same world that differentiate it, I will say that I prefer my world, blemishes and all.
I was stopped at a light, looking around, trying to see the sentry, when he found me.
"Hello, m'lud."
He seemed to be one of a number of men, all holding spray bottles and squeegees. I only assumed that they were one of the number of different types of panhandlers that were rife in the city.
Posing as a homeless person, or a panhandler, was a common practice for sentries in any city, let alone this one. They tend to be over-looked which allows them to scrutinize you without being seen themselves.
A pitfall I'd just fallen into myself.
"What organ rules you?"
"We are ruled by an elected council, m'lud."
"I am no high lord. I am nothing but a simple Enhanced." for those of you reading this, and not having it read to you, that is pronounced En-han-sed. Emphasis on the second syllable. Same word, different pronunciation. Don't ask me why, it's just one of the things I accept about the world.
I slight widening of his eyes showed his fear, but he quickly got a handle on it.
"You will have to be bound."
"Expected."
"You will have to make a statement of your crimes against this district in front of a Veritas."
"Still using the old name for a Truth?"
"We like the old ways here, assassin."
I expected his change of attitude as well. Many of my kind were assassins.
"Look, can you climb in and we can drive somewhere so you can bind me? I would like to get this over with today if possible."
He looked at me suspiciously, and then at my possessions in the back of the SUV. He thought for a moment, while people began to drive around us, and then nodded once.
He walked around to the passenger side door, which I unlocked for him, and climbed in.
"Take a left at the next light."
We went on like this for a couple of minutes, and then he had me pull up in front of a hotel. Not what I expected.
I've been shown to residential homes, libraries, warehouses, empty lots, and forested parks. More places than I can count, more styles than I care to remember. Never before had I been taken to a hotel.
Well, there's always a first time for everything.
There was evidently a convention going on in the hotel, and I wondered whether it was cover, or simply serendipity.
I think I expected to be led to a conference room or some sort of ballroom. Instead, the Sentry lead me around the side of the building to the service entrance.
The sentry took me by the hand. "Repeat after me, I bind myself body and soul to the district and the body that rules over it."
"Why don't you include heart while you're at it?"
"You want to meet the Council?"
"I bind myself, under duress, body and soul to the district and the body that rules over it."
A bit of my will passed from me. The sentry was unhappy at my change, but there was no way I was binding myself that completely without a loophole. There was something wrong about this whole situation. Even the old ways did not allow for the treatment of guests this way. Temporary bindings of fealty only. Not something open ended and all consuming like had just been offered me.
"I don't think. . ."
"I am under no obligation to swear away two thirds of my being to this Council. Many would consider the very act of asking a guest to be lacking in proper forms of respect. That you have asked me to suggests that you aren't as open as I'd hoped you would be. Do you have something to hide, Sentry?"
He glowered at me, which suggested to me that I was on the right track, but I didn't pursue.
When I failed to continue, he spoke again, "You aren't a high lord, by your own admission. We don't need to treat you anything other than the lapdog you so obviously are, Enhanced."
He sneered and opened the door for me, and we walked in. We passed through the kitchens and into a sort of staff gathering area. Three men and three women sat in chairs watching us. I assumed that they would be one each of the six disciplines.
Apprentices ruling over talents. Was that what I'd sunk to? Not a single High Lord among them? I almost turned at that moment and left, but one of the men commanded, "Sit."
I felt my binding take hold, and I chose not to break it yet. I sat before the Council.
"Who have you brought before us, Welter."
"An Enhanced. No name asked or given. Says he wants to speak with you. Offered no other explanation."
"The Sentry oversteps. He never asked why I had come. He volunteered that I would need to be bound to sit before you. He volunteered that I would sit before a Truth."
A girl stepped out of the shadows. "He speaks the truth, as far as he knows it. The Sentry however lies."
"I was not lying."
"He knows that the Enhanced never ask to speak to the Council. He assumed by a question about who ruled, clearly answered, that the Enhanced wanted to speak to the Council."
Sentry Welter went beet red at this, and glared at me. I wondered what exactly I'd done to earn his ire. For the moment, however, I chose to ignore the little man.
The Truth on the other hand was worthy of my attention. Few were the Truths that could correctly discern a half truth from an full. Nuance was apparently difficult. This one, however, knew what had been said. I would not be able to slip a nuanced truth past her. . .unless.
"You are very pretty." She looked at me and tilted her head slightly. She blushed a little.
So, she was very sheltered. That could work. I smiled at her, but happy in my knowledge, and a bit of a continued flirting. They would have been better to send a male Truth against me, even if he would have, invariably, been weaker in his ability to discern.
Then, I stopped smiling. I was no longer working in my previous job. Old habits were so hard to break.
"I apologize, Truth, for I was preparing to lie to you. Telling things straight is something of a difficulty for me."
"You can't lie to me."
"My dear, no Truth is absolute. Especially in the middle of the night, as it so obviously is now."
"But, how?"
"It is the middle of the night in Moscow, Russia."
"That is a cheat."
"But no less true for that. You could tell that I felt what I was saying was true as far as I know it. For free, I give the esteemed council a word of advice: instead of wasting your one opportunity so you could bind my will, you should have bound my word. I swear on my soul that I will neither harm nor lie to the Council. That is what you wanted, but instead you thought to be sneaky."
"Do not move."
"The problem with that command, is that it requires a loophole. I have to breathe to live. You can't command me to die."
Fear began to grow in the eyes of those who sat across from me. I turned to the Truth.
"Come here, child. I will not allow any harm to come to you."
Wonder showed on her face for a moment before she spoke, "Truth, although I am no child. You simply perceive me to be so."
"You are younger than I am, and I feel myself to be no adult. You are therefore a child."
She laughed at this and came over to stand next to me. She was actually smiling at me.
"Well, if you don't want me to call you 'child,' then what should I call you?"
"Alice."
"Lies do not come easily to you, do they?"
She winced, but shook her head, "no, they don't."
"I will call you Alice, then, even if the name is not truly yours."
"It is not my intention to lie to this Council," at Alice's nod, I continued, "I will, however choose to keep certain things to myself."
The Councilor who'd spoken already glowered at me. The other Councilor's faces seemed to become a caricature of the lead person.
I kept this to myself. There would be time to pull back the curtain later.
"I have never been an assassin, thought I have killed men."
"He was an executioner."
"I was sent to people like this Council who had overstepped their authority."
"The high lords have no authority but that which we give them."
"The high lords have the authority of power."
"Might makes right?"
"No, might commands and the weak obey. This is neither right nor wrong. Correct behavior is instead decided by those of the society where the behavior is committed."
Alice looked at me a little shocked.
Welter spoke before I could continue, "so there is no good or evil, is there? No absolutes?"
I glared at the small man, "of course there are absolutes. We were talking about right and wrong, which are determinations of correctness. Those are defined by society. Good and evil are something else entirely. . .and we're getting off topic here."
I looked at Alice, "I have no master. I am not here at the behest of anyone else."
She nodded toward the man sitting behind me, "it is the truth as far as he knows."
I turned back around and faced the man sitting there, "all I ask is permission to live. Here if possible, elsewhere if I have to."
"I will have to discuss this with my colleagues. In the mean time we can find a place for you upstairs."
The point of the hotel became apparent to me. This was their garrison. I'm sure they had their soldiers situated in the rooms around me. They would be keeping me honest. The binding would last for the next month, and it would be doing the same. It seemed that they had enough man-power to be redundant. Or they simply did not trust their binding, even worded as it was.
"Fine, I will stay here as long as Alice shows me to my room."
I knew she was worried about why I wanted her to show me the way, but I was tired of the lies. At least I knew that she would tell me the truth. How was it that a group with one of the most powerful Truths I'd ever met insisted on so much deception.
"That will be acceptable. Alice? Would you kindly lead the Enhanced to his room?"
She nodded to me, and I followed her from the room. The trip through the intensely lit back ways of the hotel was quiet except for the buzzing of the fluorescent lights, and the sound of our muffled shoes on the carpeting.
It was strange to potentially be at the end of my journey. So many hours on the roads hoping that they would not notice I was gone. So many stops where the ruling body had simply told me to move along. At least they had heard me.
Whether or not they listened was another thing entirely.
What had brought me to this point in time?
A better question was whether the districts that had simply kicked me out were right.
I felt something begin to push on my mind. Alice was staring intently at me. Everything began to recede a bit, and I knew that's she'd jump started a memory. I've always hated it when a Truth does this.
I cracked an eye open. The sun hadn't yet peaked over the horizon, but the gray of predawn filtered past my thin curtains. It wasn't as if the pallet I had to sleep on was comfortable, but I preferred to get what sleep I could.
"I've done my testing already, Neema. I know which talents I don't have."
"They've chosen you, Sebastian."
"Yes, I know that too. Can I get a couple of hours more sleep before I wake for the day."
"You have been commanded into their presence. Now."
Grumbling I got up from my pallet, and pulled on my shirt. Well, it was more a vest than a shirt. It was all that was left of the t-shirt that I'd worn in here that first day. I wasn't sure how long it would even last in its present condition. Even the smallest holes were big enough to pass two or three fingers through without touching the sides.
"Hurry, Sebastian. You're needed now."
Some of the urgency in his voice infected my feet, and I followed him quickly out of the room. My bare feet slapped on the concrete of the walkway that lead from the dormitories to the main building.
I didn't have the time to spare a thought to the formal Japanese garden that surrounded us, even though on similar mornings it had been enough to calm me. Being called out this early in the morning could mean one of two things.
I doubted I was about to be executed if I were the only person heading toward the chamber.
Neema floated in front of me as I was about to open the door.
"Remember: speak only when spoken to, do not utter a sound unless permitted, and try not to be scared."
The spirit floated away, allowing me to open the door and pass inside. It always amazed me that the doors, big as they were, could be opened with the gentlest of touches.
I closed the door behind me and then walked exactly five yards into the room and went into a full prostration. I did not look around.
I waited there, patiently. I was here at their whim, and I would not in any way make a move that would bring their wrath upon me.
"Sebastian." Said the voice of the First Great High Lord. Taking this to be a statement, and not a question, I made no sound.
"Sebastian." Said the voice of the Second Great High Lord. Again I made no movement or noise.
"Sebastian." Said the voice of the Intermediary High Lord.
"We have brought you here, Sebastian, to receive your talent. Are you ready to receive it?"
"Yes," I said silently.
"Then you shall receive."
The pain was intense. It felt as though my body were tearing itself to pieces. I clamped down my jaw and struggled not to utter a sound. The high lords were adamant in the following of their edicts by anyone of a lesser order.
The pain began to lessen somewhat, and I began to relax, but then it intensified to an even greater level than before. Fire was pouring through my veins, lighting me up from the inside. The pain paled in comparison to my fear, so still I did not make a sound.
There was no lessening before the final stage of pain began. Oh, how I wanted to scream at that point, but I no longer had the capacity for it. There was no description of this pain. It went on for an eternity. I had always been in pain. I was pain. There was no end to the pain and it consumed me completely. The promised darkness only came as the pain itself retreated.
I awoke in a bed. The sun outside shone through a brilliant blue sky. I'd been dressed in a silk garment, and I rested under the first sheets I'd had since my arrival.
I relaxed and fell back into the comforting arms of sleep.
"Do not do that to me again."
"I'm sorry, Sebastian, I didn't mean. . ."
"Sebastian died long ago. I am Treyvor now. I have been, and will be."
"I'm sorry, Sebastian. I will try to remember in the future."
I wanted so much to apologize, but for the moment the remembered pain stopped me. I had been in that moment again, and felt everything like I'd been there. As I lay there I felt the woven rope pallet that had been my only cushion from the moment I entered their realm until the day they gave me my talent.
I felt the rough wooden floor of the audience chamber. I felt the cold of the concrete on my bare feet.
So real.
Alice had moved on, and was waiting for me by a white fire door.
"I'm sorry, Alice. I shouldn't have snapped at you."
"I'm sorry too. I shouldn't have. . .done that without your permission."
She opened the door for me and we stepped out into the hotel lobby. We walked over to the elevators and rode up to the third floor. I was in a room just a couple of doors down from the elevator. Again, Alice waited for me by the door, and opened it as I approached. I stepped inside and she left without saying another word.
The bed was hard, as most hotel mattresses are, but I was tired enough that I didn't care. Sure, I could go without food, water, or sleep for up to a week, but I paid for it afterwards.
I ate the food that had been provided and then fell asleep on top of the covers, hoping for a little extra padding between me and the mattress.
I chuckled at the thought. I'd grown so soft compared to the boy who'd gone seeking a magical gift.
I didn't need an alarm clock. My room faced east and the first rays of that warm yellow light seeped over the sill past my bare windows. There was the promise of sunny days and long lazy nights. It wasn't quite the summer holiday, but I could taste it in that sunlight.
There was a feeling that resided in my gut; anticipation of what was to come wrapped up in memories of summer days that I'd experienced in my past. It was a feeling of hope, with just a little bit of trepidation. I would have to survive the last few days of school before I would be able to truly revel in the experience.
That day was so much like so many others, and yet, there was something off. Something different. I couldn't put my finger on it then, but I knew that today would be different. I hoped so at least.
I made sure to put on a black long sleeved shirt underneath my yellow school t-shirt. I always thought it made me look a little like a bumble bee, but I had no other choice. I was limited in my wardrobe choices.
Blue jeans that were torn at the left knee, an accident that I wrote off as fashion sense, finished off my ensemble. The fact that these were my only clothes did not even enter into my mind.
The twin angels of anonymity and obliviousness were my only protection from ridicule and bullying. They worked for almost everyone at my school.
I walked alone along the same route at some point between seven oh five and seven ten. Most days I simply hoped that I would be there about the same time that classmates were on their way to school. Certain female classmates that were my entire world at the time, but whose names I have since forgotten.
I will never forget, though, that one had Irish red hair, and the other was a brunette. I didn't see them on my way to the school that morning. They were sitting on the steps chatting when I arrived at school.
I waved as I passed by, and they began to giggle a little. I like to believe it's because they thought I was cute. They were looking at me while they were giggling. There could have been any number of other reasons, but I checked my hair and teeth when I got into school, and my clothing was washed, dried, and pressed nightly.
Well, it could be the fact that my mother insisted on pressing my jeans. No one else I knew ever had ironed jeans.
The smell of mildew pervaded the entryway of the school. It had been there for the two and a half years since I'd started going to high school, and I assume it is still there today.
The building affectionately called Herbert Hoover High School was not a young building. One of the pictures in the football trophy case has a picture of my father, I think. I never personally knew him. I only know that he played football in high school. He also left a pregnant girl behind when he went off to Yale with his entitled girlfriend.
I have mixed feelings about the trophy case.
Like every morning I glanced over at the trophy case as I passed. "Morning, Dad."
As usual, the picture didn't respond. I told myself it was because my father never knew me, and was simply wondering who this strange kid was.
School was a chore to get through, and lunch was one of my only respites this semester. I was on my way to lunch when it happened.
The windows to my left shattered inward as a figure dressed in tight fitting clothing leapt through it. He rolled to a stop and then turned to face the way he'd just come. A second individual wearing the same type of clothing followed closely on his heels.
I ducked behind a door and listened to the screams of the other students.
The first man smiled at the person who'd followed him. There was no warmth in that smile. "So, you're not as old as you seem, eh Rolly."
"Just come back peacfully with me, Neema."
Rolly warily approached, trying to circle around behind Neema, but to what end I couldn't tell. Neema lunged suddenly toward the nearest door and casually ripped it off its hinges.
Before I could even react to this, Rolly put his arms in front of his face to protect it. The door shattered around him and he staggered back a bit.
Rolly began to smile himself and then they really got into it. Their speed was such that I could barely follow their movements, let alone the punches and kicks they were throwing. At one point, the first somehow caught the leg of the second and slammed him into the ground with enough force to crack it.
There was also the sound of shattering bone, but I didn't yet recognize it.
Rolly curled in on himself, and Neema made to leap away again.
His foot sank into the concrete floor, and became trapped there. A man walked up to the wall where the window had been and simply walked through it. The wall dissolved in front of him and then reformed behind him. He made a single glance at the empty window and the glass on the floor began to flow back into place.
He shook his head in disgust at the man lying there on the floor and nudged him with his foot. Rolly began to scream for a couple of seconds, and then relaxed. Rolly stood quickly, and moved beside the new comer.
"Neema, you shouldn't try to escape from the High Lords." said the newest attacker.
"I deserve to make my own choices, High Lord Terrell."
"You have no rights, Neema, except those that we give you."
"There is a document in this country, you may have heard of it, it's called the Declaration of Independence."
"A doggerel wasted on parchment by men for the edification of other men. If you haven't noticed, we are above such mundane matters."
"We are still men, Terrell."
"Watch your tongue, Neema," Rolly said, stepping forward with his fist raised.
"I always knew you for a dog, Rolly, but I never figured you for a scoundrel. Would you really hit a man who can't defend himself?"
"You never knew what it meant to be Enhanced, Neema. You never had to kill to keep the districts safe."
"You mean keep the high lords in power, Rolly"
"Neema," Terrell began, "someone must be in power. If it were not us, then it would be someone else. We've raised you from nothing. Doesn't that mean anything to you?"
"I was a person before you twisted me into an Enhanced. I don't need you to survive."
"How unfortunate."
Neema began to scream as his body began to crumble away into a sort of grey dust. I noticed a ball of energy leave his body before it was too far gone, and the corpse collapsed to the ground. It continued to crumble until all that was left was a pile of the dust and a hole in the floor.
Terrell gestured toward the hole and it sealed itself.
"Rolly, would you please call in a team of Lethe and resolve this. I'd really hate to have another sanction by the Guardians in as many months."
"Yes, High Lord Terrell."
Terrell walked back out the same way he came in: through the wall.
A group of hooded men and women wandered through the school, and where they passed the screaming fell silent. I felt one of them. . .looking into me. I don't know how else to describe it. I felt the command to forget, but I shrugged it off.
I wanted to remember this.
I followed them through the building. They gathered at the entrance to the school, and then walked out. Behind them, the school resumed its normal frenetic pace.
Kids rushed to lunch, hoping to get something to eat before the period was completely gone. I looked around in disbelief. Had they all just. . .forgotten?
I remembered the impression I'd had to forget all I had seen, and realized I was the only one who hadn't followed that command. Whether they'd simply wanted to forget, or were unable to stop it, I was alone in a crowd. That was normal for me.
The rest of the day went in a blur. I know I went to class, because no one called my mom about it, but I don't remember a single thing that was taught that afternoon. All I could think about was the vista that had opened up before my eyes. I could see so many new possibilities. Magic existed in this world.
I had to know more.
The library remained open for an hour or so after the last bell rang. The periodicals and reference materials were all out of date, but they did have some computers with internet access, and since I didn't have a computer at home, it was my only option.
The smell of books pervaded the quiet space. Not many other students chose to make use of the library, even during school hours. It was one of my sanctuaries and the librarian always had a ready smile for me.
I remember her as being old, but I doubt she was much older than twenty-five.
Strange the things that your mind remembers. Stranger the things it forgets.
I know I spent the next four hours in the library. I hid in the staff washroom when the librarian told me it was time to lock up soon. She assumed that I left. The washroom was clean and had a slight floral scent to it.
I turned the computer back on and used one of my teacher's passwords to log in. He thought he was being sneaky putting the password to his school account on the bottom of his tape dispenser.
I'm not the only student who used his account without his knowledge.
I don't remember anything that I researched that day. None of it was true, and so I made room for the knowledge I received later. It did excite me, however. It gave me a sense of purpose. I wanted to join with this group.
When I was done, I shut off the computer and slipped out into the hallway. The lights were off, except for the emergency lighting, which meant that even the janitors had gone home for the day.
The hallway where this had all started was on my way out of the school and I stopped here for a moment. There was no mark on the floor where the man's, Neema's, foot had been. The window was whole.
I looked out through the window. This close to summer vacation the sun would be up for hours yet, but I could still make out the ball of energy that I'd seen leave the body of Neema just before he died. It was hovering there as if waiting for something. I ran a little way down the hall and pushed open the fire door. An alarm sounded, but I didn't really care.
The ball was still floating there until I began to approach it, and then it floated a little further.
"You might be able to succeed where I failed," I heard a voice say.
"Who's there!"
"I understand this burden is heavy, but you have the strength to bear it. I can see that in you."
I stopped dead in my tracks. Could it possibly. . ? The voice sounded like. . .
"I am Neema, or more specifically that which was Neema and has not yet crossed over."
"You're a ghost," I said a bit skeptically, "like that's plausible."
"Boy, you saw someone walk through walls, watched as your entire school forgot a few minutes of their lives, and witnessed a duel between two. . .ninja."
"You don't look anything like a ninja," realizing what I'd said I modified it a bit, "well I mean didn't."
"Just because neither of us were in black, and our faces weren't covered, doesn't mean we aren't ninja. Didn't you ever watch Japanese anime? They actually get some things right. . .once in a while."
"Why me?"
"Because you're one of the strongest Minds I've ever met. You didn't have to even think about ignoring the suggestion that you forget the fight."
The word had a capital letter the way he said it. I didn't know what a Mind was, but even the possibility that he was right, that I was something special, sent a thrill through me.
"Does that mean I could become a High Lord someday? The way he walked through that wall. . ."
"Don't covet the gifts of the Body when yours are the gifts of the Mind. Come, we have a long way to go tonight. You'll have to proceed on foot, so it will take you about three days to get where we're going."
"Where are we going?"
"To present you before the High Lords, of course."
With that, the ball of energy, Neema, began to move away.
"Wait up!"
Neema paused for a moment or two while I got closer, and then began to move away again. We walked until it got dark, and then walked some more. The city ignored us as we continued through it to the edge.
The entirety of my life I had spent in the confines of this city. It wasn't even that big, really, but it had been my home. I spared a thought for my parents, but the draw of adventure pulled me forward. I didn't want to go home yet.
I had nothing else to do so I began to talk to him, "So, what's it like being a ghost."
"You named me a ghost. I never said I was."
"But, you said. . ."
"That I was what was left of Neema that hadn't passed over. I'm something like an echo. If there is life after this one, then Neema has passed into that life."
"What do I call you, then?"
"Neema."
"Ok, so now you're just being confusing."
"I'm not trying to be. I think we are missing a point of reference."
"How much of you is what Neema was?"
"All of me, but a better question would be how much of what Neema was am I."
"You're confusing," I said with a little laugh.
"I don't try to be. I am a free floating residual image of the thoughts of Neema."
"Wait, what?"
"A ghost would be a person's soul. I had no power over the soul, and so I can't be a ghost. I did have power over the mind. I released a copy of myself just before I died. Apparently it killed me."
"I thought that disintegrating killed you."
"The High Lord Terrell didn't want to let me go so easily. It would likely have taken me minutes to die. He didn't really have the time to make it take hours, but if he did. . ."
"Why did he kill you?"
"Because I escaped. Enhanced are not allowed to leave."
"If you knew it would happen, why did you leave."
"Some things are more important than life, child."
"I'm not a child."
"Oh really," Neema said with some amusement, "how old are you?"
"Fifteen," I replied.
"Still so young. Pick up the pace, child."
"Can you just call me Sebastian."
"Is it your name?"
"No, but I always wanted to be called Sebastian."
Neema snorted, "It's your life, for the moment, Sebastian. I can call you that."
"How can you snort if you have no lungs?"
"I'm speaking directly to your mind, Sebastian. I can do anything I can imagine myself doing."
I took some time to think about that one. We followed a highway through the countryside. During the day it probably would have been pretty, but there wasn't enough light now to tell. Like most cities, the light pollution washed out all but the brightest stars, and it was difficult to pick out the constellations that I was only vaguely familiar with.
"This way, Sebastian. It's time to sleep."
I followed Neema through the darkness and over a slight rise. We were hidden from the road, although I could still hear the occasional car passing by. I thought that sleep would be a long time in coming, but it found me soon enough.
The sunlight filtering through the sparse leaves woke me, and I stretched. The ground had not been the most comfortable of beds, but at least I'd slept.
"Time to go, Sebastian."
"Ok, when's breakfast."
"The sooner we get to our destination, the sooner you can eat."
"Three days without food?"
"We made relatively good time yesterday. If we keep that pace, we might even get there today."
"How far is it?"
"Only another fifty miles."
"Fifty? Miles?"
"Sure. Not all that far really."
"How far have we come already?"
"About twenty miles. I really thought you'd have trouble walking for more than ten miles before you were ready to collapse. Then twenty miles a day for the next few days. You've impressed me already, Sebastian."
Fifty miles.
My legs were sore, and my feet were beginning to blister from last night's hike. And now I had another two and a half times the distance to travel.
"I can't do this."
"Sure you can. Your mind has more power than you give it credit for."
I sighed in resignation and moved down to the shoulder of the road.
"That's the spirit."
"Not a word out of you, Neema. I can't handle it right now."
"What?"
"I am tired, I am sore, I would prefer to be in a car or at home. The only reason I'm still heading forward is because it would almost be worse to head back."
"You do realize that's illogical, right?"
"Shut up. Don't examine my motivations."
I got the distinct impression that Neema was smiling at me.
I think my legs fell off about the time I hit thirty miles from home. I only say that because I stopped being able to feel them. All that existed for me was keeping my feet moving, one after the other. Last night had been easier for me, for some reason. I was fresher, or more motivated, or something.
Possibly it was simply the fact that I didn't have any idea how far I needed to travel. Fifty miles seemed so big to me. Neema tried to engage me in speech, but I wasn't in the mood. I think I must have entered a sort of fugue state after that. My mind sort of wandered as I simply kept following Neema. A couple of times he directed us toward a gas station where I got a couple of long drinks of water from the tap and then we were moving again.
I hurt all over by the time that he called a halt. I was discouraged and ready to turn around and head back the way I'd come.
"I think we should call a break, Sebastian."
"I want to finish this, Neema."
"You've been slowing down for the last hour, and are barely crawling now. We can finish the last fifteen miles tomorrow."
I looked at him in shock. After the talk he'd given me that morning, I thought we would be so much closer. I'd only been about to do about thirty five miles and I'd been walking since sun up. The sun had an hour or so to go before it passed beyond the horizon, and I hoped to maybe get another ten miles before I stopped.
"Sebastian, you need to rest."
I looked at him and then followed him off the road. I sat down intending to just rest for a moment. I closed my eyes. Yes, it would be good to sit here for a couple of minutes.
When I opened my eyes again the sun was just coming up over the far horizon.
My legs still ached, but I had a little more energy. Which was a bit amazing considering my stomach was grumbling.
My revitalized feeling left me fairly quickly as I again began to walk toward my unknown destination. I entered another city around noon, or I should say I realized I was in another city. Many cities extend for miles beyond their official borders. Urban to Suburban and finally rural in a gradual blend.
I hoped that this meant that I would be reaching my destination soon. The pain in my feet and legs made concentration on more than simply moving forward a chore, but I paid enough attention to my surroundings to realize that people seemed to be watching me a little.
I supposed that a bedraggled boy stumbling along and talking to himself was something to watch.
Neema kept up a running commentary that I responded to whenever it seemed appropriate. We continued on like this for another hour or so when a beige minivan pulled over in front of us.
An older woman in a conservative dress and sweater climbed out of the driver's seat, "Can I help you get somewhere?"
"No thank you. I think I'm almost to where I'm going."
"Aren't you sure?"
"Never been there before. Neema is guiding me."
"Who's Neema?"
I realized my mistake as soon as she asked me the question. "Friend. I call him periodically on my cell phone."
"I can give you a ride there."
"It's probably not a good idea, Sebastian. Arriving on foot is usually the best method."
"No thanks, Ma'am. I'm good for now. Thanks, though."
I walked past her and continued toward my destination. She followed me for a couple of blocks and then went on her way. I hoped it wasn't to get the cops. Or a social worker.
I just needed to get to my destination.
I began to notice some strange behavior from the people going about their lives. Everyone seemed to get about halfway down the street I was walking along before making a U-turn and heading back the way they'd come.
It seemed to be the most normal activity for them. They all just turned around. Continuing forward I came to a stone wall parted in the center of the street by a pair of metal studded wooden doors. I guess they would actually be called gates due to their size.
"Welcome to the lair of the beast, Sebastian. From here on out things become interesting. Unfortunately, I'll need to leave you on your own for a while so your answers are more. . .authentic."
I took a deep breath and knocked on the gate. A small window opened in a door and someone looked out.
"It would seem we have some fresh meat for the grist." His laughter was anything but pleasant.
The small door opened and a large man gestured to me, "Well, come in, Meat. It's what you're here for after all."
I stepped through the doorway wondering what the future might hold.
Ok, I know, here is the beginning of my story where I'm supposed to either introduce myself to all of you, or tell about my last day of high school, or whatever BS.
Look, I'm happy I'm female now. Ecstatic. Yeah, sarcasm, but it would be a whole lot easier to take if only I'd gotten. . .
You know what? Maybe I should start at the beginning. No, this isn't a bitch session. I just want you all to realize the magnitude. . .ok, so I'm just complaining.
Sigh.
I really would prefer to begin at the beginning, however.
I never went to high school. I had no friends. No neighbors. Nothing but my pa and I didn't see him most of the time anyway.
It wasn't a bad life. Up when I wanted to. Slept when I wanted to. Fished, and hunted, and generally got up to nothing much, you guessed it, when I wanted to.
My Pa had this idea back before the year 2000 that the entire world was about to end, so he packed me up, and our dog brisket, and we moved out into the Canadian Rockies. Sure, I bemoaned losing my PS2 and my x-box for a little while, but I soon learned the benefits of living off the land.
Mom died in childbirth, but anyone who's already read one of these 'Center' stories already knows that. I never knew her, so I never missed her.
Ok, so that was a little disjointed, but it's these damn female hormones that keep flooding my system. I find it hard to be all logical like and follow my own train of thought. That and I suddenly missed my mom for some reason.
So, anyway. I was living in the mountains in Canada and happy as all get out, when I begin to notice I'm not the only one in the woods.
No, most people, or at least those a little closer to civilization wouldn't pay no nevermind to a couple of cute girls tramping across their property. Me, on the other hand, I simply stood there like the slack jawed idiot my Pa always accuses me of bein' and stared. I hadn't seen another human being in a long time, let alone a girl since I really hit puberty.
They tell me what I felt was my first, and only, raging hard on. That is one feeling I think I will never miss for the having.
So, up they walks to me, and all I'm thinkin' is that I'd really like to get to know them better. Lookin' at them is better than hunting and fishing combined. . .
Ugh. Sorry. They have been teaching me how to speak like a civilized being at the Center, but thinking about the life I led, and who I was, I reverted there for a minute.
So, these two girls walk up to me and introduce themselves:
"Hi, I'm Kris. Are you Anderson Anders?"
Yeah, my Pa was really original when naming me.
"That's me. Who're you? I meant t'other one?" I turned to look at the other girl.
"I'm Dani. We're here because. . ."
You know what, you don't need the same tired explanation of blah blah genetics lab blah blah terrorists blah blah bottle water. I kept trying to peek down Kris' shirt without her catching me, and I didn't really pay attention to what Dani was saying until. . .
"Will you quit trying to look down my shirt!"
I went beet red. I thought I was being sneaky. Dani blushed too, something to do with being an empath.
I mumbled something like, "Sorry, I didn't mean for you to see me doing that," which actually came out as , "Serblerglesnort."
Well, that's what Kris told me later, you know, after the transition. Yeah, I didn't find it all that interesting either.
So, they tell me that I'm supposed to be changing into some superhero, and then within another twenty-four hours into a girl, and I fainted.
Dead away.
When I came to I was in the back of an SUV and we were already out of the woods I was familiar with. I figured Pa wouldn't miss me much, and we buried Brisket three years ago so he certainly wouldn't miss me. Being with a couple of girls, even if they thought they used to be guys, wasn't all that bad.
So, there we were, off-roading in a Black SUV and we blow the left rear tire. I specify the left rear tire for a reason. Being the manly almost could be considered a gentlemant in the right bad lighting I was, I got out and changed the tire. We had one.
Yeah, you guessed it. We drove along for another ten miles or so and loose the right rear tire.
Now, since getting back to the Center, I've learned that little miss Dani is some sort of precog. She failed completely to see any of this.
There we were, miles from hom and nowhere near civilization, and all that was left was for us to walk.
And walk we did. The girls lost their un-sensible footwear, and I let Dani borrow my boots. They almost fit her and I was still pissed at Kris for embarrassing me. I didn't need them as I walked around barefoot half the time anyway.
So, we walked for the rest of the day, and made camp for the night on the side of the almost road we were following.
No wackiness ensued. Sometimes I wish my life were a bad TV movie pitch.
We got up the next morning at dawn, and I relished the opportunity I'd just gotten to sleep in. Usually getting up when I wanted meant three or four AM to get to the best hunting spots before the deer came over the ridge.
We got up and walked the rest of the day again. Well most of the rest of the day. Kris cut up her feet pretty bad, and I had to apply a field dressing using the only suitable cloth we had available. My socks.
I offered to tear up her shirt and use that, but I think she thought I just wanted a better look at her breasts.
She'd been right about that.
So, her feet wrapped up, we continued to walk. About dusk, we realized that we must be near some civilization due to all the light pollution that was even then trying to dispel the darkness.
I sighed in relief because I was tired of the slow pace these gals had been keeping. Sure they were good to look at, but we'd only walked about forty miles in two days. It was downright disgraceful.
So, after getting into the town, and finally getting somewhere with cell service, Kris makes a call to someone or other named the Colonel and let's him know what's up.
They sent a car round to get us, which we gladly accepted. I may have been a fit and strapping young lad, but Pa didn't raise no idiot.
From there we were off to a private airfield and a Jet. Might tiny thing she was too, but since there were no other passengers going to board her, we had her to ourselves.
No wackiness ensued. Damn it.
So, we landed, and we got in another of those SUVs. Black of course. I was wary to be riding along in this one, but the tires held out long enough for us to get to the institution that they called the Center.
They lead me out to the bunker they called Containment, saying they had no idea what my power would be, and that if it were dangerous that I needed to be in here.
I started to get a little bit excited here. Maybe I would be able to throw lightning bolts like Kris, or fire, or maybe I would be nuclear, or you know something cool like being able to walk on walls.
I get in there, and get all locked in, and the countdown begins. I have a couple hours left from what they tell me.
I get this massive headache, and just lie down with my eyes closed waiting for the end. Or the beginning.
I begin to feel the weirdest feeling in my gut and chest, and I just start thinking, here it comes. The feeling grows, but I hold onto consciousness hoping that I might get a glimpse of my power. It was ironic, really, but you get to see that in a moment.
I blacked out with this feeling of hope.
I woke up, and nothing. No smell of smoke. No feel of electricity. No telepathy. No empathy. Nothing.
I opened my eyes. . .and realized that I used to be color blind. Yeah used to be. I can now see all the colors of the rainbow. Well, and distinguish more than most other people.
Yeah, that's my "super" power.
My response was pretty much what yours would be.
"Oh, no. This is BULL. . ."
"Oh, no. This is BULLCRAP!!!"
Bet you thought I was about to use the S in BS didn't you? Well, My Pa did not abide a girl using profanity, and since I was now a girl, I guess I'd have to watch what I said.
First thing I did, well better say the next thing, is look at my feet, cause ya know, they felt weird, and not just weird.
So, it's like you were wearing gloves all your life and suddenly you decide for no reason to take your gloves off? Only the gloves were on your feet. And the gloves were calluses.
So, yeah, my feet were SENSITIVE. You know how weird that is? And they were kind of cute too.
It was only after a minute or two that I realized that my toenails were painted.
What the. . .crap.
See, I'm not swearing, honest. Pa would be so proud.
"Who painted my toenails while I was asleep?"
"What are you talking about?" Dani had just walked into the room, and she gasped. Then she giggled. Then she was rolling on the floor laughing.
"Oh my word, that's just too funny?"
"What?"
"Look in the mirror."
For the first time since I'd awoken. . .awakened. . .woke up? . .anyway, since I opened my eyes I saw a full length mirror.
I looked into it. . .and I saw the door. Angle issues. Ok, so I moved as if to stand up, and Dani was there to ease me up.
Yeah, first step and all.
So, there I am standing in one of them stupid paper gowns, looking at the woman in the mirror, and I can't help it.
I began to laugh. A big deep, high pitched, belly laugh.
I looked like some prostitute clown, or maybe Tammy Faye. Yeah, my pa gave me a classical education.
Or maybe like one of them French mimics or whatever. . .
In an instant I was in whiteface, with the black lips and Diamonds on my eyes.
As if my life wasn't hard enough. I have chameleon makeup.
I looked at Dani, examining what makeup she was wearing, and thought it looked nice, so I focused on that look.
Then I turned to look at the mirror again. . .ewww.
I noticed the subtle dissonance in color between my face and Dani's makeup and almost threw up. Ok, a darker shade for the lips, maybe a bit more orange. . .no yellow. . .no. . .um. . .okay I have no idea what you call the color I finally used for blush, but it worked. Lighten the eye shadow, and there we have it. Perfect
I wanted blue nails. . .and before I knew it my entire hand was blue.
Ok, more focus. . .lighten the shade a bit. Perfect. Metallic blue. Same as Pa's truck.
And his nail polish, but he don't know I found his stash of makeup once.
Pink, maybe, for the toes? No. My toes went through a kaleidoscope of color before I finally settled on a hue. No, I'm not going to tell you. A girl has to keep some secrets, like the color of her panties.
Black thong by the way.
So, I got my makeup situated and realize that Dani hasn't said a word the entire time I was applying it and I turned to look at her.
"Honey, you know that flies and spiders love open mouths, right?"
She closed her mouth with a snap, and I begin to realize that this might not be so bad. You know, this body? At least I'll look better in a dress now.
And no it was just the one time. My Pa was drunk off his. . .keister, and thought it would be funny for me to dress in one of his sun dresses.
I definitely didn't have the body for it, and luckily Pa had forgotten he'd told me his little secret by the next morning. I made sure he never got that drunk again.
But now?
Ok, I was tall. I mean tall. And I was what I'd once heard described as willowy, but until that moment I had no idea what the phrase meant. That was me. A little light in the bust, and no caboose to speak of, but all in all not bad. Especially with the makeup.
I didn't like the mousy brown hair thought. It would be so much better if it were, black?
I think it was at that moment that I realized I was a chromatopath.
So, I didn't have a name for it at the time, all I thought was, 'This is. . .freaking awesome. I can change colors.'
So, I started playing with my hair, and finally settled on a sort of rainbow of regular hair color. I ran red into blonde into brown into black. Locks of each patterned randomly over my head. I adjusted some of the blending, and had an effect I could live with. I spent a moment memorizing the look, in case I had to repeat it later.
"Now if only you could do that for other people you could just about put the salon out of business."
"There's a salon?!"
I squealed. I put my hand over my mouth and blushed. and then my entire body turned red. I mean really red, which embarrassed me even more. No one was supposed to know I'd always wondered what happened in that estrogen zone called a salon.
I looked at myself in the mirror, and all of my makeup and hair styling had gone out the window. All of me from my eyes to my hair down to the nails on my feet was a brilliant red.
I would need to keep random thoughts about my color to a minimum.
I closed my eyes and focused on the image of myself just before I got embarrassed at the sound I'd made.
I opened my eyes, and it was all back. Ok, so if I could just keep that focused, then I'd never have to worry about touching up my makeup.
"That is so cool."
So, she handed me some clothing, sweats and stuff, and we went off. I wondered how quickly I could change my color, and so I began trying to match my hand to the color of the wall passing behind it. Without much success I might add.
It's not that I couldn't match the color, just that I couldn't match it that fast.
For a minute or two I'd had images of walking seemingly invisible down the hallway. . .well, I'd have to be naked, but it would have been cool.
Nah, nothing like that. It took me about a half second to change color fully.
I began to get mesmerized by the effect.
Have you ever dropped dye into a jar of water. You know, a single drop. How if slowly spreads from that one point until it begins to take over the entire water?
Well the way my skin changed was nothing like that, but it's still a cool image.
My skin just seemed to. . fade. . .from one color to the next. I watched as it went through all the hues between the first and second colors.
I began testing a bit seeing if I could change it faster by trying closer hues, and ran right into a wall.
A mobile wall, sure, but a wall none the less.
"Watch where you're going. . .meathead." See, right there? I changed it into something less crass.
The guy I'd run into was about as opposite me as you could get. He was broader than he was tall, and built. I mean really built. I felt parts of me I never wanted or dreamed I would have begin to react to his manliness, but I stomped down on them.
Figuratively speaking, of course. I think it's anatomically possible to really stomp on those parts of my own body, even with gams like mine.
Like I said. Classical education. My Pa was the greatest.
He helped me to my feet, at which I blushed. Full body red time. My arms looked like they'd been dipped in red paint.
I closed my eyes and focused on my self-image with the makeup again.
"Dani, am I presentable again?"
She snickered. "Yes, you're presentable."
"Thanks!"
So, we continued on down a hall that was rapidly filling with other kids my age, and figured that it was time I began to pay attention to my surroundings.
There were kids with all colors or hair and eyes, and even one or two with exotic skin colors. I'd never really thought about it before, but it might be kinda cool to experiment with. . .the air was knocked out of me when we reached our destination.
Yeah, I completely lost my train of thought at that moment.
"Welcome to Wardrobe."
It was. . .amazing to say the least. Racks and shelves and lots and lots of clothing. Blazers and shirts and bottoms and jeans. But they were all girl's clothing.
I was still getting over my shock when she brought something to me that could only be a girl's school uniform.
I took one look at it and said what any red blooded American male in his right mind would say.
"Oh, HE. . ."
"Oh, HELLO!? What IS this? It's soooo Pretty!!!!!"
You should have realized by now that I'm no longer a red blooded American male.
I don't know how they could stand not to wear this outfit all the time, but I'd noticed many of the girls in the halls in other clothing as we'd walked past. It was the prettiest and most shimmery skirt and vest I'd ever seen. It was a sort of blue gray, with these red side shimmers. Okay, I don't know how to really describe it. Basically, if you looked at it straight on, it was blue. As you get closer to looking across it, the color shifts into more of a red.
I was engrossed tilting the fabric this way and that, and generally just enjoying myself when Dani cleared her throat and said, "what? They're just grey?"
"Blue. . red. . .you can't see this?"
She continued as if I hadn't said anything, "anyway all the girls I know complain about how short they are, and with your height. . ."
I hadn't had the opportunity to go burgundy yet, but I know that was the exact shade I turned at her comment. I could just imagine what my Pa would say if he were to see me in that getup. And every time I tried to get my color under control, right back to burgundy at the thought of how much leg I would be showing.
My Pa woulda been ecstatic. His little boy all grown up and in a skirt no less.
Dani broke me out of my reveille, reverie, whatever, "Look. . .what do I call you now? Most of us come up with our own girl names. What would you like?"
I thought about it a moment, and I had the perfect name, "Amanda Helena Louise Phillipa Magdalena Forsythe, Queen of all she surveys!"
Dani just began to laugh at me.
"What?"
"You are ridiculous, you know that, Amanda, or is it Helena? Maybe Louise?"
Ok, you know how everyone says that anger is red? I've never believed that myself, and it seems I was always right.
Anger is yellow.
Sure, there is a touch of red in it. It's not a canary or anything. It's like the first rays of sunlight through smoke.
That was the color I turned in that instant.
"Take it back!"
"You were serious?"
"The queen of everything crack was a joke."
"Why the long name?"
"I don't want to go into it."
"Ok, Amanda, you can have the mouthful."
Joy is a canary yellow. I didn't stay that color very long before I was back to burgundy. You don't know how embarrassing it is to be canary yellow.
"Just put the clothing on Louise."
"Instead of changing my name every time you address me, just call me your majesty." I smiled.
"Nope. You're now officially Phillipa."
"Oh, pooh."
"You're the one who chose it."
I began to undress so I could try on the new uniform, when Dani yelled at me again. "Not out here! There are boys walking past. . .well not so much anymore as they're all kind of staring now."
There I was, in sweatpants and nothing else. Yeah, you guessed it. I'd left the bra back in the infirmary. I was NOT going to wear a bra. A guy had to draw the line somewhere. Well, now I wished that I'd at least worn the bra.
Ok, the rest of what happened in the wardrobe as more embarrassment for me, and a lot of laughs for Dani.
In short wackiness ensued. No, it didn't end up in whipped cream or feathers or even compromising situations. That came later.
In the end, I found myself barely covered in the uniform, playing with my color a bit, trying to match the exact hue of the cloth.
I couldn't quite get it for some reason.
"Dani, what's this uniform made out of? For some reason, I just can't match the hue on my skin."
"It's just the uniform, Phillipa."
"I've decided I want Helena more right now."
"Ok, Helena."
I took a deep breath and changed my colors back to normal skin tone with my makeup and multicolored hair, and turned to head out of the Wardrobe.
"Helena, you haven't picked out the rest of your clothing yet."
Okay, so I stood there dumfounded. More clothing? I'd only ever had the one set at home, and that I'd washed in the creek once a week, at the same time I washed myself. Pa said it was more efficient that way. . .of course I never seen him do that with any of his girly clothing, so maybe I was under different rules now.
It dawned on me that I had left civilization behind. I mean, who in their right mind washed themselves more than once a week.
I told Dani as much.
"You have so much to learn, Helena, about being a girl."
"Magdalena."
"What?"
"I changed my mind, stop calling me Magdalena, call me Louise again."
"Damn it, Amanda, stop changing your mind!"
I turned a light pink, and quickly corrected myself before my tone got any deeper. Not that there really was anyone shallower than me in tone right now.
I took a deep breath and looked around. "So, how much of this can I take?"
"As much as you need. . .at least a weeks. . .stop trying to leave!"
"What? I have a weeks worth of clothes on me, like I said."
"In the center you will change your underwear once a day, and you will change your outerwear at least that often."
"Really? I will have that much clothing? Where will I keep it all. Not like I can wear it all at the same time."
"Amanda, trust me, pick out about fifteen outfits and twice that in underwear, and lets go get you some lunch."
"I could eat some horse."
"Don't you mean 'eat a horse'?"
"Nope."
She didn't inquire further, so I figured that she must be up for some horse as well. Mustang is especially good, but nowhere near venison. I just figured that they'd be more likely to have horse down here.
We picked out some outfits, and I was amazed at her lack of any style sense. I mean, she would pick out hues that clashed like nothing else. I would have to pick a slightly differently colored top or bottom from the same rack and she'd look at me like I was crazy.
"Those are the same color as what I just picked. Why do you keep changing out pieces for the exact same piece? Stop doing that!"
"You mean you can't see that? How this color of yellow and this color of yellow clash?"
She blinked at me a couple of times as her jaw dropped open.
"You can tell the difference between these shades of yellow?"
"Can't everyone? Up until this morning I was apparently completely color blind, so I don't rightly know."
She recovered quickly and lead me out the door saying, "the clothing will be delivered to your room."
Wow, we had servants here as well as everything else? That's so cool. Maybe I really was Queen of all I surveyed.
We entered the lunchroom next. I'd been so intent on changing my skin tone again, you know matching it to the walls again, that I had no idea where we until I looked up at the sudden increase in sound.
No wackiness ensued, mores the pity. I guess I'd exceeded my wackiness quota for the day. Who decides that anyway?
I got my meal from the line, sat down, and just looked at my meal. Nothing else. No one really talked to me for a while, or it may be that I was really bummed that they had neither venison, horse, nor pheasant. How was a guy. . .I blushed burgundy when I remembered that I wasn't a guy any longer.
"Is that your ability?" a quiet voice asked me.
"Yep, I change colors."
"Oh, That's pretty cool I guess. Better than mine."
"What's your ability?"
"I'm the center of attention, as long as I speak in a normal voice."
"Freaks and misfits unite!" and so saying I took a big forkful of whatever it was I'd put on my plate.
It tasted like nothing at all. Ok, that's a little odd. I tried the fries next. Nothing. The orange juice? Nothing.
"You've got to be SH. . ."
"You've got to be SH. . ."
"Watch your tongue please, Ms. Forsyth!"
"Um, who are you?"
"I'm Ms. Fine."
That's what she said. I mean really. You should see her. If ever a name was more appropriate. . .
No I didn't say it aloud. My Pa didn't raise no slack jawed idiot. Just me.
So, I sat back down in my seat, silently fuming about the fact I can't taste anything when I start to hear this giggling behind me. I turn in my seat, and see one of those rarest of creatures: A guy giggler.
"What's so funny?" I ask in my sweetest voice possible. Well, my sweetest voice and my most savage smile.
"I'm sorry. That was my fault."
"Jeremy, did you make it so she couldn't taste her food," the girl behind me said. I immediately turned to look at her. It was like I was compelled. So did everyone else in the room.
She almost blushed burgundy. I was impressed. "Sorry," she whispered into the now quiet room. We all went back to what we were doing, which was me actually looking at the girl who'd spoken.
"What do you mean. . ."
"Francine."
"You picked that name?"
She blushed and nodded. I shrugged. Who was I to complain, really? I mean remember my name? Good, I'm trying to forget.
"What do you mean he did this to me?"
"Jeremy can turn off one sense of one person within ten feet," she said in her original quiet voice.
"Yeah, they always have me practicing sight, but the others are more fun. Especially taste or hearing."
"Look, Jeremy?'
"Yeah?"
"Stop using your power on me or I'll bury my foot up to my ankle in your hind parts."
He got a sort of faraway look in his eye.
"Eww. That's just gross," great, he's one of those. A conservative.
"I meant I will kick your sorry, hairy, white. . ."
"Ms. Forsyth."
Ok, so Ms. Fine was getting on my nerves. And how did she learn my. . .oh, Dani was over talking to her.
I sashayed over to Jeremy, put my hand on his arm, set my hip on his leg, and began to whisper in his ear, "if you ever do that to me again, I will rip your balls of. After that I will feed them to you one by one. Do we understand each other? Nod and smile happily at me if you understand."
He nodded while smiling at me. . .no, he was looking down my shirt! I went sunshine through smoke and smacked him in the back of the head. After a moment to fix my hair and makeup to more reasonable colors, I made surehe was looking me in the eyes and asked him again. "You understand?"
He went green and nodded while trying to swallow a sudden lump in his throat.
I smiled sweetly at him and put my hand to the side of his face, "Good"
I figured he deserved a look for being such a good boy so I raised up my. . keister first and then the my torso. I sashayed back to me seat.
"That was fun," I said to Francine when I sat down across from her.
She was staring blankly into space. "What was fun? he's blinded me again." Dangit, and Pa said stuff like that was always better with an audience.
"Jeremy, sweetie. I include all my friends in that statement. All senses." I looked down at his pants for emphasis.
He turned a little green again, but I heard a sigh of relief from Francine.
"You are so wonderful. That was great service."
Yeah, that's. . .ok, you know what. That is a stupid joke. I'm not typing it out again.
I'd lost my muse for a moment, and I sat there absently looking at the other students. My good mood had gone out the window. I couldn't think of a thing to say that was witty, or fun. I absently ate the drab food while I sat.
and sat
and, "I'm tired of this. I'm going to go find something humorous."
"Can I come too?" Francine asked. It might have been better if she suggested I go to the infirmary. I mentally smacked myself in the face. That was bad even for me. Considering the puns I've already slipped in here that's saying something.
I'll wait while you go looking for them because you've missed them.
No, really, I'll be here when you get back.
"Can I?"
"Of course you can." Rocking hot bod like that? Hey, I may be female, but I'm not dead.
So, we stepped out of the cafeteria, looking at the deserted hallways. It was almost as if my name had suddenly been change to Truman and no one had told them that we were off script.
Yep, classical education. Thanks Pa.
So, we wandered around for a bit in the hallways.
There were no hijinks whatsoever, and no wackiness ensued.
Yeah, we had no whipped cream anyway. I think feathers might not have been that hard to come up with, but I was sure they'd be in the wrong hue.
"So. . .I have to go to my afternoon class. . ."
"And I have no idea what I'm supposed to be doing."
"Well, wander around long enough and someone will right you?"
"Okay," so that's what I did. I wandered right out of the building and into the woods. I'd had it with their version of civilization anyway.
Well I'd had it right up until the point my three inch heels sunk into the dirt. "No, fair. Why can't my footwear be functional AND cute!"
I tried a pout, but I seemed to be out of practice so I turned around and wandered myself back toward the Center.
I needed to go back to wardrobe and get a pair of boots anyway.
"There you are!"
"Hey, Dani. What's next?"
"The salon."
"What?"
"The salon. We need to get you a makeover."
I gestured at my face, "Hello, chameleon chick. I do my own makeup."
"Yes, but, fingernails. . .um. . .toe. . .ok, you got me, but they still want you in there."
So, I resigned myself to being bored, and went into the salon.
They were impressed to say the least.
"We're impressed. Not many girls do their makeup before coming in to see us the first time."
"I cheated, it's my power."
They were in love. They had me changing the colors for my hair, and skin tone, and eyes, and. . .well, let's just say we closed the doors before that part.
In the end, I ended up with an alabaster complexion, titian hair, and jade green eyes. We matched makeup, eye shadow, and lip gloss for it. I memorized the look, and switched between my first one, and this one a couple of times.
"Cool. I'm a master of disguise."
"Or something," Dani said.
I giggled at this and walked out of the salon. I had gotten a mani pedi though, so I really felt pampered.
I began to strut my stuff down the hall.
"Where do you think you're going?"
"Huh?"
"This way."
Ok, so I turned around, after a quick foray into the realm of burgundy, and began to strut my stuff in the right direction. Give a girl a break.
Dani just laughed at me, and I giggled right along with her.
Next, they put me in for placement testing. I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do with the loops and squiggles on the pages, so I spent my time drawing pictures. They were pretty pictures too, using subtle variations in light and shadow. . .
Just kiddin'. I can read. Sure, I didn't really understand most of the questions but I answered as best I could. It was the beginning of a stretch of boredom you don't really care about.
I spent the next two days testing.
No wackiness ensued. Not even any mild hilarity. I would have even been satisfied with a bit of silliness or even 2 am over tiredness.
Nope. Two absolutely normal, event free days.
Well, except for the purple and blue panda, but I'm sure you already know about that, so I won't waste your time.
So, I was given a touch phone and a schedule and a room.
My room was sooo boring. I mean really boring. So I decided to liven it up with a little me.
I lay against the wall, naked, and decided to blend in.
I lay there for almost three hours. Man, buildup is a drag.
I was about to get up and call it a bust when I heard a knock on my door.
"Amanda, you in here?"
I took a deep breath so I could calm my nerves for someone not seeing me naked.
"Come in, Francine."
The door opened and she looked around the room. She even looked at me once or twice. I laughed silently. I think I forgot to change my teeth because she started looking at my face. Then something dawned on her and a look of horror overcame her.
"You're naked?! Oh MY G. . ."
"You're naked?! Oh MY GOSH!"
Suddenly my attention was fixated on her, and I knew that so would be the attention of everyone within the sound of her voice.
"Amanda, what are you doing!"
I'd jumped up and I was rushing over to her.
"Amanda, don't touch me there."
I was already burgundy, and I didn't think I could be much more embarrassed than that. Oh boy was a wrong. I tripped as I was almost to her.
"Amanda, that hurts, go slower!"
I collapsed on top of her, half in and half out of my room, completely naked wearing nothing but my hair and a smile, as they say.
Apparently Francine's power spread to anyone in contact with her, as everyone was staring at me as well now.
"Eep!" I hopped up, or at least I tried to, as my legs were tangled up in Francine's and I tripped into my room landing with my shoulders on the ground and my butt in the air. I quickly scrambled out of that position and into my room.
I tried to close the door, but Francine was still blocking it. "Hey, I'm still here!"
My attention focused for a moment on Francine before I broke free of her power and tried to drag her into my room. She finally got the idea and helped me out, since there was no way I was moving her on my own.
She whispered, "Sorry," through the door just as we were closing it.
"And here I thought my compromising situation would have been with a man. . .mores the pity."
"What are you saying, Amanda?"
"Nothing whatsoever."
"That's very important, write it down."
I looked around for a pencil and paper for a moment before realizing she was joking.
"Oh, ha ha."
"Um, could you put some clothing on, please?" Her face was almost turning the same shade as my entire body.
"Just a thought, but would you hold your face up to my body so I can compare shades?"
"Amanda!"
"What? Oh. Right. Sorry, Francine."
I decided to try out Goth girl this time, so I went white (the color not the skin tone) for my skin, black for my hair, and applied the heavy Goth makeup around my eyes, topped off with black lipstick.
"I think we already have a Goth around the center, and at least she wears clothing."
"Oh, yeah." I quickly moved toward my dresser and slipped into my uniform. Then after picking myself off the ground I put on yoga pants and a tank top.
"Ok, I'm groaning and I can't even hear your mental monologue."
"How do you know I have a mental monologue, Francine?"
"It seems like everyone has an internal monologue these days at the Center."
She had a point there, I mean, have you done a search for The Center recently on BC? Scary.
I shook myself lightly and surveyed the damage I'd been doing to the fourth wall in my room. "So, you think I need to patch this up a bit?"
"Nah. This story has had a semi-permeable fourth wall since the beginning. Leave it alone for a while and it should mend itself, Amanda."
She had a point, so we decided to head off in search of something to do. I stepped out of my room, looking at Francine behind me, and ran into another mobile wall. I put up my hands to push myself back from it. Ok, it was the same mobile wall as before, and I flushed.
Here I thought that maybe after transition I might start liking girls or something. I mean, sure I liked to look, but give me a manly body any day.
Nope, looks like I was still into guys, and I wouldn't mind this guy getting into. . .
"Sorry. I should have been watching where I was going." He said interrupting my train of thought
"You can run into me anytime you want. . .what was your name again?"
"Fred."
"Hey, maybe we could rewind to the end of the last chapter and you could knock on my door instead of Francine."
"Uh. . ."
"What did we just talk about, Amanda?"
"Sorry. Oh well, I would have loved to climb on top of you."
It seems that Fred was one of the more bowling ball shaped tools in the shed, because he finally had the decency to blush. I wondered how hard I would have to throw myself at him to stick.
"I'm not sure if, I mean I used to be. . .You know what I'm saying."
"Well, if you're ever looking to test drive a sports car, then look me up."
We left him stammering in the hall, and Francine giggled at me, "Amanda, you are sooo bad."
"Hey, it's not like I'd let just anyone in the driver's seat, but he looks like he has good eye hand coordination."
"Amanda!"
"And speaking of hands, if they are representative of. . ."
Francine stopped and got a distant look on her face.
"Francine?"
"Ok, I think I need a shower before we head off to the rec room."
"I wouldn't mind joining you."
"What?"
"In another stall. I need a cold shower as well."
Showered and refreshed, if much colder, we headed off toward the rec room and the promised movie.
I think I'd had enough wackiness and barely disguised innuendo for an evening so I was looking forward to an evening of mindless entertainment.
They were showing the new movie by that one dude, yeah, you know the one.
Oh, don't give me that. You've secretly wanted to watch it since you heard about it and are jealous that I got to see it before it was even released.
Apparently the Center has more connections than we even knew.
So, Francine and I get to the room, and there is Fred himself. He smiles over at me, but I don't figure I want another cold shower today, and he may be gorgeous, but he makes Cronk look like Einstein.
Ok, so that wasn't so much a classical movie reference as a slightly dated one. I still liked it.
Apparently this year's model is named Fred.
I wonder if he cooks spinach puffs.
If you still haven't got it, then there is no hope and you have just become the Englishman from that bad joke. I'll ask you if you've figured it out when you're old and gray.
Having filled my quota of references to jokes only I get in the first place, I survey the room and find a place to sit.
There are two empty spots on stools at the back of the room. I'm so glad that I wore pants and not a skirt, as that could have gotten embarrassing.
We watched the movie, and it felt vaguely familiar. It was about this girl who liked to run around everywhere in red body paint. . .
Just kidding. So, we watched the movie, and about halfway through, I fell something brush against my shoulder. I brush it off and think nothing of it.
Then something tickles down my face, and I begin looking around the room. There's something floating around in the darkness.
"Hey could someone turn on the lights?"
A couple of photokinetics oblige and we see for the first time that there are hundreds of feathers floating through the air.
What's going on here? There slipping up from under the crack in the door. And so I open it up, only to be snowed under in a drift of white goose down. This was getting stranger by the moment. I pushed out into this thinking only one thing over and over to myself.
This is all wrong.
I finally get to a window, and I realize that these feathers are all snowing down on us. I can't contain the wrongness any longer.
"White! The feathers are most definitely not supposed to be white!"
"White! The feathers are most definitely not supposed to be white!"
Not a single pink feather in the lot. And they were all supposed to be pink per. . .
Never mind. Right now what was supposed to be didn't matter. The Center was being buried under a mountain of feathers.
"Amanda, are you out there?"
"Yes, Francine. I'm here."
Someone had their arms out questing and ran into my torso. Somehow I knew instinctively when he started groping my breasts who it was, "Jeremy!"
"Sorry."
"That you ran into me, or that I asked you to stop groping me?"
"Yep."
"Men," I said in an exasperated tone, ignoring Francine's rolled eyes.
"Hey, Fred is lost."
"And talking about himself in the third person. Hold Jeremy's hand, then and try to keep up."
If you've never had the opportunity to go trudging through a snowstorm of feathers, then I invite you to give it a try. They get everywhere, and I mean EVERYWHERE. It was one of those moments when I really regretted not wearing underwear, as that would have meant one more layer before the sharp points were sticking me in the girly parts.
Yes, feathers have a sharp point. It's called the quill. And while one or two aren't a problem, and they are more fluff than quill, you get enough of them and you will become a pincushion.
Especially in parts where you really don't want to be poked.
From the way the guys were squirming, I think they had it worse than Francine and I.
I was happy not to be a guy at that moment. I mean the shear torture of it. The pleasure and pain of it. I was never one for S & M you see.
I figured, being the intelligent person I am, that if we head toward where the feathers were deepest, then we'd find the source of the problem.
So, there we were, My hand on Francine's shoulder, Jeremy's hand on my buttocks, and I can only assume Jeremy holding hands with Fred. That is an image I never saw that still makes me giggle. Oh, yaoi.
No, I wasn't in front. Francine was the one who wanted the attention.
And being in front she would be the first one to get it.
We were approaching what I could only assume was the center of the disturbance, which happened to be the Center's infirmary, when I began to hear something cracking.
"Amanda, should we maybe. . ."
Was all that Francine was able to say before a flood of whipped cream burst through the dor in front of us.
"Ugh, Fat Free! You've got to be kidding me! Fat Free Whipped Cream!? That's like 0% Feline Cats or even Military Intelligence."
"You forgot Central Intelligence Agency," Fred said through a mouthful of the stuff I refuse to call whipped cream.
Yeah, I didn't get it either.
So, the wave of semi-liquid foam washed over us, plastering the not pink feathers to our not naked bodies. It would have been soo hot if it wasn't so sticky. . .well and if we were naked
"Look, the infirmary!" Francine said pulling me from my fantasy. Fred and Jeremy were still holding hands after all.
We pushed our way into the room, which is of course where the whipped cream had burst from. and there was a creamed body lying tied to a bed.
Wait, let me try that again.
There was a naked woman tied to a bed and covered in nothing but feathers.
Ok, so there was an emergent at the center of it all. It was The Center after all.
As soon as the groans stopped I moved over to her and said the first thing that popped into my mind upon seeing a woman covered entirely in white. . .
"My name's Luke Skywalker and I'm here to rescue you."
Strangely enough, she gave me the same look as Princess Leia gave to the afore mentioned Luke.
Well, and then she began to scream and more feathers began to appear.
"Jeremy make me deaf."
As soon as the sound stopped I said, "Francine! Talk to her!"
Yeah, I yelled because I couldn't hear myself speak and wanted to make sure I could be heard. As soon as everyone's attention focused on Francine, I walked over to the girl and let her out of her restraints.
She stopped yelling, and in fact began to smile. The feathers and whipped cream faded from sight, and disappeared from our clothing. . .
"But, Ms. Fine, it is the truth. Just ask Francine! Or Frank. . .I wouldn't trust Jeremy to give his mother the time of day."
"The fact that they tell the same story as you do doesn't mean that it's the truth. I mean, no one else remembers the whipped cream, and how would you know it was fat free."
Ignore the man behind the curtain, just visit the blogs.
I've revised chapter 4 of Baseball Rose for clarity. I should have done this weeks ago, but I was lazy and only got around to it now since I started to work on the next chapter.
I am currently working on a new story and I would love two editors as this one I don't want to post without someone looking through it first. Send me a PM and I'll check back here every day or so for a response. Love you all and hope to have something ready to post soon.
I added some to the end of the story, as in reading back over it I realized that the commenters were correct. I stopped it too suddenly. It should be a lot better now.
The link tells it most of everything you need to know about it, except for the fact that the Girl mentioned is a fifteen year old on her high school baseball team.
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/05/10/phoenix-school-forfeits...
This is one of the tings I have considered about my story Baseball Rose, how other schools would react to Melanie and Jay on the team. Apparently my thoughts on the subject, which would have come out later, were not too far off.
Hello BCTS,
I guess I am writing this in letter format as it seems to be a little more formal that way. Things took a severe detour for me a few months ago. I was asked not to write Tg fiction any more by my wife. It is probably the hardest thing that I have ever been asked to do by anyone. I truly love to write, and I love all of you here at BCTS. The problem exists, however, that this woman who I love feels truly uncomfortable with people knowing her as intimately as some of my writing allows. She is a very private person, and feels that I expose too much of myself, and others, when I write this type of fiction.
Unfortunately, I have to agree with her on some points.
The problem I have, however, is that there are no other communities out there like BCTS. I've looked. Nowhere is there this sense of togetherness that is so prevalent here.
So, I have a humble request of the people here. Would you mind if I posted my non-TG fiction here? I love the feedback I have recieved here and feel it makes me a better author. I can write without that...but it really is something I miss. It also keeps me writing. Just like certain characters (none my own) on this site, I am very unsure of my own abilities. When I lie awake at night, my self doubts plague me.
Regardless, I only ask because I value your opinions.
I guess this letter to you all has another purpose as well. I'm going to be removing my TG fiction from this site over the next couple of months. I love everything that you've all said about it, and enjoyed all of your responses, but I do have to take it down. I wanted to let you all know first so that you could get a copy of it, if you wanted. Please, do not post my works anywhere else. They are a piece of myself. They are, in a sense, my children. I am fine with them finding nice private homes, but they do not need to be exploited.
I will not be continuing the stories that are unfinished here, and would appreciate no one else attempting to finish them. Call it a bit of selfishness I am entitled to.
I do love you all, and hope that I don't offend any of you with my decision. I still feel a part of this community. I'm sorry.
Craig, the Faeriemage.
Something happened to my last change, and for some reason it did not appear on the site. Unfortunately I wrote the new stuff ON the site. RE-wrote it, and hopefully it is at least as good as the first version no one ever saw. It is really up there this time. I promise.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
Preface
When I began writing about Jamie and all of her friends, I had no idea what sort of story I was planning to write, let alone where that story would take me. I began with a simple concept: What if there were someone, somewhere, who could jump between worlds and what if that person could see the memories of their alternates in these other worlds.
What emerged from those two ideas was Jamie as she first sprang to life in what I called The Gateway in the Woods. I changed the title before I published, but the idea remained the same. I changed the title, because I changed the idea from being something external to Jamie, something she had no control over, to something that she would grow to use and control. She needed a little more control in her life.
I did not know what I expected when I published this first chapter, but it wasn't the number of page views I got so quickly. It gave me the desire to continue and add to Jamie's world as quickly as I could.
I have come to the realization, that like most of the work I have done in the past, this story about Jamie has a Beginning, a Middle, and an End. Because of this, I have decided to offer it up as a novel in chapters. The current thought I have is that this will end up being about 35-40 chapters long, which will bring it in around 120k-140k words, or about 260 to 310 pages in printed format. I may make it longer, it may end up being shorter. It will depend on where the story goes.
This will not be the last story about Jamie, but I may take a short break from her and work on some of the other ideas I have in my head. It depends on where I am when I finish. It will also depend on whether you all are tired of Jamie at that point.
Some of you have been here from the beginning, to all of you I say thanks for the support. Some of you are just starting on this journey, to whom I say welcome to a wild ride.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I have problems with my family. I'm sure you're saying that everyone has problems with their families. Mine are different, and possibly more severe than yours. You see, I have always felt that there was something about me that was wrong, didn't fit, or simply was broken. I don't consider myself special in any real way. It's just that I would remember events from the past differently from the rest of my family.
I remembered getting a dress for my fifth birthday. For half of the population, this wouldn't have been a big deal. That's because you are all girls. The other half of the population, the one that I'm a part of, are boys. We don't usually get things like dresses or dolls (Christmas of the same year). I don't remember being disappointed. Well, not when I received it. I went to look for the dress a couple of weeks later, because I wanted to show it to one of my friends, and it wasn't there. I asked my mother where the dress was, and she got a strange look on her face. I never asked about the dress after that. Or the doll when it went missing.
Life for me was like that. I would have an event happen, that later no one around me would remember. Like my first date with Brian Reynolds. I remembered him asking me. I remember the search through clothes I have never owned to find just the right thing to wear. Putting on make-up that didn't exist. I remember him trying to kiss me, and puling away from him.
I was twelve at the time.
It is also the event that lead me to believe that I was a little bit insane. I knew that I didn't have a vanity in my room. I knew that the yellow comforter with the lace frill had never been on my bed. But I clearly remembered them from the whole "date event". Brian was my best friend, and I couldn't ever see him asking me on a date. He is girl crazy. And like I said before, I'm a boy. Sure, I'm a bit small for my age, but that is normal for someone in my condition.
I just took a moment to read back over what I've written, and man, I'm so wordy here. I'm telling the story. Let's get in a little show, shall we? (Mrs. Henderson would be proud)
---
Jamie opened his eyes.
That's me, James Patrice. Everyone called me Jamie til my 9th birthday. After that most people switched to Jim. Damn you Jamie Summers, I really liked Jamie as a boys name. Sure, it was re-runs but the teasing at school made the name unbearable. Also, you may notice that I tend to talk about myself in the third person in flashbacks. Get over it ;)
He had gone to bed excited for today to come. He couldn't now remember why. He lay in bed on his Transformers sheets looking at the model of the Millennium Falcon he had suspended from the ceiling with fishing line. The Tie Fighter had fallen to the floor again, and luckily, this time, it didn't break.
Then he remembered. Today was his first outing with the Cub Scouts. They were going to a BMX rally and would even be allowed to try some of the tricks. He jumped out of bed and threw on his blue Cub Scout shirt with a pair of jeans. He didn't have any of the rank badges like the other boys yet, but he'd only been eight for a week. He had finished all of the requirements for his Bobcat badge and his dad said he would be there to "Turn Him" into a Bobcat at the next Pack Meeting.
He put on his yellow bandanna and raced downstairs to gulp down some breakfast.
"Slow down, Jamie. You're food isn't going anywhere." Jamie's mom, Helen, said to him with a smile.
"But, Mom," Jamie whined, "I don't want to be late."
"No whining, Jamie. You still have time before they get here."
Jamie moderated his pace just a little, but patience hadn't ever been his strong suit. He had to wait a long time after breakfast for the Den Mother and the rest of his Den to show up so they could head out.
In reality it was probably only about 10 or 20 minutes, but an eight year old never really pays attention to time. It doesn't mean anything to him yet. Especially in this simpler time without the internet, widespread games systems, or cell phones.
They finally arrived and he rushed out the door to the waiting station wagon.
For all the youth who aren't yet bored to tears with my ramblings, a station wagon is like an SUV. . .actually, it is more like a limo. Only not as glamorous.
He climbed into the back of the station wagon through the rear door.
You know, like a hatch back. You know what? How bout this: http://www.google.com/images?q=plymoth%20station%20wagon&oe=.... That will give you an idea. Having not had it until recently, I often forget about the internet.
The boys joked around while they traveled out of town to the race track. BMX was big at that time. Especially Freestyle. Jamie loved watching the flips and jumps of the bicycles.
There were some competitions running when they got there, so the boys rushed over to the fence to see older teens compete.
"Look at that!" Jamie yelled as one after another the racers did a flip on the ramp right in front of them. He watched how they pulled back on the handle bars at the last instant, and went mostly rigid while in the air. "I could do that," Jamie whispered to himself. His best friend Brian heard him whisper.
After a couple of runs, and some more jumps, flips and twists, Mrs. Lewiston led them over to a fenced in area.
"Hi, guys. My name's Brad."
"You're Brad Davis!" Jamie enthused.
"Yes, I am. Three time cup winner. Let's get you checked out on these bikes and let you try a few jumps. The main thing to remember about jumping bikes is that whatever you start doing before you leave the ground continues after you leave it. Try and be straight up and down. Just let the jump happen and you should all be good."
Jamie knew instantly that what he had been thinking had been right. You start the flip before you leave the ground. It starts on the ramp. "It's so easy," Jamie whispered again.
"Bet you can't do a flip," Brian said almost casually to Jamie.
"I can so." Jamie replied. Jamie was the youngest of the scouts and always felt that he needed to prove himself.
"Ok, then, do it." Brian said with a little smile.
"Ok, then I will."
Jamie rode up the highest hill, since he thought he would need some speed. He pedaled down the hill as fast as he could. As soon as he pulled back on the handle bars at the top of the ramp, Jamie knew that everything was going to work perfectly. The earth whirled around him. He saw the sky, followed by the hill, then the ramp, still going, and he saw the landing point. Everything was perfect and he let out a little whoop. His feet slipped off the pedals as he landed on the ground. He crashed into the metal crossbar of the bike. He felt something break as he tumbled to the ground. He vomited his breakfast on the mud before passing out.
Jamie awoke in the hospital.
---
Mrs. Henderson, my creative writing teaching in junior high always told me that it was better to show a story, that to tell it. Sometimes, I think, a little bit of tell goes a long way. Especially when I am trying to introduce you to my life.
I had landed on the cross bar hard enough to break my pelvis. Everything between the cross bar and my pelvis was crushed. They reconstructed my penis, but there are things that can't be reconstructed with simple plastic surgery. That's right. I produce no testosterone. I'm 14 and I am never going to grow a beard, bulk up, or anything else a normal boy my age will do. Well not without hormone shots. And I'm not even sure those are the shots I want.
I blame my shrink.
After the accident, my parents got me together with a child psychologist.
Ok, this is another reason that my family and I don't get along. I hate my Psychologist. I prefer his wife Mary. She's also a psychologist, but I see her as a friend. My Shrink (I never acknowledge his name. He gets frustrated with me.) isn't my friend. He is paid by my parents, and tries his best to get me to agree with them. He wants me to be a boy. I'm not so sure who I am.
I've told Mary about my false memories. Even about the date with Brian. I told her about how it made me feel. About my anticipation for the event, and disappointment when he didn't treat me like a lady.
I told my Shrink about my fifth birthday party and the dress. He calls it a fantasy. That was the last time I told him about one of my false memories.
Judy and I usually speak over the phone. I asked her once what she tells her husband. She said she considers me her patient, even if no one is paying her directly. After the accident, I dropped out of the scouts. I had only really done it to please my dad. I spent a month in the hospital as they tried to piece my groin back together. That was when I first started to write.
---
Jamie sat looking out the window. He couldn't move his body because of the heavy plaster cast that immobilized him from the waist to the knee. One of the nurses came in and saw him.
"Cheer up, Jamie. I'm sure it isn't all that bad."
"I'm stuck in here, and they moved the last kid off the ward this morning. I'm alone in here."
"Well, why not write or draw about your life?" She produced a pad of paper and a pencil.
"Ok," Jamie said, not sure if this was something he wanted to do. He started to write. Not about himself, but about a kid named Jodi. Jodi's life was nothing like Jamie's. Jodi had really been given the dress on his fifth birthday. Jodi had gone to parties, and had lots of friends. He was popular at school. Jodi never landed in the hospital. Jodi never had to sit around for days with nothing to do.
Jamie wrote for hours and cried as he thought about what his life could have been, if only he'd been Jodi instead.
Jamie stopped crying as he began to think. Maybe he couldn't be Jodi, but he could at least write about him. Jamie made it a bit of a Science Fiction story. Jodi was born in 1995 just like Jamie was, but there was something called The Web that connected peoples TVs together. They carried around personal phones and sent "text messages" to each other. They had typewriters connected to the TVs so that they could type messages there as well.
It was about 6pm when the nurse returned. "So, what have you written for us?" She asked me as she came in.
Jamie turned the pages over. Suddenly he wasn't so sure about all of this. He liked his story about Jodi, but he was afraid that anyone who read it would know that it was about him.
"Look, Jamie, It's all right. My name is Mary Keller. I council kids who have been through tough situations. My husband was hired by your parents to help you, but he couldn't come today."
Jamie looked at the woman who he had thought was a nurse. She had seemed so nice, she just had to be a nurse. She reminded him of his mom.
"Ok, but I only want you to see it."
"I have to tell my husband, Frank, something about this, as he is your councilor."
"Can't you be my councilor?"
"Oh, Honey. You'll like my husband. He is really a nice man. So, let's take a look at what you've written."
Jamie reluctantly handed over the pad of paper. He watched as Mary read his story. He knew that she would know, that he wished his life were like Jodi's. He just hoped that it would be alright.
"Well, Jamie, you certainly have a good imagination. Some of these devices you describe almost sound magical."
"Yeah, Jodi really gets to have a lot of fun."
"Don't you get to have a lot of fun?"
"Jodi is popular and has a lot of friends. My only friend is Brian. Sure, we play a lot together, but Brian has other friends that don't like me very much."
"Why don't they like you, Jamie?"
"They think I'm a wimp. They want me to go play sports and camping and all of that. I tried that. Look what happened to me!" Jamie had tears in his eyes as he gestured down at his cast.
"Tell me about Jodi's friends. Aren't they all girls?"
"Yes, but they don't call Jodi a wimp. They like him for who he is. They had tea parties, and dress-up parties. They know Jodi is really a boy, but they don't mind. He even has a pink personal phone. They all have identical phones, and sometimes they get them mixed up, but that's ok because they are all best friends."
"You know Jodi will never be real, right?"
"Jodi isn't real. It's just Jamie. His name is Jamie too."
"His name?"
"The little boy I sometimes remember. I remember getting the dress for my fifth birthday, and going to Susan's party in it. I remember the China doll that I got that Christmas, along with a cloth doll. I liked the China doll better because she had brown hair just like mine, even if mom told me I couldn't play with her. She was a doll for looking at, not for playing with."
"Do you have other memories like this?" Mary asked. She had a weird look on her face.
"I have lots of memories like this. Most of them are in the Jodi story. I know they can't be real because there isn't really a Web connecting TVs and there aren't phones you can take anywhere. I used to get confused, though. I thought my mom stole that dress. It really stuck with me. I wondered how she could be so cruel. I later realized that it wasn't a real memory. I started calling them false memories. Sometimes it feels like I am living two lives. One in the real world, and one with False Jamie."
Mary seemed to come to a decision. "Ok, Jamie. We'll keep the stories just between us. I would like you to keep writing them for me. Even if they aren't real, they let me see a bit of you that you aren't comfortable showing any other way. Can you do that for me?"
Jamie smiled. "Sure. I really like you, Mary. You're neat."
---
I didn't stop writing about Jodi. Mary was a bit surprised last year when Jodi went on a date with my best friend Brian. I told her that False Jamie's life had started becoming more and more different from mine. When we were both eight, there wasn't much of a difference. He had friends. I had Brian. As both of us grew older, our early divergence lead to a greater and greater difference in our lives. I think that is when Mary realized I wasn't making False Jamie up.
I didn't realize til recently.
Jodi wasn't my only character that I wrote about. I mostly wrote fairy tales. Princesses being saved by handsome princes. Princes being saved by beautiful princesses (I was an equal opportunity author). Sometimes, they saved each other.
Last week, my Dad read my journal.
Mary had asked me to keep a journal of my thoughts and feelings. She didn't ever need to see it. I just needed to write to sort everything out in my head. She did this the day after my ninth birthday. Everyone was calling me Jim at this point, but I decided I would still sign my journal Jamie, to keep me closer to the False Memories that I really wanted to be true.
I walked into my room to see my dad on the light blue bedspread that had replaced my transformers years ago.
"Dad?"
"What in the heck is THIS," my dad bellowed at me as he looked up from his reading.
"That is private Dad!"
"Is this your diary, you little girl?"
"It's my Journal, Dad."
"My little pansy boy, writing about his feelings, in his little diary!"
"Dad, give me my Journal. You had no right." I was starting to cry.
"No right? I'm your father, damn it. You will respect me."
"Respect you? You don't know the meaning of respect. Mary respects me as a person. You see me as someone who can live out your lost fantasies."
My father hit me. "How DARE you, you little pussy." He threw my journal at me, and it opened up my cheek under my eye. I picked up my Journal and walked out of my house. Blood dripped onto my shoulder. I had stopped crying before I left the house. That man would never make me cry again.
I walked up to the woods behind our house. Suddenly I could see both the forest around me, and one that was just slightly different. In one of them, I was crying. I could feel my skirt swish around my legs as I hugged myself. The Trees were in all the wrong places. My view passed through the tree in front of me. I closed my eyes and could still see.
The hill looked the same. I tried to keep as close to the other perspective as I could. Brian jumped out from behind a tree. He looked angry.
"There you are, you little fag. Did you actually think you could run away from me after telling me your little secret?"
"What are you talking about." I said before realizing that this was the False Brian that False Jamie had been on a date with.
"I never meant to hurt you, Brian. I really want to be your girlfriend."
"How can you be my girlfriend when you're not even a girl! We can fix that here and now." There was a large kitchen knife in Brian's hand. He stabbed False Jamie in the groin. I could feel her die. I felt what she felt, but I had the clarity of mind she didn't. I knew that my best friend had just killed another person. He had just killed me.
I don't know what happened next, or even how it happened. One moment I was in my world (or Earth1 as I think of it) and the next I was in her world (Earth2).
The air smelled subtly different. It was a little dirtier. It clung to my throat a bit. It was also quite a bit colder. No wonder False Jamie had been hugging herself for warmth. Oh no, False Jamie. I turned to where I knew her body would be. Brian was still standing over her with the knife.
My dad, upon learning I would no longer be attending scouts enrolled me in a karate class. It was a small school run by someone called Billy B. No one I knew back in Earth1 had ever heard of him, and every one in Earth2 is crazy enough to think he only does aerobics. It was a mixture of Judo, wrestling, and kick boxing that he taught us. I have a black belt that he personally awarded me.
I stepped behind Brian and twisted his right arm out and away from his body, the whole time putting pressure on the nerve point in his wrist. I slipped my left arm around his throat and after he dropped the knife I kicked his legs out from under him so I could get a better grip on his throat. After a slow 30 count, I dropped his now unconscious body to the ground. I checked his pulse and breathing and then hog tied him using Jamie's belt. I searched through Jamie's purse for her personal phone and dialed 101. When a voice came on telling me that there was no such number, I remembered that 911 was the emergency number here, and they used something silly like S.O.S. for the international emergency code. How silly is that.
I dialed 911 and told the woman who answered the phone what had happened.
I sat down to wait for the police. I heard my dad calling for me. Wait, he was calling for Jamie. And she was dead. That is when I heard the first police sirens.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I looked over my last post and realized I needed to clarify a couple of things. Any of your who is reading this is in what I call Earth2. I was born in Earth1 or Earth Prime. Sure, I understand that it is a little ego centric of me, but I'm the one who can shift dimensions. More on that later.
I looked at the poor crumpled body on the ground. I could hardly believe that she had been as alive and vibrant as I myself was. Could hardly believe that she was me. It was the weirdest sensation I have ever had. I was looking down at myself. She was cute. I'm not sure if she would have ever been more than that. Her hair was pretty, and she looked good in the clothing she was wearing. I heard her father again and knew I had to be gone, but there wasn't anywhere to hide. Looking down the way I had come, there was a slight shimmer in the air.
As I approached the sparkling outline, I realized it was vaguely Jamie shaped. I walked through it, feeling a tingle. When I turned around, the shimmer was there, but False Jamie and Brian weren't. I almost ran down the back of the hill. I needed to speak to someone now, and I didn't have access to my phone anymore.
I walked to Mary's house. She lived a few miles from my house, and it only took me about four hours to get there, since I was sticking to the back ways and alleys. I knocked on Mary's door, and my Shrink answered.
"Jamie. . .what are you doing here? Is that blood on your face?"
"I need to speak to Mary, please."
"Ok, I'll let you speak to Mary, but there's something I think that the three of us should discuss after you've had your say."
He showed me into the living room, and then went to get his wife. I looked at the clock on the wall. That's when I realized how long it had taken me to get there. It was after midnight.
Mary came in, tying the sash on her dressing gown. "Are you all right, Jamie?" She was the only one who still called me Jamie. "Whose blood is that? I know all of that didn't come from your face."
It was the first time that I had looked down at myself. The knees of my jeans were covered in her blood. They were covered in my blood.
"Its False Jamie's. Brian killed her tonight. Before I saw the blood I thought that I might be going crazy. I saw myself dead, dressed as a girl."
"Frank, I was right. There were two of them."
"Were?" My shrink said as he came in. "The other Jamie is dead?"
"You talked to him about me? You promised!"
Mary came and sat down beside me and put a hand on my shoulder. "Jamie, honey, let me explain. My husband and I have a unique practice. I know that you feel betrayed right now, but we both have been working for you. My husband will tell you what your parents want you to hear. I just listen to what you have to say. We don't do this with many of our clients. Just the ones who we fear might have really difficult times with their parent's desires for them."
"What do you mean?"
Frank sat down in the chair across from the couch. "Your parents felt that you needed help growing up as a boy without the natural physical growth that you would normally expect to have. That is mainly what I do: Help children better understand their gender roles in today's society. No matter where that takes them. Usually, the parents and children are in agreement over where that should lead. Sometimes, rarely, they disagree. When that happens, the one of us the child is least comfortable with tells the child the parents version of things, and the other runs normal therapy sessions with the child."
I felt a little uncomfortable being called a child, even indirectly. After all, I'm thirteen. Everyone knows that teenagers aren't children. That aside, I was suddenly worried about Mary. "Isn't all of this Illegal?"
Mary smiled at me. "No, it isn't even unethical. We are both your councilors. While you and Frank may talk about what your parents want to talk about, it is still your counseling session. We are both here to help you."
Without realizing it, I had begun to calm down. Talking about this seemingly inconsequential thing, at least when related to the knowledge that False Jamie had been killed. I need to change that. Let's call her Jamie2. Then something struck me. "You didn't need to tell me this. You could have continued with the act."
Mary looked at her husband Frank. He cleared his throat before speaking. "We thought that your father had attacked you."
I realized then that I hadn't told them everything that had gone on this evening. So I told them about fighting with my father, I would never call him dad again, and how he hit me and threw my journal at me and cut my cheek open. I told them how I ran into the woods behind our house, and how I started to see the world through Jamie2's eyes. I told them how Brian2 had leaped from behind a tree with a knife. I told them how I had tied him up and called the police.
It was at this point that Frank went to the phone and dialed 101. He told the police his name and that he had another runaway at his house. He told them my father had attacked me and I had run for my life. I started to realize the type of person that Frank really was, and felt sorry for how I had always called him my shrink, if I even referred to him at all. They left me there in their living room as they went out front to wait for the police. I lay down on the couch and fell quickly asleep.
Something began nagging at me while I was asleep. Something was bothering my dreams. I woke up as it hit my conscious mind. My journal was still lying out there in the woods. Frank and an officer were just walking into the room. I had always wondered why police wore yellow, when blue seems to be a much more soothing color. Jamie2's police wore blue which I always thought to be a much more suitable color. His name plate said Paxton.
"How are you doing young man?"
'Young man? Can't he see I'm a girl? I'm wearing a skirt after all.'
I was startled for a moment. 'Where did that thought come from. I'm wearing pants.'
"I'm doing fine, officer. A little tired."
"Well, we'll have you home in a jiff then."
I cowered into the couch at his mention of taking me home. "Please, no. I don't want to go back there. He'll kill me."
"Who are you afraid of, Son?"
"My father hit me, and threw a book at me"
"Where did he hit you?"
"Right here." With that I pulled my sweater up and let the officer see my stomach and lower ribs. Frank gasped a little. I looked down at myself and saw why. A large bruise had already formed on my left side. It seemed bigger than my father's fist could possibly be, but I keep forgetting how small I really am.
The officer talked into the radio mic on his shoulder. "I need the forensic photographer in here to get a full spectrum collection." At the time I had no idea what a full spectrum collection was. CSI doesn't exist in Earth1. We may be less advanced than you Earth2ers in a lot of things, but at least we never invented procedurals or reality TV. . .at least not yet.
A female detective came in with the biggest camera I had ever seen. Ok, so I have seen video cameras that are bigger, but this obviously wasn't a video camera. She had to hold it in two hands to keep it steady. She started taking pictures of my chest area.
'They'll see my bra'. This time I noticed there was a different, well, flavor from my own thoughts. For a moment, the hand holding up my sweater twitched as if to cover my pecs, but I quickly regained control. After the police left I would have to talk to Mary, and Frank, about this.
At first the flash was just white, but then it started flashing in a number of other colors, and sometimes it didn't seem to flash at all when I heard the double CLACK of the shutter.
"So, where is the book he threw at you," asked the officer when the woman with the camera left.
"My Journal," I exclaimed. "Frank, I left it in the woods. I need to go over and get it." I hoped that Frank would get the message that I left it in Earth2 but we would see.
"It would be a good idea to go and retrieve it, but I think that can wait til morning." said the officer. He handed me an auto-dialer card. "The number is also printed on the strip. Call me if you need anything."
An auto-dialer card is a business card with a magnetic ink strip on the back. The strip has been encoded with a telephone number so that any of the newer phones that have card readers can automatically connect you to the number on the phone. A lot easier way to connect you to someone you don't know very well. See, we have a few things that you Earth2ers never thought of.
"Frank, we'll send child care division over tomorrow morning. You both can take care of him until then."
"Thanks, Richard. Sorry that this one was so late."
"Not to worry. It's my job, and I really like my job."
I smiled at this. I looked at my knees wondering why they hadn't asked me about the blood stains there, and realized that someone had been in to clean that up while I was asleep. There was still a slight discoloration but nothing particularly noticeable. When I looked back up the officer had already left.
I heard a ringing coming from my pocket. 'Who could be calling me at this hour' the not-me thought. That reminded me that I still had Jamie2's phone. Wait, her phone was ringing?
I opened up the phone and said "Hello?"
"I'm officer Richard Paxton. May I ask who I'm speaking with please?" There was a lot of static on the line, but I figured that must be normal for talking to another world.
"My name is Jamie." I'm not sure what, or who, possessed me to use that variation on my name, but I heard a gasp on the other end of the line.
"Jamie, where are you? They told us you were dead. Your Dad said he saw you covered in blood."
Crap. It was my, I mean Jamie2's Mom. What was I going to do? I thought for a moment and then replied, "I'm so sorry, Mom. I am dead. Brian killed me. He found out that I wasn't physically a girl. I love you Mommy."
'Mommy? What's going on here. I don't call my Mom Mommy'
'I do, so get over it.'
I didn't have time, yet, to figure out what was going on, but I would have to deal with this soon.
"I love you too, darling." Her Mom was crying. I sat there myself, thinking about how cruel a world can be where someone just trying to live their life is killed just for who they are.
"I have to go." I couldn't think of anything else to say, so I hung up. I turned off the phone so I wouldn't get any more uncomfortable calls.
I looked at my hand. How did I know how to turn off this phone. I had never gotten the details of Jamie2's life. It was all memory. I don't know about the rest of you, but my memories seem to be more symbolic than technical. I let my conscious mind interpret the images, so I can see that this object is a car, and that one a person and so on. The memories themselves, however, are just the five senses of the moment. Well, minus feel, since I can't ever seem to accurately remember that.
'I helped you, silly.'
'Jamie? How are you in my head?'
'Good question, Jimbo.'
'Um, could you please not call me that?'
'How 'bout Jimbob?'
'No.'
'Jimbalaya?'
'NO!' Have you ever realized how hard it is to yell at a voice in your head? Give it a try sometime. Without lungs and diaphragm, making something louder is a real headache, literally.
'I can't very well call you Jamie, even if that is what you call yourself.'
'I am Jamie1 and you are Jamie2."
'Why can't I be Jamie1'
'Cause we are in my body'
'You've got a point there.'
"Jamie, are you alright?" Mary had come into the room and was looking at me with a worried expression on her face.
"Sorry, I'm just talking with Jamie2. It seems she hitched a ride or something."
"Can I speak to Jamie 2." I snorted at this. How come other people can't get the subtle difference between Jamie 2 and Jamie2. Oh well.
"I'll see what I can do," I said and then thought, 'Ok, you take care of my body. I'm letting you into the pilot's seat.'
It was the strangest sensation I have ever felt. She changed posture, more demurely crossed her legs, and put her hands into her lap.
"You remind me of my Mary. Which I guess Jamie1 would call Mary2."
"Unless you have spontaneously exhibited Multiple Personality Disorder, I think I am speaking to Jamie 2, is that right?"
"Jamie1 says that it is Jamie2 not Jamie 2, but yes, you are."
"Okay, then, Jamie2. Can you tell me how you got here?"
"I'm not exactly sure myself. I saw Brian, I mean Brian2 jump out. He yelled at me, and then I felt the knife go in and grind against the bone. I watched him grow taller all of the sudden and wondered how it was happening. I left my body. And then watched as another me come out of nowhere and tackle Brian2."
'I didn't tackle Brian2. I did a reverse arm lock and disarm, followed by a half nelson and a leg sweep. Or did the half nelson happen first. . .'
"Jamie1 wants me to clarify that he did some jiujitsu-thingamy and didn't tackle Brian2," Jamie2 said with a giggle.
I fumed silently in my head as Jamie2 went on. I don't giggle.
"I saw him rummage around for my phone, and knew what he was going to try to do. I wanted to help him, but he wouldn't listen to me. I reached out to take the phone from him. At the moment that I touched his hand I was sucked in. I have been trying to figure out how to communicate since then. I could barely get through to him how to open and make a call before fading the first time. When I saw him dial 101 instead of 911 I made an extra effort. It took a lot out of me and I wasn't aware of anything until after the police came."
Mary sat there a little shocked. A somewhat effeminate boy had gone from 0-Girl in .10 seconds. Then the fact that this seemed to be a possession of someone by their own ghost. "I'm only a psychologist, not a parapsychologist, but even I can see that this probably isn't healthy for two people to inhabit the same body."
I took over at this point. "I don't think that Jamie2 would be happy in our afterlife, and I should probably go back over there so she can get on with it. I need my Journal anyway."
"Ok, we can do that tomorrow."
I didn't want to do it tomorrow. I think that Mary saw my disappointment.
"Ok, I can take you tonight."
She went into her room to change into something more appropriate than a dressing gown to go into the woods at night. She drove us in her car and we walked up to the crest of the hill. It took a lot less than four hours this time.
"Is the shimmer still here, Jamie, because I can't see it."
"Yep, it's right over there." I took her hand and pulled her over to it.
She put her hands forward and waved in the air blindly. Her right hand intercepted the portal and she jerked her hand away. "I just got an electric shock. I can't see anything there, but I can certainly feel it."
"I will hop over and let Jamie2 off then I will be right back."
It seems that Jamie2 had completely different ideas of how this was going to work. The woods had changed since the last time I was here. There was police tape around the top of the hill, and the grass outside of the tape had been trampled flat in places. Although it had been a little warm for it on Earth1, I was happy for my sweater now.
'Ok, Jamie2, get going. I want to go back home.'
'And I want to say goodbye to Daddy.'
'WHAT!?!' This gave me a bigger headache than last time. I could even feel Jamie2 cringe away from the noise. 'I don't want to even see him again, let alone say good bye'
'My Daddy never hit you, and certainly didn't throw your precious journal at you.'
My journal! I ran over to the tape and looked around the crime scene. Even in the scant light of the moon I could tell that my journal wasn't there. Did I mention that the cover is white? No? Well, the cover is white so it would be easily visibly against the dark underbrush.
"Where is it?" I said getting frantic. I looked all over the hill it wasn't here. The police must have taken it. How was I going to get it back now?
'I want to Say GOOD-bye TO MY DADDY!!!!!'
I put my hands to my head. If I thought I got a headache when I yelled at her, it was only a shadow compared to the one that Jamie2 just gave me. 'Geeze, Ok. We'll go say goodbye to your Daddy.'
I could feel Jamie2 jumping up and down and clapping. How did I get myself into this.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I wasn't going to just go off and leave Mary1 hanging. So, I hurried back through the portal. Once more the familiar tingling sensation took me and the air was warmer than it had been just a moment before.
"Mary, Jamie2 has decided she has unfinished business with her father. She won't leave me until we have gone and said goodbye."
Jamie2 was happy. Her happiness was almost infectious. I felt really sorry that she was dead.
'Jamie1, don't feel sad for me. I lived my life how I wanted to. I know that I missed out on the might have beens of the future, but at least you are alive to carry on for us.'
'I'm not a girl.'
'No, you are a Jamie. Whatever you decide for your life, it should be wonderful.'
I cried a bit, and was amazed at Mary's patience. "We have been standing here for a bit, Mary, weren't you going to say something?"
Mary chuckled a bit and smiled. "I could tell you were talking with Jamie2, and didn't want to interrupt."
"Thank you, Mary."
"I think the two of us should head back to my house for a couple of hours. We need to meet with child care division, and they can temporarily place you in Frank's and my care. Then you'll have time to take Jamie2 to go say goodbye."
'Yay' and she was off again with the jumping and hand clapping.
'When I become a girl, I'm not going to be this giddy.' I stopped, shocked by what I had just thought. I hadn't realized I had made a decision about my life before that moment. Mary had told me about other options to Testosterone injections when I told her about Jamie2's date with Brian. It had taken me a year to realize, but this is what I wanted. I knew it when Jamie2 received her dress eight years ago. Sure, it was her memory of receiving the dress, but it was my sense of loss when I realized I hadn't received it.
"Mary, I'm ready to start my life as a girl."
"Where did this come from, Jamie? This isn't because of Jamie2 is it?"
"She just helped me to realize the decision I'd already made."
"Well, let's get you home and we can talk about this after you get back from saying goodbye to Jamie2's Dad."
We went to the car, and I climbed into the passenger seat. I thought about everything that had happened to me over the past day. A short ride later and we arrived at Mary's home. She showed me the room they kept for runaways, and I stripped to my underwear and lay down in bed.
'How can you just leave your clothing on the floor? It's messy.'
'Jamie2, I'm trying to go to sleep.'
'Yeah, but. . .'
'No buts. We can clean it up tomorrow.'
'Jamie1. . .'
'Go to sleep!'
'Fine.'
I could tell she was sulking, but I was too tired to care. I woke up when my face hit the floor.
'JAMIE2! What did you do!' The headache was less this time. Guess I was just exercising some "muscles" I hadn't used before.
She was crying quietly in my head. 'I can't sleep anymore, so I decided to try to get the body up and clean up the room for you. It was a lot harder than when you let me talk to Mary1. It was like I was walking in cement, or something. I ran out of energy about the time we got out of bed and collapsed on the floor. I'm sorry, I was just trying to do something nice for you.'
I thought her a hug and picked myself up off the floor. 'I'll let you take over from me, but make sure I'm asleep before you get us out of bed, ok?'
I could feel Jamie2 smiling through her tears. 'Ok'
I let go of control of my body, and fell asleep faster than I ever had in the past. My dreams were garbled and tied up with being a twin, and my father being a monster.
'Jamie1, you need to get up. The child care officer is here.' Waking up with your eyes already open is a really weird sensation. 'Her name is Anne.'
'Thanks.' I replied to Jamie2 and focused on the officer in front of me.
"Are you ok, Jamie?" Mary asked.
"Yeah, I was in a meditative trance until just a moment ago."
"You were walking about in a meditative trance?" Anne said as she looked at me a little funny.
"Yeah, it's kind of like sleep walking."
Mary looked sharply at me. I knew she didn't approve of me lying to the officer, but I doubted the truth would help, or even be believed.
"So, why are you here, Jim?"
"I prefer Jamie, or do you like total strangers calling you Annie?
"I didn't mean anything by it, Jamie, I was talking to your parents before coming to talk to you, and they call you Jim. So, Jamie, why did you come to Mary and Frank's house?"
" I ran away from home. I was tired of my father hitting me. This time he threw my journal at me and cut my face."
"Did you have someone look at that?"
"I don't think it was that deep, and there were other things bothering me."
"Like what?"
Before I could respond, Mary interrupted me. "Tell her the truth this time, Jamie."
"I went up the hill behind our house and witnessed a murder, only it was in a different reality. The murdered person was the me from that world, and her ghost is inhabiting my body. She was in control while I was asleep."
Anne blinked a couple of times, started to say something, stopped, blinked again, and then finally found her voice. "Is this true, Mary?"
"As true as I can tell without a different degree."
Anne chuckled at this. "What degree would that be?"
"Parapsychology."
Anne's mouth made an 'oh' of surprise.
"You mean. . ."
"Can we talk to Jamie2 please?" Mary said as she looked at me.
'It's your show, Jamie2'
Jamie2 smoothed out her clothing, and sat up straighter. She put her knees together and sat closer to the front of the couch. "Hi, Anne. I met you at the door, remember?"
'It always used to be a little uncomfortable sitting this way.' Jamie2 said to me at the same time.
'I have no testes.'
'I would have given almost anything for that.'
"Yes, I thought that you changed a bit when you sat down, but I couldn't really put my finger on how. Now I see. "
"Pleased to meet you, as myself I mean." Jamie said with a demure little smile.
"What do I call you?"
"Jamie2 or just Jamie if you prefer."
"Jamie 2?"
"Jamie2 but that's close enough."
Anne talked to the two of us for about half an hour. I forget most of the particulars, but mostly she was asking me about my parents, and about times that my father had hit me. We talked about Mary and Frank and what I thought about them, after asking Mary to leave the room of course.
"Could you come back in here, Mary?"
Mary came back into the room.
"I think it would be best if both of them stay with you for the time being." Anne said with a smile.
"Really?" l asked with a little grin.
"Yes, really."
I did a little jig there in the living room while Mary and Anne laughed.
"I'll be here to check up on you in a weeks' time, and will assess what we are going to do at that point."
"Did you hear that, Mary. I get to stay here."
I was so elated that I didn't have to go back to my parents house that I didn't even notice Anne leaving.
"So, are you rested enough to go back to Earth2 to say goodbye to Jamie2's Dad?"
'Yes please.' Jamie2 said in my head.
"It would seem so. Jamie2 definitely is." This time I was dancing and clapping with Jamie2 in my head. I could suddenly see the appeal. Sure, we were happy about different things right now, but the happiness was something we shared.
Mary and I went out to the car, after Mary told Frank where we were going. We made the drive out to the hill once again.
"Mary, before I forget." I took Jamie2's phone out of my pocket. "If this rings, just open it up. The ear piece is where the picture is, and the mic is below the keypad. I will let you know if something comes up, and when to come to pick me up."
"Be careful over there, Jamie. We don't know what crossing over takes out of you, so I need you to pay attention to what your body is telling you. Make sure that your well rested before you try to come back again."
"Yes, Mary."
I stepped through the opening in the air and again found myself on Earth2. I suddenly felt very weak and tumbled to the ground. 'Help me, Jamie2' I said when I realized I couldn't lift myself back up again.
'I'm trying. I can't take control.'
'You have all the control you need.'
I was barely aware when Jamie2 stood us up and started running down the hill. I felt myself slipping out of consciousness and tried to hold on. Jamie2 ran into her house and found her Mom. 'Mommy, Jamie1 is hurt and I can't help him.' I'm not sure who fainted first. Me or Jamie's mom.
---
I woke up in my room. Ok, it wasn't my room, it was her room. I was underneath the yellow comforter and looking at the China doll on the shelf. She was dusty and looked like Jamie hadn't thought much about her in a while.
'That old thing? I never really wanted her in the first place. I liked the cloth doll better.'
I was shaken a bit. Had I misunderstood how this memory sharing worked all along? Did I get the raw feed, so to speak, and then simply applied my own values to them?
'It would seem so, Sis.'
'You calling me Sis now, Jamie2'
'It's less of a mouthful'
'You don't have a mouth anymore, girl'
'You know what I mean.'
'Ok, I can live with Sis.' Jamie2 knew the little thrill I had gotten when she called me that. 'So, to keep us straight, what would you like me to call you?'
'Well, it would be a little more special if you came up with it yourself.'
'How 'bout Metoo'
'That's almost as bad as Jimbalaya.' She thought as she mentally stuck her tongue at me.
'Nothing's as bad as Jimbalaya.' I agreed with her. 'Jams?'
'I like it. How are you feeling, Sis.'
'Better now.' I say. Why aren't you moving us about while I sleep.
She began to cry. 'Because it's all my fault that you collapsed. I could feel your energy reserves going down while you slept last time, but it was so much like I was the only one there, that I was alive again, that I couldn't stop. I needed to feel alive again.'
I couldn't imagine anything I could do to comfort her, I couldn't think of anything that would make her feel better. Then a thought came to me. 'Jams?'
'Yeah, Sis?'
'Maybe you could sleep if I let you into my dreams, like I let you take control of my body?'
I felt her perk up, and knew she would be beaming a smile if she still could. 'Let's try it,' she said with enthusiasm.
I still felt tired, so I rolled onto my side and let my mind drift as I fell asleep. I kept thinking over and over that I wanted Jamie2 to be a part of it. I'm not sure what I had been dreaming about before that moment, but there was a moment when my conscious mind reminded my unconscious one that Jamie2 should be there, and suddenly she was.
"It worked, Sis. I'm here!" She danced a little jig and I giggled.
I put my hand over my mouth. "Did that just come out of me?" Something felt wrong about my hand and I looked at it. My nails were a bit longer than normal, and perfectly shaped. There was an iridescent polish on them that seemed to change all the colors of the rainbow as the angle changed. "Oh, wow. Look at my hands."
"Look at your hands? Look at the rest of you?"
I was wearing a ball gown. It's color matched my nail polish, but it seemed a bit toned down, as if it only reflected pastels, and not the whole spectrum. I was wearing flats underneath it that shimmered like diamonds.
"Let's go find this dance you were dreaming about," Jamie2 said. She closed her eyes for a moment, and was in a dress similar in pattern, but a pale yellow in color. She grabbed my hand and we ran off in search of adventure.
This dream turned out to be one of my Princess saves handsome Prince tales, and Jamie2 and I had a blast trying to make it come out alright. I don't remember all of the dreams I had that night, but I do remember that Jamie2 was there with me in all of them.
I awoke feeling rested, with a smiling Jamie2 sitting in a corner of my mind. 'I didn't stay in the entire time, because some of your dreams are really weird,' she thought, with a grimace on her face, 'but after you showed me the way in, I think I can get in there anytime I get bored.'
I smiled at this. I knew that this entire situation was really tough on the both of us, but if I could make it easier in the least bit it made me happy. I squealed at this thought. 'You're contagious, you know that?'
'Which one of us was wearing the Rainbow Ball Gown when I showed up.'
I blushed because we both knew who she was talking about.
She giggled. I couldn't help it and I joined in with her.
'Come on, Sis. Let's get dressed in something more becoming.'
I felt a little scared, but I felt exited at the same time. I had never dressed like a girl before. This would be my first opportunity. We discovered that Jamie2 was couple of inches taller than me, and a bit bigger in the waist, but it was close enough that it could have been picked out just for me. We picked a knee length skirt and a tee shirt.
'Are you sure?' I asked her, looking at the skirt and shirt. 'They're girls clothing.'
'Of course they are. But they're also my clothes. No one will think anything about it, Sis.'
My heart beat faster as I slipped into her clothing. It was both fear and excitement that drove me forward. I was finally doing this. Sure, It wasn't anything like that little party dress I remember from so long ago, but it was a skirt.
I had a goofy grin on my face as I zipped up the skirt. I added a belt to the skirt to cinch it in that little bit, and then it was perfect.
'Let's do your makeup'
'Really? Do we have to?'
'Stop whining, Sis. It's unbecoming.' She said this last with a little grin and a giggle.
'Ok, but only because you made me.'
'That's the spirit.'
'If I let you take over, are you going to tire us both out?'
'That only seems to happen when you are asleep.'
So I let her take over. She had obviously had lots of practice. I had let my mind wander as she worked, thinking about the steps that had brought me here, when I felt her frown.
"It's not fair."
I looked in the mirror and I was shocked. Sure, I'd never be a beauty queen, but no one would take me for a boy. She had used techniques that I had never heard of, but the end result was subtle and eye catching. I still looked younger than my thirteen years, but now there was a femininity about me that was unmistakable. I probably would have still looked like a girl in the clothing I had worn here. 'It's amazing,' I thought with a look of awe on my face.
'That's why it's not fair. I had longer hair than you, but you just look more like a girl than I do.'
I knew this admission really hurt her, so I gave her a mental hug. 'Next time I have the Arthur dream, you get to be Guinevere, Ok?'
She chuckled sadly at this but responded, 'Ok'
I went downstairs to see her mom. 'What is your last name?' I asked. I had been assuming it was Patrice like mine, but I suddenly realized that I might be wrong. People were close in this reality, but not everything was perfect.
'Patriche, but my Mom went with Bonham-Patriche." She pronounced it like Pat-ree-shay, so that fit with the odd pronunciation for my own last name, Pat-rees. She also got the reason that I had asked.
"I'm sorry if we scared you when we came in, Mrs. Bonham-Patriche"
Jamie2's Mom looked up when I came in. Her eyes were a bit puffy, but she gave me a smile. "You make me sound all stuffy. Call me Helen, if you must, but I would prefer Mom."
"You do look a lot like my Mom, but you certainly don't act like her." She looked a bit startled at this, so I continued, "My father beat me, and she did nothing about it. I had to wear lots of sweaters and turtle-necks to hide the bruises."
"I'm so sorry, sweetie. I know that nothing I say can make up for what your Mom did. I just know that if my Andrew ever did anything like that, and I knew about it, I would kick him to the curb in a blink."
"My father's name is Allen, so there at least is a little difference in our worlds. . ."
"Jamie, my Jamie, told me about it after getting me back up. I really don't know what to think about it, but seeing you in her makeup and clothes, I can see that the resemblance is not perfect. You look very nice."
"Your Jamie thinks I look better than she did."
Helen2 Chuckled. "She was always one to give a complement, where one was due. So, why did the two of you come here? Not that it matters, I loved spending a little more time with my daughter. The trip seems to have taken a lot out of you, however, and I'm worried that it was for something important."
"Jamie2 wants to say goodbye to her Dad. She thinks then she might be able to move on. It's a little crowded in here with the two of us." Helen2 grimaced. "I really like your daughter, Helen2. She's like the sister I never always had. I have been sharing her memories for years. It's just that it is tough to live with two people in a space that was only really designed for one."
"I think I understand what you mean. While I will be really sad to see my daughter leave, you have given me the opportunity to make peace with her passing. It makes it more like a sudden illness than. . .than. . ."
She began to cry, so I walked over and hugged her. "It's okay, Mommy. Jamie2 isn't gone yet, and I tied up the boy who did this and called the police on him."
"Brian did this?"
"Yes. Didn't the police arrest him?"
"They got there and he said something about being attacked by a maniac with a knife. He says that he tried to fight the assailant off, but he was overpowered and knocked out. By the time he came to, he was tied up and Jamie was dead. I had him here consoling me over the loss of my daughter right after they released him."
'That little bastard was in my house and lying to my Mom?!' Jamie2 began to sob uncontrollably.
"They're looking for the mystery assailant. Apparently he left behind some sort of journal."
'Ask my Mom why the police told her so much about the case. Don't they usually keep this all a secret?'
I repeated her question to her Mom.
Helen2 blushed. "Usually they would, but I used to date Richard, I mean Detective Paxton, who is in charge of the case."
I sat back in my seat. Not only did they have my journal, but now they wanted me, and not Brian2, for Jamie2's murder. It just keeps getting better and better. "Helen2 I think that I need to talk to Detective Paxton again."
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
While Helen2 called Detective Richard on her personal phone. . .
'It's a cell phone.'
'Am I telling this story, or are you, Jams.'
'You are, of course, Sis.'
While Helen2 was calling Detective Richard on her cell phone, I went into the living room and called Mary1. There was more static on the line than last time.
"Jamie?"
"It's taking longer than I thought it would." Mary1 chuckled at this. "You knew this would happen, didn't you?"
"I thought there might be some complications."
"Well, I collapsed after going through the portal, Jamie2 got us to her house safely, but we slept until the next morning."
"You're ok now?"
"Yes, Mary. Both of us are ok. Oh, yeah, we found out that Jamie2 can share my dreams with me."
"Ok. . ."
Mary1 was like that. She would never ask me questions when she wanted me to open up. She would say things like 'ok' and then wait for me to respond. I told her about what happened, and about the police wanting me for questioning. I told her about dressing up, and the makeup. Since I wasn't going to be back for a bit, we talked about my decision to become a girl as well, and what helped me make up my mind.
"Remember that you need to do all of this for yourself. You can't sideline your own desires to make someone else happy."
"This is what I want, Mary. I was surprised when I saw myself in makeup, but it also felt right. It was as if I was seeing myself the way I was meant to be. I really missed my nails when they were gone in the next dream I had."
"Then you should try growing them out a bit. Remember, though, that nails in real life have to be taken care of, and even then they sometimes break."
I giggled a bit at that. "I know that."
"A girl for a whole day, and already an expert. You must be a teenager."
I blushed. "Sorry, Mary. I know you're only trying to help." I looked up and saw Helen2 standing in the doorway. "Gotta go. I will call you again when I can."
"Take care, Jamie," she said, and I hung up the phone.
"I called Detective Paxton, and asked him to come over."
I felt a little scared at the prospect of talking to the police about what had happened. It must have showed to Helen2 because she hugged me. My own Mom never hugged me. I began to cry, and hugged her back.
"It's okay, Honey. You don't have to worry about Richard. He's a good man, and a good cop as well."
"But, but, what if they don't believe me."
"Everything will be alright. Trust me on this. We will get you through this."
After I stopped crying, I went back upstairs and watched while Jamie fixed my makeup. It would take some practice, but I didn't think it would be too hard to get the hang of. I had applied stage makeup for some school plays I had been in and a lot of the concepts were the same.
We went downstairs and sat on the couch. I did my best to sit in a ladylike manner while we waited for Detective Paxton.
I don't think the name really dawned on me before he walked into the room. I liked him better in his civilian clothing. I think his shield was the same, though. He stopped dead on the threshold. He took one look at me and put his hand on his gun holster. "Helen, I know who you think this person is, but that's just not the case."
"What are you doing, Richard? I know this isn't my Jamie, but she explained that."
"I heard what you said over the phone, and it's just too much to believe. I need for him to come downtown with me."
"She looks just like Jamie."
"He killed my Jamie."
I felt shocked at this revelation. His Jamie? What's going on here.
'Jams, do you know what he's talking about? You weren't dating him as well, were you.'
'Ewe. He's old. Sure, he's not bad looking, but yuck.'
'I totally agree with you. Of course I wouldn't have ever dated Brian2..."
'Be nice, Sis.' She said while sticking her tongue
This interchange took only a moment, but I had already missed something. Helen2 had said something to Detective Paxton, and he was looking embarrassed. Then he nodded at her and she turned toward me.
"What's going on, Helen?" I was really beginning to get worried. She looked so sad.
"Jamie was Richard's daughter."
"Then that means. . ." My world reeled. Connections started coming together. Parts of conversations and statements that my father, no, not my father, that Allen had made while he was beating me. I was a constant reminder to him of my Mother's cheating. It must be. Just like Helen2 had an affair with Richard2, my own mother must have had an affair with Richard1.
But why didn't Richard1 recognize me then?
'Because your mother never told him, Sis.'
Parallel but different. I'm not sure I would ever get used to this. The similarities seemed destined to screw up my ability to cope. I must have been a bit in shock, because the next thing I knew, Richard2 was helping me to my feet and leading me toward the car. He put me into the back seat.
"We need to contact your parents. What is your real name?"
I thought about giving a smart-ass reply for a moment, but then decided that the truth might work a bit better. "My name is Jamie Patrice. My guardian has Jamie2's cell phone. You can reach her there."
"Jamie 2?"
I rolled my eyes at him. I hoped that my Dad wasn't as slow as this guy was. "Jamie Patriche's cell phone."
Helen2 came out of the house before he could shut the door. "Jamie, both of you, I have an appointment to close on a house that I just can't reschedule. I will be at the station as soon as I can so that we can sort this out."
Richard2 shut the door and got into the front seat. I couldn't open the door from the inside, and there was a plastic barrier between the front and back seats. Luckily I am small so the tight confines of the back seat didn't cause me any problems. I entertained myself by looking out the window at all of the differences between our two worlds. Close to the point where I crossed over, the differences were minor. A tree here or there, but the hills and other ground formations were the same. Jamie2's house was in almost the same place as mine, and had virtually the same floor plan. The paint colors were different.
The land changed the further away we got from her house. The freeway was nothing like in my world and I marveled at the ribbon of concrete. We only stayed on the freeway for a couple of exits and then we were back on city streets. Something a little strange seemed to happen as we got closer to the police station.
I had been to the police station a number of times in the past on Earth1, for school field trips and the like. The police station, barring a light difference in color scheme, was in exactly the same place, and had the same landscaping. Well, as far as I could tell.
'Don't you dare even think about it, Sis. We need to try to resolve this, not make it even worse.'
'Think what? I'm not thinking anything.'
'Don't give me that. I'm in here, remember?'
I blushed, but I knew she was right. I had been thinking that if I had crossed over to this world in a place that was close to my own physically, then I might be able to cross again here. 'I will save that for if we get into real trouble, ok?
I could feel her quizzical look, but I ignored it. I couldn't stay here to resolve her murder. The police would be able to get it fixed up. . .eventually.
'You promised we could say goodbye.'
'And if it is at all possible, we will.'
'A promise is a promise. You have to keep it for me.'
I suddenly felt an emptiness in my head. I knew Jamie2 wasn't gone, but I'm not sure she could still hear me. I tried to talk to her a couple of times as I was led into a small room with a mirror on one wall. She never responded.
They let me sit in the room for a while. It was white and boring. I figured that they were watching me from behind the mirror, but I didn't really care at this point. Jamie2 was disappointed with me. I was locked in a room, yes, I checked, without any windows. I walked over to the mirror and examined myself in it. I looked like millions of pre-teen girls around the country, despite my dirty blonde hair being in a very boyish haircut. No real hip development to speak of, and flat as a board of course. This made me smile. The makeup job that Jamie2 had done for me still looked good. I looked a little young to be wearing makeup, but at least it wasn't heavy. I looked at my eyes and was a bit startled. The center seemed to be a sort of orange color, which seemed to be pushing into the green that my eyes normally were. I wouldn't call the green outside a ring, since it didn't have a regular thickness.
I looked at my eyes a bit more, making sure that it wasn't just a trick of the light. I then realized that more time was passing, and no one had come in to talk to me yet. 'Ok, this is about enough of this,' I thought to myself. I rapped on the mirror with my knuckles. "Can we get on with this, please?"
I'm not sure if that had anything to do with them getting off their butts and talking to me, but it was only about thirty seconds later that they came in the door. Richard2 was of course one of them, but there was uniformed officer with him as well. "Have a seat, please. Have you ever seen this before?"
Richard2 tossed my Journal on the table. I wanted to do nothing more than snatch it from the table, but I restrained myself. "That's my therapy journal. I write my thoughts and feelings in there as a means of working through issues. Mostly I wrote about the glimpses I had into your daughter's life."
I figured that it was a little strange that Richard2 was still working on a case that involved his daughter, so I thought I would get that out there. I've watched cop shows, you know.
The door opened. "A word please, Detective Paxton."
I smiled at this. It seems they didn't know. Well, this would be interesting to see, but I knew that they would leave me here where the action wasn't. I picked up the bag that they had put my journal in. My blood spotted the front of the white book. It almost seemed like a badge of honor there.
The officer that was still in the room took this moment to speak up, "I don't think you should be touching that."
"It's my book."
"It's evidence in a crime."
I was getting tired of all of this. I put my hand on the book and began to concentrate. I had taken my clothing with me, and this book, as I switched worlds. Maybe I could simply push the book across to the other world. The light started to get a little dim, or maybe I was just blacking out, but I could feel a connection of some sort. I remembered then that this is where Richard1 worked. I tried to focus on the part of me that came from him, to focus on our connection as Father and daughter. I felt the book start to pull away from me, so I let it go. It disappeared before it hit the table.
"What did you do with the book?" The officer walked over to me. He seemed to be a little agitated.
"Search me. . ." I said jokingly, but the officer did just that. It should have been obvious that I wasn't hiding anything in the shirt, and that the skirt couldn't hide anything at all, but he went ahead and frisked me anyway. He didn't find it, of course.
"Stand over there, by the wall, and don't move."
I figured I had pushed my luck enough for one day so I went to stand by the wall. Suddenly I felt myself begin to fall, and I couldn't stop myself. I felt the concrete floor hit me, but I couldn't even put my hands out to catch myself. I hit my head and blacked out.
---
"Queen Guinevere, we need to rally the troops. Mordred is bringing his army to attack Arthur and he only has Lancelot and Gawain to protect him."
I was about to answer the page, when I realized I wasn't on the throne. I was in a Lady-in-waiting dress. Jamie2 was on the throne, as I had promised her she would be. "Send for my armor, and sound the battle cry. We will save my husband from the treachery of foul Mordred."
Not the lines I had used last time, but not bad for all that. "Your Highness, you can't lead our troops into battle," I said trying to get Jamie2's attention. "Sir Galahad is fully prepared to protect your honor on the field of battle."
I don't know where I got this idea, but I had always felt that you should let the best person for the job do that job. In this dream, the best person to save Arthur was Galahad.
"Sis!! I am so happy to see you. I came in here to get away from you and I got stuck."
"Huh?"
"Apparently I can only get out of your dreams if you are here to let me out. Apparently you come to this one fairly frequently, so I was able to get out of the first dream into this one fairly easily."
"I'm so sorry that I made you mad, Jams. Can you forgive me?"
"Of course I can, Sis. Provided that you can get me out of here."
I giggled at her response. "I don't think either of us are getting out of here for the time being. I hit my head when I fell and I seem to be unconscious right now."
"Why did you fall?"
"Um, well, I figured that if I couldn't go home right now, at least I could send my Journal there."
"You opened a portal and put your journal through?"
"Not exactly."
I told her what happened and her eyes widened. "You seem to have one versatile power there."
"Now, if only I could stop passing out when I use it. I passed through a couple of times without issues. Why so many problems now?"
"I don't know. Maybe you had reserves when you started that both of us have been using up. You know, when I ran around while you were asleep and unconscious, and the number of times you hopped back and forth."
"You're probably right, although I think that it was more you using up my reserves more than crossing over." I smiled and stuck my tongue out at her after saying this. "Suddenly, I don't feel very good."
I felt like someone was trying to pull me through myself. "Jams, grab my hand. I think they are trying to revive me." I stretched my hand out to Jams as she reached for me. I grabbed her hand just as I felt one final yank. I opened my eyes.
I was in a different room than the one I'd been in before. I was lying on a couch, and I had a scratchy blanket over me. Someone was removing a vial of vile smelling. . .something. . .from under my nose. It was another plainclothes officer. I carefully sat up. I put my hand to my head. There was a bump on the side of it.
"I need to ask you some questions, Miss."
I smiled at him. He was the first person I didn't know who took me for a girl. "How can I help you?"
"What did you do with the book?"
"It was my journal. I picked it up because I wanted it back. I'm not sure how to tell you what I did next, other than to say I sort of pushed it back home."
"You did a magic trick?"
"Isn't it on the video? You have cameras in the room, don't you?"
"On the cameras, the book began to glow the instant before you let it go, and then there was a bright flash and the book was gone."
"There wasn't any flash. It just disappeared."
"That's what Sergeant Ames and Detective Torres said as well."
"Then why won't you believe me?"
"I do believe you, honey. I really need to know why."
"It didn't belong here. It was mine. It needed to be on Earth1 to help prosecute Allen Patrice for abusing me."
"Earth1?"
I goggled at him a moment. No one had ever gotten the emphasis right the first time. I shook myself and responded, "I am from Earth1. This is Earth2. It is how I name things to keep them straight. Like the difference between Helen2 and my Mom."
The detective was about to say something else when I heard Helen2's voice. "I demand to be brought to the young lady this instant. If she's under arrest, then I demand she have a lawyer present during any interrogation."
'Your Mom is a lot more outgoing than mine, Sis.'
'I know,' she thought as she beamed a smile.
"Over here, Helen2," I said as I stood and waved to her.
"Are you okay, Sweetie?"
"Yes, Helen2. I'm ok."
"That's good. What's this?" She reached up and touched the bump on my head.
"I collapsed and hit my head."
She looked concerned at this. "Are you sure you're ok?"
"I'm really fine. I was pushing myself further than I should have. Could you find out if they tried to call Mary1 on Jamie2's phone? I want to call her and tell her I'm fine if they did."
Helen2 looked over at the detective next to me, who shook his head. "We're not sure what Detective Paxton was trying to pull, but he is on suspension. He decided to question you without even trying to contact your guardian."
Helen2 looked like she was getting angry, but I spoke up. "Helen2, He's Jamie2's Dad. He shouldn't have been working her case, but I don't think he should be punished for trying to help her."
"I need to have some words with him, anyway." Helen2 got up and walked off.
I turned to the detective. "Brian2's prints should be on the knife. Why did you let him go?"
"The prints were smudged."
"But I saw him kill her."
"You witnessed the crime? Why didn't you say so before?"
"Well, because, I thought I wouldn't have to be involved. I thought subduing him and calling the police would be enough."
"How did this happen?"
I told him the whole tale again, including crossing worlds to try to save Jamie2, and getting there much too late. I described how I subdued Brian2 and how I tied him up with her belt.
"That explains a couple of things. I'll get you a piece of paper so you can write your witness statement. One note. I know what happened, and so do you. I saw the footage of the book, and know that Sergeant Ames and Detective Torres are honest men. Unfortunately a Jury will not have the same luxury."
"Ok. . ." I had no idea where he was going with this.
"I have never told a witness to lie in a statement. I never will. Just make sure that your statement is truthful and believable."
I think I understood what he wanted, so I nodded.
He got me a legal pad and a pen and I wrote out a statement and signed it. I finished and sat for a while waiting for someone to tell me what to do. I saw them bringing in Brian2 in hand cuffs.
He looked up and saw me from across the room. A look of horror crossed his face. "I killed you, you fucking faggot. I saw you bleed to death. There's no fucking way you're still fucking alive. I'll finish the job I started." He tried to run at me, but the officers restrained him.
The detective walked over, looked over my statement, and then tore it up. "Looks like we won't need this anymore. Thank you for your cooperation, Jamie, and I'm sorry for the trouble that Detective Paxton put you through.
"It's alright, Detective. . ."
"Patrice. I'm Detective Allen Patrice."
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I looked at Detective Patrice for a moment longer than was comfortable for either of us. It had to be a coincidence of some sort, since he looked nothing like my father. Step-father? Allen1. I giggled at this last one. Most kids my age on Earth2 won't remember Tron, but it actually came out in 2002 on Earth2 (Well, if converted to Earth1 dates). Brian1 dragged me to it with his friends a couple of times. They locked me in the girls bathroom the second time. Brian1's dad had to let me out.
'Why did you keep hanging out with Brian after that?'
'I was seven. Boys do stupid things, and he apologized for it. Said it was just a joke.'
'Like the BMX flip?'
'I'm ignoring you now.'
This isn't about Brian1, it's about Allen2. Stop giggling, Jams.
I looked away from Allen2 and blushed. He had the same last name as I did, but he looked nothing like my step-father. "Can I leave now?"
He told me that I could, so I walked over to where Helen2 was standing. "I'm ready to go, Mom. . .I mean Helen2." I blushed hotter than I did when Allen2 caught me staring.
"Jamie, I told you that it was ok for you to call me Mom. I know I'm not really your Mom, and that you're not really my Jamie, but we're close enough, right?"
I kept my head down and nodded at this. "I guess you're right, Mom. This is all just so wierd and new to me."
"Don't you think it's the same for me? I'm burrying my daughter this weekend, and yet here she seems to be as large as life." I saw her starting to cry and so I went over and gave her a hug. "Thank you, sweetie. Let's get you home so that Jamie can say goodbye."
For the first time since this all started, I realized that I might want to stay on version of Earth. Ok, I know, it had only been two days since this all started, but there had been a lot happening in that two day period. It sometimes felt like it had been a week, instead of a couple of days.
Helen2 drove us home by way of the city streets, and I began to notice other places where the Earth's had similarities: The Library was in the same slight depression, the strip mall had different shops but the same layout, and other things minor similarities along the way. I was thinking about what could have caused these similarities when I caught my reflection in the window. My eyes were almost completely orange. I pulled down the sun blind on the passenger side, and it had a vanity mirror on the other side. I looked at my eyes more closely. There were only a couple of spikes of green left in my eyes. The rest was the orangey-brown that I had noticed in the police station.
'What could be causing this,' I thought to myself. Before this happened, I would be worried if someone other than myself answered.
'It could be tied with pushing your journal to the other side?' She was as confused as I was. It was also the best explanation I was likely to get without laboratory testing. While I was looking at my eyes we arrived at home.
"Why don't you go lie down for a while. I will make an appointment with a doctor so that we can figure out why you passed out twice in the past twenty-four hours."
"Thanks, Mom." It was really weird calling someone other than my own mother Mom, but it seemed to make both Jams and Helen2, so who was I to complain. Sure, sometimes she felt like my mother, so sometimes it felt right. The rest of the time I just felt like I was betraying my own mom doing it.
I went upstairs. From past experience, I cleaned off my makeup before lying down. I also got myself undressed, this time I put Jams' clothes in the hamper so that she could be happy about her room staying clean. I was asleep almost before by head touched the pillow. I don't remember any of the dreams I had before Jams was screaming at me to wake up.
I awoke to see someone who looked exactly like my step-father climbing into bed with me. He was naked. Jams was sobbing hysterically in a corner of my mind and saying 'I didn't know, I'm sorry' over and over in my head. I was already moving. I brought my knee into his crotch as hard as I could, and while he was crumpling up I slipped out of bed and ran to the door. It was locked, and I was unfamiliar with the mechanism. I felt more than saw him come up behind me.
"You little shit, you'll pay for that."
I skipped to the side as he tried to punch at me. He put his had through the door. In the moments it took for him to get himself free, I started into my attack. I threw punches and knees at his kidneys. I kicked the backs of his knees. I dislocated his right shoulder by twisting it up and away when he threw a wild punch behind him. I kept kicking him in the balls until he collapsed on the ground. I kicked him a couple of more times to make sure he wouldn't be getting up for a moment and then unlocked the door.
I was so focused on subduing my assailant, that I hadn't heard Helen2 pounding on the door. She burst in as soon as I unlocked the door, took one look at her husband on the floor, and grabbed the comforter from the bed. "Honey, wrap this around you, and go downstairs for a bit. Keep your brother down there."
"Um. . ."
"Go, now, Jamie."
I left, but not before seeing her open her cell phone. I went downstairs and sat in the living room. Jamie2 was still hysterical.
'I'm so sorry. I didn't know. I never meant to put you into danger. I'm so sorry.'
'Shhh. It's ok, Jams. Nothing happened. We're safe now.'
'But, I should have known. He spend so much time with my brothers when they were younger. He never spent that much time with me.'
'That doesn't mean anything, Jams. It's not your fault. You didn't make that bastard attack us.'
'It was my daddy.' She began to wail again. I thought her a hug and imagined that I just held her until she stopped crying. I heard a siren approach the house and saw the flashing lights. The police knocked on the front door. I went and let them in and pointed upstairs. I didn't feel like talking to anyone but Mary right now. I went to the kitchen and got the phone.
I dialed Jams' number and waited while it rang. "Hello, Jamie?"
"Mary. . ." Suddenly, all of my tension broke in a wave. I began to sob and told Mary all that had happened to me today. She just listened to me talk. I kept talking for almost an hour when I started to hear a beeping sound on the phone.
"The screen says that the phone is about to die, Jamie. I'll need to figure out how to recharge it, if I can. I will call Jamie1's house when I get it working ag. . ." She was gone.
I felt even more lost than when I started the call. I sat in the kitchen and hugged my shoulders sobbing quietly. Jams enfolded me in a mental hug and we both cried into each other. It wasn't a real hug, but it felt real. As I continued to cry, I felt someone else hug me.
"It's ok, sweetie. He can't hurt you now. Did he. . .I mean. . .Was my Jamie. . ."
'Tell Mommy that he never touched me like that.'
"Jamie says he never raped her."
'SIS!'
"She also yelled at me for paraphrasing."
Helen2 chuckled ruefully. "Tell her that I agree with your version."
"She can hear you, Mom."
Helen2 blushed. At that moment a boy of nine or ten came into the kitchen, rubbing his eyes. "Where's dad?"
"Well, sweetie, Dad tried to, um. . ."
"Dad tried to play with me in an inappropriate manner, So I beat him up and then the police came and arrested him."
"You mean that I don't have to play the bedroom games with Dad anymore. Thank you Jamie. I knew that you didn't die like Mom said. You saved me." He ran over and threw his arms around me. I had no idea who this hurt little child was. It was obvious that he was Jamie2's brother, but I didn't have a brother. I didn't have a sister either.
'What about me?'
I didn't have a sister before I met with Jamie2. I was out of my depth. I put my arms around the shaking body of the little boy and tried to comfort him as best as I could. He snuggled into me. "Do you want to talk to me about it?"
He shook his head. I just held him for a while, letting him relax. Mom hand up the phone. I hadn't even noticed that she had picked up the phone.
"Gabe, I have set an appointment for you to speak to Mary. Would you like to speak to Mary like your big sister?"
He looked uncertain for a moment, looked up at me, and then nodded his head. "I can do it if Jamie can do it."
I smiled down at him.
"Jamie, your appointment is at the same time."
My smile faded a bit. "Jamie, are you ok? Are you afraid of your doctor?" I looked into his eyes and shook my head. "I am worried about my appointment, but I'm not afraid of my doctor."
"Let's get you into bed."
I pried his hands off me long enough to put on a nightgown, and then I led him to his room. I sat down next to him and rubbed his back while he relaxed and went to sleep. I left his door open and I went back downstairs to talk to Helen2.
"Is Gabe asleep?"
"Yes, he's asleep now. This is nothing like my world. My step-father might have beat me up, but he never molested me."
"Probably the only thing that saved my Jamie was that he thought of her as a girl. Why did he think differently about you?
I blushed. "Um, I was in my boy underwear, and I wasn't under the covers."
She nodded at that, but she was staring off into space as she did it. She shook herself. "Well, tomorrow is going to be busy. We need to visit the doctor early tomorrow, so you should get some sleep while you can, Honey."
I hugged her. "Jamie loves you, Mommy. And I love you too."
She smiled, and I went up to our room. I looked into the mirror and was startled to see more green than the last time I looked at my eyes.
'Your eyes are more green. . ."
'I think it means I got some of my energy back. I think it was sleeping that did it.' I felt Jamie pull away from me a little bit.
'Jams, what's wrong?'
'As soon as you get your energy back, you'll go back to your world, and I either have to move on, or go with you. I like my world. I don't want to lose my Mommy and brothers.'
'Brothers?'
'I have another one in college.'
'Jams, I like your family, well minus your Daddy'
I felt Jamie shudder. 'I'm soooo sorry that I dragged you here now. We should have just stayed on the other side.'
'Don't say that. We would never have known, and we couldn't have saved Gabe.'
'Thank you, Sis. You always know how to cheer me up.'
'It helps that we are virtually the same person.'
I changed into a pair of Jams' panties before I climbed back into bed. For some reason sleeping in my old underwear creeped me out all of the sudden. Strangely enough, the panties were actually more comfortable than my old ones. I climbed into bed, and went to sleep.
Jams and I played in my dreams 'til morning. It seemed that since allowing Jams into my dreams, I had a lot more control of the dreamscape, and I could even, sometimes, choose which dream we were in. We did the Arthur dream twice, and each of us got to be Guinevere.
When Jams left, I started crafting a dream. I'm not sure exactly how to describe the process. It was a lot like oil painting with cotton candy, if that makes any sort of sense.
I was making a place for her to live. Added her Mom and brother to the house. I felt Jams coming back, so I locked the dream away and went to meet her. I didn't want her to see it until it was ready.
'Time to get up, Sis.'
I woke up and went the bathroom to bathe. Jams and I then argued a bit on how to make my hair look more feminine. In the end, neither of us had any real luck, but she was more successful than I was. She has had more practice. I went back to our room and looked in the closet and drawers for something to wear. I picked a button up white blouse with puffed sleeves. I picked a pair of jeans to go with it. Jamie showed me how to tuck myself away so I wouldn't show in the jeans.
I got a pair of her flats, the ones she thought went best with the outfit, and we put on makeup. Or I should say I messed up our makeup, and Jams salvaged it. More of the green was back in my eyes from the last time I had looked.
Gabe was still asleep, so I gently woke him up. He threw on some clothing. 'Boys sure have it easier sometimes,' I thought with a smile.
'Do you want to go back, Sis?'
'Not on your life.'
We went downstairs and had some breakfast. It was cold cereal and toast, but that was fine with me. Mom looked at me for a moment.
"Jamie should know that I don't really approve of thirteen year-olds wearing makeup on a daily basis. However, since you both kept it very light, and it does make you look a lot more feminine, I think we can leave it for now."
I felt Jams jumping and clapping again.
The moment that she saw my grin get bigger, she put up a cautioning hand, "The first time I see you lathering on the makeup, however, it all goes away."
I went and kissed her on the cheek. "Thank you, Mommy."
After breakfast we went and got in the car and went to the Clinic. It was sort of a small hospital, but didn't offer surgery or anything like that. Mom. . .I mean Helen2 left me in the waiting room while she took Gabe down to see Mary2.
They called my name while I was still waiting for Helen2.
"My Mom is with my brother right now," I said to the nurse who came out to get me.
"You can wait for your Mother if you want, but you might have to wait a bit longer."
'I'm here with you, Sis."
"I'm ready to go back now, thank you."
The nurse smiled at me and we went back into the Clinic. She measured my height and weight, and checked my blood pressure. Then she led me into one of the patient rooms. I sat on the table and waited for the doctor to arrive.
"So, Jamie, I see that you fainted a couple of times in the past couple of days. . .what happened to your hair?" The doctor stopped dead in his tracks at the first sight of me. He was an older man with salt and pepper hair. I liked him instantly. "You certainly look a lot like Jamie, but you don't look exactly the same. You could almost be her identical twin."
"I'm Jamie from another world."
"Really," he began to chuckle as if this were a joke, but then stopped. He noticed I wasn't smiling.
"Well, at least you seem convinced. So, tell me what happened."
I went into the full story, again, this time including the changes in eye color I had noticed before, as well as the total number of times I had crossed back and forth.
"You say that Mary. . .Mary1 was it," at my nod he continued, 'got an electric shock when she touched the portal?"
"Yes."
"Hmm. I have to admit that this is a bit beyond my understanding. There are some tests on body chemistry I can run, and so forth, but we would have to enlist a research facility to fully explore what you are capable of, and I'm not sure that's such a good idea at your age. Especially with your other life choices."
He sat back for a moment. "I want you to try to push this tongue depressor." He handed me the oversized popsicle stick and I concentrated on sending it to Earth1. "Stop, that's enough. You were right, my dear. When you begin to use your power, it seems that whatever chemical reaction fuels it, causes your eyes to change color. What exactly that process is, I'm not ready to speculate, but I think you should be very careful when you use this ability. It also seems as though geography is not as important as having a sentient focus."
"What do you mean?"
"When you tried to push the Journal across, before thinking about your father, you almost used up all of your reserves. So, you had almost no energy left. When you tried to connect to your father and then push it, you easily opened a door for the book. This ability needs a focus. It also seems to weaken the, um, wall, I guess you could call it, between worlds."
"How do you know so much about this?" I looked at him in awe.
"I read a lot of science fiction books." He said. He blushed a bit as he said this.
"From what you were saying about your phone calls, the original portal is closing. You opened another with the book, but that too will probably close in time. It might take the books opening longer to close, because of all the energy you originally put into it, but then again, it might close faster. We just don't know."
I nodded, a bit confused.
"Don't worry about it, Jamie. I'm sure you will be ok. Let's get some blood drawn, and then we can go find your Mother."
One of the nurses drew my blood, and then they wanted me to give them a urine sample, which was embarrassing. I got all of that done, and we went to Mary2's office to wait for Mom and Gabe.
I sat down and picked up the closest magazine, which happened to be a teen magazine. I read through it, since I had nothing better to do. Ok, I liked it a lot. Mom and Gabe came out with Mary2.
"Hello, Jamie. Do you have time to come talk to me for a bit," Mary2 asked me.
Her tone worried me a bit. 'Don't worry, Sis. We'll be fine.' I took a deep breath and stepped past Mary2 into the room.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I walked into Mary2's office and stopped. It wasn't anything like the office I was used to. Most of the same items were there. It just seemed that something was different. Her Vincent van Gogh Sunflower print was on the left wall, instead of straight ahead. On the back wall, in place of the van Gogh, was a picture I had never seen before. It seemed to be a set of stairs running upwards forever. Or was it going down? There were people going both ways. It was on top of a castle, or something. I really liked it.
"Examining my Escher again?"
I turned around, startled. Mary2 was standing just behind me. "You startled me."
"You haven't looked that intently at that print since the first time you came to see me."
I had no idea what to say. I opened my mouth a couple of times to speak, but nothing came out. In my own world, I considered Mary1 to be a friend. What would it be like for her to find out I was dead? And what if someone who looked exactly like me came to tell her.
"What did you do to your hair, Jamie? Trying the short look?"
"I've never had long hair." I said before thinking, and then wanted to take it back. How could I be so thoughtlessly cruel.
Mary2 seemed to crumple in on herself. 'Help her, Jams'
I felt Jams take control and go to hug Mary2. "I'm not completely gone."
Mary had a confused look on her face. "Jamie?"
"Yes, Mary. It's me. I'm hitching a ride in this Jamie for the time being." I smirked at that. Of course, with Jams in control of my mouth for the time being, only she could really see it.
I saw Mary2 genuinely smile. They sat and talked for a while, and seemed to have the same sort of relationship that Mary1 and I did. At least some things didn't change. I did notice another thing that bothered me. She wasn't wearing a wedding ring. 'What happened to Frank?'
'Who's Frank?'
'Mary's husband,' I thought. Of course Frank was her husband. There should be at least that much similarity between worlds.
'Mary's not married.'
I felt really sorry for this Mary, and was glad she had a moment of happiness with her Jamie. Even though I hadn't started liking him until recently, I could always tell that Mary1 had been deeply in love with her husband. I couldn't ever understand why, but I could see it there in how he treated her, and how she reacted to that treatment.
I knew that this Mary must feel a void in her life that nothing would ever fill.
I began to cry, and I just couldn't stop. Disembodied crying hurts inside a lot more than normal crying does. I knew that it wasn't only Mary2 that I was crying for, but myself, and Jamie, and everyone else that had been hurt, or killed, in the past little while. I didn't realize what was happening enough to know that Jams had given me back the body before I felt myself collapse on the couch.
Mary sat down beside me and put her hand on my shoulder, and when I didn't seem to be letting up, she got up. I felt so alone in that moment. What would I do? I just couldn't stop, and started to feel something uncontrollable welling up inside of me. I was terrified I would never be able to stop. I began to wail a bit, and then I felt my Mother's arms around me. No, it was Jams' mother. My mother never loved me. I tried to pull away, but her arms held me tighter.
"Jamie Patrice, I know you aren't my flesh, but I am standing here as your mother. I have you, and you are safe."
I don't know how long I sat there, crying myself dry, and still unable to stop. I felt every strike that my father had ever given me. I felt Jams' death again. I felt the loss that Mary2 would never know she had. Through it all I could hear my mother saying, "You're safe. You're mine. You're safe."
I had no more tears left to shed, and still I moaned my loss. Jamie should be alive. Not this weak, incapable person called Jim. Jamie had a life, and all I could do was almost let her murderer get away.
I felt Jams' arms go around me and I completely lost it. I began to babble out my hurts. I told them about every time my step-father struck me. I told them about Brian goading me into flipping the BMX. I told them about getting locked in the girls bathroom at the movies, and being stuffed in a trash can and rolled down the hill at school, and all of the other things that people had done to me. I told them about all the hurt I felt and the hurt I couldn't heal in others. I told them how much I loved Jamie, and that she should be the one that was alive.
I told them about trying to kill myself.
I have never had the courage to go through with it. I once bought a package of razors blades at the drug store. I even put one to the skin at my wrist. I couldn't push it hard enough to draw blood. I had tried with a kitchen knife once as well. I tried jumping off a bridge, and that was the closest I had gotten. Someone had pulled me from the edge, warning me that I could fall. I laughed at that. I think I sounded a bit crazy. I got out a bottle of my mom's sleeping pills once.
Mostly though, it was the ledge at the top of the school. The gym to be exact. Our Gym was four stories tall. I was small enough to slip through the gate at the bottom of the stairs. I used to go up there to get away from the bullies. One day I went over to the ledge at the edge of the roof. It was a little like a parapet. It was about a foot and a half wide, and flat on top. I would climb up there and watch people going back and forth between the gym and the rest of the school. No one ever looked up. I would sometimes imagine dropping right in front of this person or that one. You know, the people who seemed to torment me the most.
I would imagine them awakening screaming with the image of my death for the rest of their lives.
I was too afraid it would hurt, and so I would always climb down from the ledge, but it was always there, beckoning me to take that one final step.
Each day the time I spent on the ledge would grow longer. I had even started skipping my English class to be up there. I was taking creative writing this year.
We talked for about two hours after that. I think that Mary2 canceled some of her other appointments to give that time to me.
After we finished talking I was drained completely, and felt like I wanted to go back to bed. I wanted to sleep until. . .I don't know how long. We drove home. I sat in the back seat, not taking part in the conversation. I had said everything that was in me, and just wanted to curl up under the blankets and let the world go away.
Gabe seemed a lot happier after his talk with Mary, and I wished that could be the case for me. I began to hear Jams talking to me, and I think I made appropriate conversation, but I'm not sure.
'No, you didn't. You made the mental equivalent of monosyllabic grunts, and basically ignored everyone around you.'
'Well, if you remember this part better, then you tell the story for a while.'
'Don't mind if I do.'
As my Sis said, we were driving home in the car, and she was completely out of it. Actually, I need to back up a bit.
I could only hold onto Jamie mentally. For the first time since I had died, I really felt lost. I couldn't be there for the one person in this world who I really cared about. I loved Jamie like a sister. She was my Sister me, which is why I started calling her Sis. It just fit. I couldn't let anyone else know I was still here and looking after her because she had tightened down the mental controls again and I was locked inside. Sometimes I can get a word in edgewise or essentially slip my hands onto the controls. A smile here, a look there. Right now, I only saw Jamie.
It wasn't complete darkness. A person's mind is a place of thoughts and ideas. I lived in that place now, and her emotions were like rooms used to be for me in the outside world.
Her current emotions were an amusement park's house of horrors. My take, not hers. I'm sure if she had been there she would have seen it as a dungeon in some castle. Same emotion.
It was hard to keep myself focused on her. I had to ignore all of the things she was saying, and ignore all the things created by what she refused even now to say. I really hate clowns, that's al I'm going to say on that.
It was timeless in there. I could feel the words resonate in her mind as she spoke them, but I had no idea what the responses from the others were. I just kept holding onto her, and then I began to whisper.
I don't remember everything that I said, but I know I told her I loved her and that I would be there to help her through this. It felt a lot longer than the two hours it was outside her mind. Sometimes I think that the mind works a lot faster than the world around us, and that if our mind were left to its own devices, we could pass the equivalent of years of thought in a matter of seconds.
Slowly, I began to be able to see and hear again. and I finally felt Jamie running down. But then she kept going down. I felt her slip into a depression.
I wanted to let my Mom and Mary know what was going on, but I couldn't get enough control to speak. Mary figured it out anyway.
"Helen, I think that you need to spend some time today alone with Jamie. When I spoke earlier with Gabe, he acted as though he wanted to just get on with his life. I think that his father being arrested acted as a sort of catharsis, especially since Jamie stood up for him. He really idolizes his sister right now, and will understand you taking some time to help her. I have a children's group therapy session this afternoon. I wanted Gabe to be there anyway, but that will give you some time to help Jamie as well."
"Ok, Mary. I want to talk it over with Gabe first, but I think I can do that. If Jamie is going to be wearing my daughter's clothing, I think we need to get her into the salon to do something with that hair." Mary smiled down at Jamie, but I almost felt like she was smiling down at me too.
We got in the car, and Jamie slipped into the back seat without comment. I still had no control, but I could still listed to what was going on.
"Honey, your sister and I need to take some time this afternoon together. She is really hurting inside and we need to try to make her better."
"It's not something Dad did, is it?"
"No, Honey. Her body is healthy, and Dad didn't do this. She's hurting emotionally. She hurts in her heart, and in her mind."
"Are there doctors that can fix her mind?"
"I wish that were the case, Sweetie. Right now all they can do is show someone how to heal themselves. We don't have the tools to heal someone's mind."
"Then I'm going to find the tools so I can be the first mind doctor who can actually heal people."
I smiled at that. Gabe was so earnest it made my heart melt. 'Sis?' I got no response.
Mom chuckled a bit. "I know you want to help, Sweetie, but for right now, people's minds have to heal themselves."
"I know. You need to spend some time with Jamie. I know I always feel better when you spend time with me. Mary wanted me to go talk and play with some other kids today, so if it's alright I can go and spend time there, while you spend time with Jamie."
"Ok, Gabe. You're my big boy, aren't you."
"Mom," Gabe said while rolling his eyes, "I'm almost ten. I'm practically a teenager."
We all chuckled at this, well, except for Jamie. She was still lost in her funk. I wondered for a moment if it was a blue or a pink funk. It's not that I didn't really think that she wanted to be a girl, well not for the moment anyway, but I wondered if that is who she really was. Her dreams always had her as a girl. Or at least the ones I saw did. Could I be missing something, or possibly influencing something.
I really hope not.
We got home and had lunch. Jamie ate mechanically, not even tasting the food. Sure, it's weird tasting someone else's food, but that's the only way I can any more. I felt a little resentful of her at that moment. How dare she be depressed because people picked on her in school. I was DEAD!!!.
I wanted to shout and scream. I wanted to throw things. I wanted to run and jump and sing. I wanted. . .
I wanted to still be alive, not some shadow of a piece of a memory in someone else's mind.
I hugged my nonexistent arms to my incorporeal body. What was left for me anymore. I know I said I didn't want to go away, but what sort of a life was this for me. I knew that Jamie was distracted, and she wouldn't miss me for a bit, so I looked for a way out.
I was going to die all the way and get myself out of this miserable half life.
'You did WHAT!?!?'
'Chill, Sis. I got better.'
Jamie chuckles at this, 'I think we might be breaking the fourth wall a bit to accurately have the conversation we are having and have it fit into the confines of the story.'
'I'm sure the audience doesn't mind, besides, it is necessary for the story. You interjected as a way of showing you had no idea I left, and I responded as a way to show it would all turn out alright in the end.'
'Doesn't that remove all the tension from the story?'
'Nah, it just makes the tension different. You don't worry if certain characters die, just how they get out of it alive.'
'Get back to the story, Sis. I'm interested to see what happens next.'
I looked around her mind, and found a glimmering portal I had never noticed before. I slipped through it, and I was back outside. I looked around there, and saw another portal. It looked like a doorway that had just opened for me.
I went through the door.
That should have been the end of my story. Everyone there told me that I had to allow it to end. Everyone except for one very old woman. She didn't look old. She looked like a teenager to me, maybe just a couple of years older. From the way other people treated her, however, I got the impression that everyone saw her as just a couple of years older than they were.
"What do you want from life, Jamie." Those were her first words to me.
I wish I could share our conversation. I know that she will be mistaken for many other people, but I know her for who she is.
I knew at the end of it that there was something further for me to do in this world. I felt a sense of hope. I began looking through the multitudes of people for my way out.
I couldn't see it. I knew I needed to get back to where I had been. I was in a vast field of people. They stood around in groups and talked. Some taught and some listened to that teaching. I listened to some of it, and it was all the same. Who needed to be taught about God and his plan after they were dead. Didn't they already know that there was a life after death? Wasn't that enough?
I wandered about until I found another group of people. The atmosphere here felt like a swamp. There were no trees or water, but decay permeated the air. The people here had a much more desperate air to them as well. It felt as though they were as trapped here as I was. I walked past this prison of souls, trying not to touch any of them.
I got to the other side after what felt like hours and finally found the door I was looking for. I began to look for Jamie. No one was home. I began to panic. Rushed around trying to think where they could be.
I paused for a moment and remembered that Gabe needed to be dropped off with Mary. One good thing about not having a body, distance seems to have no bearing. As soon as I thought about going to Mary's office, I was there. My Mom was just leaving the office, so I followed her back to the car, where a despondent Jamie sat looking out the window.
I slipped back inside, feeling safe for the first time since I left.
I felt a change in my surroundings since I had left. It almost felt painful to move as if Jamie's thoughts had become as sharp as crystal. I looked at these thoughts and didn't like where they were heading.
'You can't do this to us, Sis. There's a plan. At least I think there is. Most of my experience was already beginning to fade. I couldn't remember what the woman looked like anymore. I knew she wasn't God, and began to wonder who I'd actually been speaking to.
I had felt so peaceful there, but it wasn't my time yet.
It wasn't Jamie's time either.
'Sis. This isn't the answer. SIS!'
I pulled on everything I could and threatened and yelled my mind raw.
"Come on, Honey. I have a surprise for you."
Jamie allowed herself to be lead by Mom into the Mall. As we approached the salon, Jamie perked up a bit. . .
'I can take over from here, Jams.'
I had no idea why we were here, at the mall, and I was ready for it to be over. We walked past the huge food court and into the mall proper. We started to approach a salon that I had often wanted to go into, but had always been too afraid.
We walked into the salon. Mom had made appointments for both of us. I sat down in the chair.
"So, what can we do for you, Little Miss."
I'm not sure I liked her. "My name is Jamie."
"Ok, Jamie," she smiled a pretty smile at me. "How should we cut your hair?"
"I want it cute, but I am trying to grow it out. I don't know."
"Ok, Jamie. Leave it to me. I'll do something spectacular for you."
She played with my hair for about half an hour. I spaced. It was something I had dreamed about before, and I lived the experience. When she was done, and she let me look, I wasn't the little boy in girl's clothing anymore. I had no makeup on, since it had run and Jams wasn't talking to me, and I didn't feel like trying to fix it on my own. I was fresh faced, and it was a girl who looked back at me from the mirror. I grinned at myself.
"I take it you like it?"
"Oh, yes. I love it. Thank you sooo much."
"You're welcome Jamie. We have more to do for you today. Your Mom ordered the full treatment."
We went toward the side window of the store. I sat down and they started to work on my nails. It hurt a little at times, but it was really fun as well. I noticed a rack of earrings. I saw some that I would have really liked to have. I was disappointed though because I didn't have pierced ears.
The woman, I'm sorry now I didn't get her name when we started, picked up on my emotion.
"Would you like to get your ears pierced, Jamie?"
"I don't know if it would be alright with my Mom."
"Let me go ask."
I knew that she was probably just trying to help sales in the store, but she was being really nice to me. I felt a momentary thrill of hope, that I tried to squash. Jams' Mom had already spent so much money on me for even this much.
"Your Mom says it's alright. Want to pick out a pair of studs to start you out with?"
I looked at the rack of starter studs and saw a pair that I had to have. One was a lock in the shape of a heart. The other was a key with a heart shaped handle.
I picked out a nail polish color. It was called plum passion or something silly like that, but I liked the purpleish pink hue.
After my nails dried, we went to go find my mother, who was still having her hair styled. I think she must have had her hair washed as well, because it was still really wet looking. She had beautiful long think hair.
'I hope that mine will look like that when it's longer.'
'Mine did, Sis, but it was a lighter color. Yours is closer in color to mine.'
Mom got finished and went up to pay for both of us. "Mom, I think that we should give a tip."
"Did you really like Tracy, then?" That was her name.
"Yes, Tracy really helped me a lot."
"Ok, we can give Tracy a tip."
I'm not sure how much she gave, exactly, but Tracy was really happy and gave us her card with her hours on it. "Come back anytime, Ladies."
I felt a glow inside at her words.
We went back to Mary's office to pick up Gabe, and then Mom took us out for pizza. I don't know how people can not like this stuff. Pizza is fun to eat, and it is a perfect meal to itself. Sure, the bread is all crust, but that is part of the fun too. The toppings and sauce melt together into a blend of conflicting flavors that just increase the overall taste. Peppers and cheese and sausage and pepperoni and olives and bell peppers. Each one distinct on its own, and a part of the greater whole.
Ok, I really like pizza.
I even let Jams participate and take over some. I was feeling really good about myself. There was just something nagging me at the back of my mind. I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. It seemed that everything was just going too well for the moment.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
We went home from the pizzeria. I washed my face and brushed my teeth. I looked at my new earrings in the mirror. My new hairstyle just fell right. I brushed out my hair and there was the new style again. I giggled and clapped my hands together.
'Didn't you promise. . .'
'Hush, Jams'
I thought at that moment that Jams was rubbing off on me, and I wasn't at all sure whether I was happy about it or not. I loved Jams, but I wanted to be my own person too. I know I was making her a home in my dreams, but there had to be another way. Something that would work out for both of us. I would have to think about it.
I slipped into my nightgown and crawled into bed. At some point, someone had taped some paper over the hole in the door. Looking at it reminded me of last night, so I hopped up and locked my door before getting back into bed and going to sleep.
I had the usual variety of dreams, and some unusual ones. Jams and I aren't the same person. I tend to dream in Technicolor about Princesses and Princes, castles and dragons, swords and sorcery stuff all the way.
Jams on the other hand dreams in sepia-tone. She dreams about James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart. Her mother is a huge classic film buff, and she gets a lot of her dream material from there.
Sure, we both had dreams of the more normal variety, every day stuff, but when we have control, we shape the dream to our fantasies. This, of course was my first time running into her fantasy world.
Jamie Spade, Private Eye threw me for a bit of a loop, to tell you the truth. It was also a lot of fun. Not that I ever get bored of princes and princesses, mind you, I just liked the change of pace for once.
We got up and I showered and clothed myself. I'm a big girl now. I went in. I had a thought of what I should do for my makeup. Something that would be more me than Jams. I went even lighter than she normally did, adding a bit of a difference in color. Her eyes had been more of a blue than my green. I had to mix her colors a bit to get an eye shadow that matched my nails. I tried it on, and both Jams and I agreed that it was not right. I went a bit darker, and a light brushing, and it was perfect. No blush, some lip gloss, she only has pink, and I was done.
I went downstairs to breakfast. Gabe was already finishing up but he stayed to talk to me. We talked for a bit, and then Mom came down. "Good you're both ready. I think both of you need to go back to school today."
"But, I don't know anything about Jamie's classes. I could ruin her schooling for her."
"She is in there with you. Just let her run the show while you're at school. It will be fine. I hadn't told them that she died, yet, so we should be able to keep everything going smoothly."
Even thought I dreaded it, I let Jamie take control, and we were off to catch her bus. How was it that I could subdue a murderer, beat up a child molester, and talk down and out of line police detective, and yet going to school filled me with terror.
We met a group of girls on the bus. I had seen them before, but I only now realized I didn't know their names in either reality.
I tried to pick them up through conversation, but it was going so fast, and from so many directions that I could barely keep up with what Jams was saying. I began to fidget. I felt trapped, and I had to get free. I tried to talk to Jams, but she was focused on her friends and her joy of living. I needed to get out. I started twitching my right hand. just shaking it a bit.
'Stop that, Sis. You're ruining it for me.'
'I can't breathe. I need some air.'
'Course you can't breathe. I'm breathing right now.'
And then she was off again.
"Jamie, what did you do to your hair? It's so short." This was said by a brunette with a pixie face.
"I got a wig so I could see what I would look like as my cousin. She looks so much like me. When I got done, I just had to try on her makeup style. She helped me with that."
Something really had to be done. She gave me an out for when I showed up later, but she still wouldn't have her own self, unless we started wearing a wig to pretend to be her. . .no. That would only work so long, especially if people expected to see us together sometimes, and as cousins that could be expected.
I tuned out while we finished the ride to school. More specifically I was using another sense. I was trying to find something. I knew that there were two worlds, but couldn't there be more? I was feeling out, and finding nothing, when I was bumped by Jams. We arrived at our school. The junior high school had changed little since I was there in my world. I felt my gaze going to the top of the Gym, then Jams clamped down on the motor control, and laughed at something one of the gaggle said to her.
It was so confusing. You know what it's like going into a packed theater to watch a movie, only the movie already started, and no one wanted to tell you what happened already. That's kind of what school was like for me that day.
We went from class to class, hour after hour, and I just became more and more frustrated. Then we got to the last class. Somehow, Jamie was in Creative Writing as well, and she had this worlds version of Mrs. Henderson.
Her name makes her sound like some old, grey, fat and happy woman.
Mrs. Henderson is definitely a happy person, but she is young and vibrant, and slender and blonde. I have always wished that I might someday grow up to look like her. I didn't really think it might happen until recently.
It was a basic writing class, so I won't bore you all with the details. It was the first fun I'd had all day. It was Jams' hand writing, but we were both telling the story.
I actually felt more upbeat by the end of the day, and I was better able to follow the bouncing conversation of her friends. That reminded me of what I'd tried to do on the bus earlier, so I spent the ride home sending my mind out, trying to make a connection to something.
'Oh, another one. How delicious.' Its tone had an oily, crusty feeling to it. It didn't feel at all human. 'I can feel you judging me, Jamie. You won't feel that way forever. Soon you won't do anything at all.'
It knew my name.
'Oh course I know your name. James Patriche, or are you one of the rarer Patrice variants. There are a lot of us out there.
I felt its hands touching my soul, and recoiled.
'Mmmm. A girl. I like the girls best. They know who they are. They're the true Jamie's. They are the most delicious.'
I felt its tongue moving up my side, across my ribs, over my brea. . .I was wearing the Guinevere costume. I smiled. I had something that it didn't expect.
'I really think you're out of your depth, here, Monster. We're in my world now.'
'What are you talking about. . .'
In my dream, toward the end, Guinevere dresses in armor and goes out with her knights and soldiers to save Arthur. I prefer my ending to that in Le Morte d'Arthur that we had to read in school.
I drew my silver sword and slashed it through the tongue of the monster. The James monster. I am beginning to think there might just be one too many of me in the universe.
Its black ichor spewed over my silver armor, and began to bubble and his. Acid? I stepped under a waterfall of pure clean water. It washed clean leaving no marks of any kind.
'You'll have to try harder than that, Beast.' I no longer considered it to be one of us in my mind.
'Feel empowered do you, Little Girl.' it snarled at me. 'This wasn't even the opening round!'
'Jams yells louder than you do. Let me show you how to yell. DIE!!!!!' I threw my sword into the void. Something out there caught it. Well, at least it tried to catch it. Normal physics don't apply on this plane. I twisted the sword at the last minute and the Beast skewered its hand instead of catching my sword.
'The little girl has been practicing.'
'Jams and I have both been practicing.'
A tone of surprise entered the creatures thoughts, 'There are two of you? There've never been two before.'
'It would seem some of us are more social than others.' I couldn't help it. I stuck my tongue out at the Beast.
Suddenly I found an opening, and I was into his mind. His memories washed over me like raw sewage. He had grown up and stayed male. He was a bit older than either Jams or I. Well, I'm older than Jams too, but only by a year. He was a lot older. He was already in his late twenties. His life had been much like Jamie2's up until Brian jumped from behind the tree. Different reasons for it to start, but the same general outcome. He had never been allowed to start hormone blockers, however. Brian3 and he had struggled over the knife. He got the knife away from Brian3 and made a choice. He took all of his frustration out on Brian3. I could feel the pleasure he had taken at killing Brian3 in the way that he did.
I vomited. Not in my head. For real. All over the girl in front of me. She started to look ill, and then she vomited. When it was done, the bus had been pulled over to the side of the road, and the six of us were covered in puke. They called a bus for the other kids, but Jams' friends and I had to wait for our mothers.
I had gotten one last image from that Beasts mind before the connection had broken as he retreated: He had slaughtered his family with the same knife that Brian3 tried to use on him.
Mom came and picked us up, and all of us girls went our separate ways, promising to call each other. They found out that we had lost Jamie's phone, and they would call the house.
'What happened back there, Sis?'
'We've got a real problem, Jams. We aren't the only ones out there. What I mean is, we aren't the only Jamies.'
'That's great news!'
'It would be if all of them were like us.'
'What do you mean?'
'One of us, I mean, one of the Jamies is a mass murderer. He has been killing all of the Jamies that he comes into contact with. That's not all.'
I shared with her a sanitized version of the memories that I had taken from James. Even so, I could feel her shudder in revulsion. Someone just like us had done this to another human being, and they liked it.
'So, what were you doing when this thing found you?'
'Well, um, I really love you, and all, but, I want to live my own life.' I blushed hotly when I said this. I really didn't want my true best friend in either world to get the wrong idea, but I wanted my head back to myself.
'I completely know what you are talking about, Sis. It was fun for a couple of days, but it gets to be a real drag. Not being able to talk to your friends, or wear your own clothes.'
'Having to take your classes, and let someone else control the body.'
'Having to get permission to use a body at all.'
I blushed again at this one. I admit, she had it worse than I did.
'So, what. Where you going to just push me off on another Jamie, and I would go from world to world, never having a home of my own?'
'Jams, I don't know. I hadn't really thought that far ahead. . .'
'So what do we do now?'
By this point we had gotten home and gotten in the shower. We let the water wash our bodies clean. I wished that it could wash those images from my mind, those emotions from my soul. I let the water pound into my skin as the two of us thought about what our next course of action would be.
'Wait, if he had killed you, what would have actually happened to your body.'
'It would have died too, wouldn't it?'
We felt a renewed sense of purpose, because there were the beginnings of an idea forming in my head. We hopped on the internet and began to search. We searched for "mind dead" first.
It brought up results about songs and strange social pages.
'Well, the mind is in the brain, isn't it?'
'I think you might be the smarter of the two of us, Jams.'
I felt her blush in pleasure. We tried "brain dead" next. One wiki page later, and we had some idea what we were looking for.
'I wouldn't want that to happen to me. To be just lying there, half alive, hooked to all those machines.'
I hugged her. 'Jams, don't worry about it. They're not there anymore. If the Beast had his way, then they are nothing but a body, like you are nothing but a soul.'
'Spirit is more like it.'
She fed me the exact line I had been looking for, 'yep, you're very spirited.'
She groaned at my horrible pun, but smiled all the same. We went downstairs to find Mom.
"Mommy, we're going to go lie down. We're still not feeling really well."
"At least you made it through one day of school." She put her wrist up to my forehead. "It doesn't seem as if you have a fever. You go lie down, and I'll bring up a bowl of soup a bit later."
We changed into a pale yellow nightgown, the same color as Jams' bedspread, only plush on the outside. We lay down in the bed, and I formed an image. I had looked up the machines that would be monitoring a coma patient, as well as several bed styles. I focused on a beautiful, female, Jamie. Close to our age. Long hair, Jams really missed her hair. I felt Jams lending her support. We both focused on what we were looking for. We reached out a mental hand together. We felt a connection. I let go of the world.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
Tumbling across dimensions is not my idea of fun. I felt a lot like a rubber band. One second we were in bed, both of us focusing on our destination, and the next we were nowhere.
It's hard to describe. I watched the decor of the room change some items flickering faster than the eye could see, and some only slowly changing. The bedspread and bed seemed to be fairly constant. The rapid change in color made it seem mainly black with the edges and wrinkles flashing in different colors. We were passing through the objects as if they, or we, did not exist.
I began to realize that we had started to move in relation to the room. We were moving toward the roof and the outer wall. The further we moved from our starting point, the faster we traveled. I thought we might get a sense of flying, but there was no feeling of movement at all.
'It would probably be a good idea to orient ourselves better for landing, Sis.'
'I wouldn't want to land on my back, that's true.'
I began to try to sit up, or turn, or adjust my position at all. It wasn't working. No matter how I flailed around I couldn't move myself at all.
'Jams, it's not working.' I was getting a little hysterical at this point.
'Sis, relax. We can do this.'
'How, we have nothing to push against. We are floating through objects.'
I stopped to think for a moment. I could still feel the pull of our destination on me. Maybe. . .
'Sis, maybe you should push against the thing that is pulling us toward it.'
I smiled, but I let her have her moment. I didn't want to argue about who thought of this idea first, since we were both currently using the same grey matter. I reached out with the. . .hand. . .tentacle. . .thing that I had let go with and grabbed onto the thing we were going toward. In the instant that I grasped hold we were there.
I rubbed my behind as I climbed to my feet. "Ow"
"Who are you?" This was said by a man sitting next to a hospital bed. There was a Jamie in the bed, but she looked really pale. The machines I had envisioned were there as well. I was trying to figure out who this guy could possibly be. Ok, so he probably wasn't much older than we were. His anger changed into confusion. "Jamie?" He looked from the bed to me to the bed again. He got out of the chair and started walking toward me.
"I know I look like her. . ."
"But you're not her, are you. You're not Jamie. I'm sorry for bothering you. Can you leave please?"
'What are we going to do, Sis. He wants her to wake up, and we can't tell him we're going to steal her body.'
'Is it really stealing if you are in there? Isn't possession nine tenths of the law?'
She giggled at my bad joke. 'I'm not sure we should do that to him.'
'Couldn't we ask him?'
'I don't know.'
Well, since I was in charge, I took charge. "Excuse me. . ."
"I thought I asked you to leave. You remind me too much of Jamie."
"How much do you know about Jamie?"
"We met at the sanitarium. I was there because I tried to kill myself. She heard voices. She said they were trying to kill her."
"Are you always this open with strangers?"
He chuckled sadly. "Like I said, you remind me of her."
"You know she wasn't insane, right?"
"I wanted to believe her. I just couldn't believe that there was anything beyond this reality."
"In other words, she said that there were a whole bunch of realities, all stacked on top of each other?"
"Something like that."
"And that she was in all of them?"
"All of them she could touch. . ."
"Hi, My name is Jamie."
His jaw dropped. Then his expression changed. "I don't believe you my Jamie is gone, and you can't replace her."
"I'm not trying to replace her, but a friend of mine will need to take her body."
"It's all I have left. We were going to get married eventually. You can't have her! NURSE!"
We ducked out of the room. There as a huge male nurse coming toward us. We ran down the hall with him in hot pursuit. 'Jams, just take the body. We'll sort it out later.'
'He'll know something is up, I won't remember common things.'
'Pretend you have amnesia or something.'
'Well, that might work.'
I continued to run for my life for a few moments, and then I felt Jams start to panic. 'I can't get out. There is some sort of barrier keeping me in.'
I felt the nurses hand on my shoulder, and had to dodge to the right to get out of his reach. I had to move smarter, since I wasn't going to be faster than him. I dodged right down a side corridor and pulled a gurney I passed so that it blocked the hallway behind me. I glanced behind to see what the nurse would do just in time to see him hurdle it without breaking stride.
'Crap.'
I think both of us said that at the same time. I kept changing direction, but he was always just a step or two behind me.
I saw the fire stairs ahead and pushed through the door. Instead of going down the stairs I went halfway down and started hopping the hand rails, snaking from one stairway to another. The space between the top of the rail and the bottom of the upper stairs wasn't big enough for the nurse to follow the same way, so we started to pull ahead. . .at least until he started jumping from landing to landing.
'I think he's into parkour, Sis'
'What?'
'I'll explain later. Just keep moving.'
I was a couple of flights below him when I hit the ground floor and rushed through it. I was outside. I ran over to the parking lot, and hid myself between two cars, putting the tire between me and the hospital.
I heard the door slam open, and then the sound of heavy footfalls for a moment or two.
"Damn it.! I lost her. Did you see where she went on the camera out here?"
'Camera!?'
Again, we spoke simultaneously. I thought for a moment, and then got down on my stomach and started crawling under the car furthest from the hospital. It tore up my hands a bit, and my nightgown got dirty. My feet had already gotten torn up a bit when we ran across the parking lot. I didn't know what they were using to surface the road, but it felt like broken glass. I was getting small cuts on my front now, so I figured I was tearing up my nightgown as well.
I stopped under the third car. I saw the nurses white shoes moving around between the cars. I tried to breathe quieter.
"I don't see her." He paused for a moment or two. "Ok. I'll head back up to the ward. Keep the entrances locked down for a couple of hours so she can't get back in."
I watched as the shoes walked away. You know what I mean. I got up and looked at my eyes in the side mirror of the car I had been hiding under. They were almost completely orange.
'But, we made a connection, didn't we?'
'I don't know, Sis. But we're about taped out, and will probably need at least a full night's sleep to recharge again.'
We got on the grass and walked over to the sidewalk. It would be a long walk home from here. At the time I didn't even think about how far home really was. I was tired and almost falling asleep.
As we were walking a black car with blue neon piping pulled over in front of us. "'Scuse me miss. Can I scan your ID please.?" A police officer in a black uniform got out of the car. The steering wheel was on the wrong side, so he got out on our side.
He pulled a wand of some sort off his belt and ran it over my left wrist. Nothing happened, so I did it again. He tried once more on my right wrist. "Control, I've got a girl, about 10 years old, no ID and walking around in a torn nightgown." He paused like the nurse had. "Ok, I'll bring her into the station so that we can get positive identification." He turned to me, and gestured toward the car. "Would you mind, miss?"
The rear door moved out away from the car and then rotated out of the way. The interior of the back was roomier than the last police car I had been in. I climbed in and the door closed behind me, sealing me in. I couldn't see out at all. As soon as the car started moving, the lights went out. I sat there in the darkness, listening to the sound of my own breathing. I could barely feel any acceleration at all.
'Jams?' The instant I though this, I felt a blinding headache come on. I put my hands to my head and cried out in pain.
'Sis?' Again the pain. "Don't speak while we're in here." I said this last aloud, knowing she would hear me, and hoping that they wouldn't be listening, but I had the feeling that they would be. These people had technology that I could not understand at all.
I felt the car accelerate a lot more than it had before. It seemed to coincide with my first thought to Jams. Could they possibly be tapping into that somehow? I'd know soon enough because we began to decelerate as quickly as we had accelerated.
We came to a stop and the door I had entered opened up again. The cop was wearing a sort of helmet made out of a silver mesh. It looked a lot like a chainmail coif, except it only covered his hair. "Miss, you have been found in violation of the Psi Edict of 2204. Your demonstrable ability with, and use of, psionics has been recorded and sentence passed. You will be transported to a Sanitarium for the Psychologically Dangerous for the remainder of your natural days."
What in the world had I gotten myself into. I felt an answering thought. We didn't try to talk to each other because I feared a repeat of the pain from earlier. They took me into the building and processed me. I expected to be finger printed and photographed, but that was only the beginning. They took blood. They photographed my retinas. They put a chip into my left hand. They discovered I was physically a boy.
They brought out boy clothing. "You will dress in this." Said the gruff officer who now replaced the female officer who had been processing me.
I opened my mouth to protest, but he interrupted me. "The charge for sexual deviance of a minor has been suspended assuming you had no choice in your attire. Your hair will be shaved as is the hair of all male inmates."
I shut my mouth and dressed in the clothing. It was scratchy and the underwear was uncomfortable. The machine beeped. The officers eyes rose. "You're fourteen? Looks like we'll need a full body scan. Strip please." He said please, but there was no leeway in his tone.
I quickly stripped and he pushed me into a cabinet. Some lights and clicking noises went on for a minute or two. When the light and sound show stopped he opened up the box.
"I don't know where you grew up, but I'm sorry for my earlier attitude." The officer looked completely different with a smile. "You're lead a really hard life, haven't you, Young Buck."
I nodded and he continued, "Your Father beat you quite a bit, Huh?"
"Step-father"
"No excuse for that. He the one who dressed you as a girl?"
I needed him to help me as much as he could, so I lied with my body. I nodded.
"I'm so sorry, Young Buck. What's your name?"
"Jamie Paxton"
"Isn't Jamie a bit of a girl's name?" asked the officer. He didn't seem hostile, so I thought I'd help him out.
"James, my name is James."
"How bout we call you Jim then. It's a nice manly name."
I just nodded. I tried to be grateful to the officer, but it was hard not to cry. Luckily he mistook my reason for crying.
"It's ok, Little Man. That criminal is never going to touch you again. He probably never even told you that public Psi use was illegal."
I just shook my head.
"Get dressed. Ok, I'll tell you what, Jim. You go quietly to the sanitarium, and I'll see what I can do about getting you out of there. Just remember that you can't use any Psi while you're there. Don't even think Psi thoughts. No talking to others remotely. No trying to move items you aren't touching. Just do everything normal. Talk with your mouth and move with your body."
Sure, he wanted me to be a boy, but he wasn't a bad person overall. If he could really get me out of this place, then I would do my best. I suddenly had a thought that scared me.
"Is controlling your dreams Psi use?"
"As long as you only control your own dreams, and don't get into anyone else's head and control their dreams, you are perfectly fine."
I smiled for the first time since I'd felt that first blinding headache. We wouldn't be able to talk while awake, but at least Jams and I could talk when we were asleep.
I hated my boy clothes already, but I would live with them while I was in this world. I felt a nod in my head, but no pain. It seemed that their sensors only detected speech, not the other sense that I seemed to have for what Jams was doing. She smiled and gave me a thumbs up. I assumed that she was saying that she agreed. That and she could read my louder thoughts.
They shaved my head, and removed my earrings. I tried to "man up" but it was hard when all I wanted to do was crawl into a corner and cry.
At this point processing was done, and I was led to where a number of other kids my age were sitting. Most of them had lots of piercings or tattoos. One boy had the sides of his head shaved shorter than the rest of his close shaven head and he had a strange sun pattern engraved into the skin on both sides of his head.
I really mean engraved. It was like a reverse scar. It went into his skin about an eighth of an inch. No hair grew on the lines. "It's not safe to stare too intently at one of the priests of the Sun god."
I turned to look at the speaker. It was a girl about my age. "I thought they didn't shave girl's hair here." She said to me continuing.
"They don't. I'm a boy."
"You don't look like one to me."
I smiled and blushed. "Well, the machine says I am, so it must be right."
"The machine also says that I use Psi, which can't be true either. My parents had my Psi nexus removed from my brain when I was born. They didn't want to worry about something like this happening."
"Maybe you just don't know you can use psi with it removed?"
"You really are cute," She replied. "The Psi nexus is what generates all known Psi powers."
"Um, what about unknown ones?"
She stopped, blinked, and then blushed bright red. "I never thought about that."
"And without your Psi nexus, you probably don't even know if you're using it."
"Well, I do know that I don't feel the pain they say I should when using my 'power' in here. What am I going to do?" She began to cry a little bit. I put my arms around her and held her and cried a bit myself.
"Look, a sissy boy's huggin' little miss mind melter." I turned to see one of the bigger boys getting up and walking toward us.
"Mind melter?"
"He means a Psi user."
"No, I mean a scum sucking mind melter. You deserve what's going to happen to you at the sanitarium."
She shuddered and went pale. "Leave her alone." I said and got up to stand between King Kong and Fae Rae.
"What's you going to do, sissy boy? Cry on me until I wrinkle into a prune? Or maybe you'll trade that sweet little body of yours for hers."
The way he was looking at me made me really uncomfortable. I decided it was time to make a stand. I hoped my sense forgave me. I was supposed to only use my training for defense only.
"Look, you imbecile. The lady asked you to back off. I asked you to back off. Now, if you don't back off, I'll have to make you."
"Look, at this, people, the sissy boy thinks he's a real man now." I had turned his upper body to look at everyone else in the room. As he finished, he twisted his upper body and shoulders bringing his fist around in what would likely have been a life ending punch for me, if I'd still been there.
"Rule number one, worm, never take your eyes off your opponent. Grandstanding is for idiots and politicians." I said this as I threw an uppercut to his ribs. This was just to get his attention. He threw his arm back toward me, so I obliged him by catching it and twisting it into a lock. I kneed him in the ribs a couple of times, and then straightened my leg, forcefully, and planted the heel of my foot into his knee. It popped out sideways with a sickening crunch.
He collapsed to the floor cradling his knee. I sat back down next to the girl, and she leaned into me. "Thanks," she whispered to me and kissed me on the cheek. I blushed. "I still think you're a girl." She continued. "You move to fast to be one of these boys. They use their size and power, not their minds, to beat people down."
I wasn't sure if that was a compliment to me, or an insult to the other boys, but I took it how I wanted to: a compliment on my femininity.
It was another five or ten minutes before an officer finally came into the room. It was the one who had befriended me. He walked over to the boy who was still groaning on the floor, picked him up by the scruff of the neck, and half dragged him out of the room.
A couple of minutes later, he returned. "Jim, a word please." I got up and went over to him.
"The only reason that you aren't in more trouble is because I watched that whole interaction. I know someone with training when I see it. I don't ever want to see, or hear about, you picking a fight like that again."
I opened my mouth to protest, but he shushed me.
"Don't give me any of that. I know you escalated that fight expecting him to take a swing at you. You got your prince charming moment, don't do it again."
"What if he attacks me?"
"People like that one usually only prey on perceived weakness. They know that anytime you're awake, you're a dangerous target. Get someone you can trust to bunk with in there. It will keep you a bit safer at night. If they attack you first, without any provocation, protect yourself. Just don't go picking any more fights, or there might not be anything I can do to get you out of there."
I nodded and went back over to sit next to the girl. She leaned into me again. I felt really weird about it. Having her lean on me just didn't feel right for some reason.
"My name is Mary Pierce." She said after a little while. I felt Jams' eyes open wide. I tried my best not to jump up and step away. She felt me tense up. "Something wrong, Jim?"
"No, Mary. Nothing's wrong. I knew a Mary once, and your name startled me with a memory of her."
"Not a bad one I hope," she said with a flirtatious little pout.
We are so screwed, "No, Mary, she was almost like a mother to me. Only the your name reminds me of her."
What in the world was I going to do now. My counselor was hitting on me.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I found out later that we were kept in the waiting room for two reasons: It is easier to process a group of inmates at one time, than to do so individually; they wanted some of the freaks to get attacked before they were separated off from the convicts.
It seemed a really cruel system, but I saw what motivated it. They were afraid of those who had more power than they did. After seeing what the Beast had accomplished, I could understand that fear. At this point in the story, however, I knew nothing about any of this.
I sat there, uncomfortable, with Mary leaning into me for comfort that I was unable, or unwilling, to give. I still don't know which it was.
"Alright you lot of malcontents, listen up. Everyone on their way to the juvenile facility, stand up and move over to the green door. You know who you are. Move!"
Most of the individuals in the room got up and lined up before the green door. They shuffled out, and the police sergeant walked out of the room. There were only four of us left in the waiting room. The two who had been sitting on their own, another girl and a boy, moved over next to Mary and myself. The room began to fill up again, more rough looking types, with the occasional scared, fresh face, that I was starting to associate with people in my condition.
I'm not sure whether it was the police themselves, or some other criminal pseudo-telepathy, but there weren't any fights with this next group. A couple of the rougher types started to insult the innocent looking ones, but their buddies would nudge them, and gesture in my direction. I did my best to help the situation. I sneered. Hey, I was in drama, remember?
One or two went pale, a couple just swallowed. One guy got a really wierd look on his face, and his eyes went out of focus. He shook himself, blushed, and looked away. I really didn't want to know what thought process had caused that.
It took a couple of hours, but then the seargeant was back, the convicts shuffled out, and we were left with twelve. They grouped around me again. I began to feel a little uncomfortable. I had no idea why this was happening. It seems that these people were looking to me for protection, and I had no idea what I had done to evoke that response.
At this point I had been sitting here for about three hours. Mary was already here when I came in. I wondered how long she had been sitting here. I looked at the clock. It displayed 4am. I didn't dare fall asleep yet. More people started coming in. It seemed as though I was seeing a sizeable portion of the city come through.
"How can all of these people be arrested in this precinct alone?"
Mary looked up at me, as if coming out of a daze. "This is a routing center. All of the people who get arrested in the county come here."
That made a little more sense. There were about seven million people in the city and county surrounding it. I could easily see such a small percentage being arrested in such a relatively short timeframe. As I was thinking these thoughts, a group of kids was ushered into the room. They all seemed terrified. The oldest couldn't have been more than eight, and the youngest was probably five. There were seven of them.
We had come here to find a new body for Jams, but what had we found. The sheer oppression of even the most innocent of their people struck something within me and I began to cry. I couldn't help it. These were children. They couldn't know any better, and yet they were grouped with the teenagers going off to the sanitarium.
"Everyone take charge of one of the children," I heard someone speak, and it took a moment to realize it had been me.
We opened up our ranks a bit so that the children were surrounded by our presence. The other teens began to quietly talk to the children next to them, reassuring them about what the future might bring.
"Are you going to be my Mommy now?" asked a sweet little girl of about five or six who sat next to me.
"I'm not old enough to be your Mommy, sweetie."
"My old mommy didn't want me. She said I was evil, so she gave me to the police."
"It's ok, Honey." I didn't really feel it would be ok, but I needed her to feel relaxed.
"It's ok that you don't believe what you're saying, I know you mean well."
I'm not sure what shocked me more: the fact that she was reading my mind, or the fact that there was no pain when she did it. Weren't the same pain devices in place here as in the squad car?
"The pain devices are in the cars, because the psi shields are too big to fit in them. We can't get beyond this room, so they figure we should be able to do what we want here."
"Can they monitor us?"
Mary looked up at me like I was crazy. "Don't you know anything? Psi shields are complete. Nothing in or out. They can't monitor us because of the shield, and we can't affect them."
"I'm not from around here."
'Jams, are you ok? They didn't do anything to you did they?'
'I'm ok, Sis. I've hated not being able to talk to you at all, since you are the only one who can hear me.'
"Silly, other people can hear you, especially when you are so loud," said the little girl beside me. A few of the others laughed as well. "Why are there two of you in your head?"
I spent the next couple of hours explaining who I was, and where I was from. I told them about Jams dying, and the whole thing from beginning to end. I'm not sure if they beleived me, but they accepted my story.
"When you go back, can you take us with you?" This little girl seemed so lost, but I had no idea what to tell her. "My name is Naomi."
"Well, Naomi, I don't know if I can take you. So far I have only been able to take myself."
"I might be able to help there." said one of the older boys. He was probably about sixteen.
"How's that," I asked.
"I am a gestalt."
"A what?"
"I am able to share abilities from one person to another temporarily. Share the load in other words."
I looked at him a little strangely. This all seemed a little too convenient.
"I really can do it. Here, let me show you. Give me your hand, Naomi." She trustingly reached out her hand to him. "Now you, Milady." He said this last with a little grin. As soon as our hands touched, I could suddenly hear all of the thoughts around me. It took a moment or two to filter them out, but I was able to focus in and start listening to those around me. I turned back to the person who had enabled this just in time to see his grin change into something colder.
"Jamie, Jamie, Jamie. When are you going to learn that I am always out here waiting."
A shiver ran down my spine. "Beast." I whispered.
"See, you did miss me. Got it in one." His smile was like death, and his eyes like empty graves. "This child thought himself better than you, Jamie. No wonder really. He thought himself safe from, how did he put it? My pitiful attempts at mind games. Well, you saw how quickly he fell."
"Leave him alone!"
"Too late for that, Jamie-doll. Tory's left the building. It's all James in here all the time. WHOOO!!" HE tossed his head while saying this last bit. He almost seemed a caricature of himself.
One of the other younger girls walked up behind the Beast and put her hand to his head. He collapse, his eyes rolling back into his head. "Go away, bad man. Leave us alone."
Tory got up off the floor rubbing his head a little. "What happened?"
"You know damn well what happened. You tried to borrow my power and ended up almost becoming breakfast."
"I don't feel so good." He said right before he threw up on the floor.
"Alright, freaks. To the red door. Let's get you all to your new home and away from the people. MOVE!!!"
They marched us out to the bus. It had no windows like the police car. We were shoved in, and the door was shut behind us.
"I'm scared, Jamie."
"Me too."
A chorus of little voices, and some not so little, joined these.
"It's all right, little ones. They're just taking us to the sanitarium. We'll worry about that when we get there. For now, hold hands with the person next to you and think about better times."
"I don't remember better times."
Suddenly I felt very Julie Andrews, and it was all I could do not to break into song. My singing voice makes babies cry.
I decided to tell them a story instead:
A long time ago, in England, there lived a king. He ruled his people well, and his knights were known for their bravery and adherence to justice. He ruled them as an equal. They sat in council, not at an ordinary rectangular table with a head and a foot, and levels of inequality in between, but at a round table where all were equal in the sight of their god.
Arthur was the name of this king.
There were many knights who followed him for a time. There were some who followed him for their lives.
There were some later besmirched by men of lesser caliber trying to explain why an ideal died with the progenitor of it.
In this story, we follow two knights: Lancelot and his son Galahad.
Galahad is not a youth when he joins the others at the round table. He is already renowned for his swordsmanship, and his physical beauty.
Lancelot has another part to play.
"You can't be seen here, Lance. Mab's already been spreading lies about us."
"You require a protector, My Queen. I shall not step a foot inside your room, as you cannot step outside it. No one else stands forth to protect you."
"That's because they think we have betrayed the king."
I stood there for a moment, my back to the locked door. I looked out on the courtyard where the other knights practiced. "Do you think my husband will ever trust me again?"
"You must not think this way, My Queen. Your husband loves you, as do we all. His love is only greater in degree."
I smiled, my back still to the door. I cared for all of my husband's knights, and thought of them as brothers.
"What do you here, Cur?"
"I protect My Queen's honor, as no one else will do so?"
"The honor that you yourself stole?"
I heard the sound of metal on metal as someone drew there sword. I spun to see Lance offering his sword to Arthur hilt first.
"If you truly believe that I could betray you in this manner, then strike me down with my own sword. Give me the traitors death I would so richly deserve."
There was a gleam in Arthur's eye as he took Lance's sword. Lancelot knelt before his king. His head bowed. His lips moved in a silent prayer.
Arthur raised the sword above his head, and hesitated. I dared not move, or even to cry out. I knew he was testing me at the moment more than he tested his knight, whose courage everyone knew.
I calmed my countenance. "Husband, do as you will. This man means no more to me than any other knight. Like any knight, I will mourn his loss, but as his liege it is your right." I looked calmly on as Arthur brought the sword back for a full swing and threw it across the room.
Lance did not flinch.
"Rise, friend. I heard today the source of this foul rumor. It seems Mab tries once again to break up my kingdom. Open up her Majesty's door."
A key rattled in the lock, and I was let once again into my husband's embrace. "Forgive me for my lack of faith, Wife."
"There is nothing to forgive, Husband."
The bus stopped abruptly at this point. The children all wanted to hear more, which I promised to give to them later. Jams smiled at me. 'I love that dream.'
They took us into a drab windowless building. What was with these people and artificial lighting. 'Maybe it's to keep people from looking in?'
I thought for a moment before answering her, 'I think it's to keep us from looking out.'
We were led into a small room with shower heads along all the walls.
"Strip" a sexless voice demanded from a speaker in the ceiling.
We looked at each other wondering where the boys and girls would go to be separate. "Strip now, all of you."
We quickly removed our clothing, standing naked in the shower room. "Close your eyes!" said one of the others urgently. I didn't wait to ask questions. I closed my eyes. Almost instantly I felt the sting of the not quite water beat down on my skin. The chemical stink of it filled the air. The beating went on for a minute or two before the voice began and the water stopped in the same instant. "Move to the exit."
We shuffled to the exit. We walked, naked, down a glass lined corridor. "These are your fellow inmates. Welcome to hell." We watched the slack faces of the other people lined along the outside of the glass. Some of them were children like those with me. Others were much older. The sight sickened me.
I caught a gleam in Tory's eye before he saw me watching, and then he showed the horror that showed in the other children's eyes. There was certainly something wrong with Tory.
We got to the end of the corridor, and they clothed us in identical grey jumpsuits. They were only one size, with drawstrings to adjust it from there. The littlest children looked like the Michelin man. Suddenly I knew that they planned for us to be here a long time. The old people had lived their entire lives in here. The realization made me want to vomit.
"Jamie, are you ok?" Mary asked me. "I can feel your anguish."
It made sense that Mary would be empathic. 'Move over counselor Troi.' Jams said with a grin.
'Who?'
She was a bit flabbergasted.
The voice guided us along to our new quarters. I never saw a living being, besides the patients, that entire first day. We huddled in the empty room wondering what would happen to us now.
The doors locked. "There will be no food until you take your medicine."
Little cups appeared next to the name plates at the head of each bed. I put the pills in my mouth and pushed them to another reality. It felt as though smaller objects required less energy.
I knew what my pills felt like, so I tried to push all of the other pills in the room to join them. I had to walk halfway down the room before I was sure that they were all gone, and then I almost passed out. Mary helped me to my bed, and went to get my dinner for me. I would have to figure a better way to keep us all clean.
We ate breakfast, returned our trays to the receptacles in the room, and the doors locked again. "Sleep now so your medication will take proper effect." The lights went out as soon as the last person got into bed.
Someone began to sing a soft lullaby, and we all went to sleep.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it's who you kill to get there, and how much enjoyment it brings.
!!!WARNING!!!
The content included in this chapter is of a stronger nature than other chapters in this book. It is currently included as a part of the story, but may be omitted based on future revision. Read at your own risk. Read comment below for more information.
From the journal of Tory Hollerith
Sometimes a little change is for the good. Sometimes it's for the best. Likw when I slaughtered my parents like the pigs they were. My father was abusive, and my mother was a good for nothing enabler. I'm glad that Brian pushed me to see my true calling in life. Right now, I'm pretending to be Tory. It is giving me the opportunity to scout out my enemy, without them becoming any the wiser.
When that little bitch put her hands on me, I had a moment of fear, as I felt my essence being pushed from the quiescent body of Tory. I managed to get a finger hold and hang on. She'll get her's soon enough. They all will.
Can you believe that story she told us yesterday? How could someone as blind to the realities of the universe have even repulsed me once. It must be this second entity in her mind with her. I'm sure it must be a parasite of some sort, telling her what she wants to hear so that it can keep feeding on her life energy. I can't believe that I never thought of that tactic myself. It certainly led me to try this little experiment out.
Jamie actually wasted energy on us before lights out to push away the drugs they gave us to control us. I was about to get rid of my own, but I am fully willing to let her waste her enegry. I spent a little energy myself to hold onto my pills, just making her expend that much more. I think she was almost fully tapped out when she got done. Now, I just need to keep her there while I work out how I will prove her final humiliation.
I've never raped one of my alternates before. I might have to give it a try this time. She's really caused me no end of aggrivation. Whatever I do, it has to be special, just for her. Something imaginative.
Hmm. I wonder if they have a healer in this place.
I found a healer in my own world once. They had the most delicious mind I have ever tasted.
There's an idea, keep the healer alive and free so I can keep Jamie alive a lot longer than she would normally last. It will keep some hope alive in her that she might just get out of it. Then, when the time is right, kill the healer. I will be able to watch the hope die in her eyes as I begin one last time. The agony in her soul will be delicious indeed.
I look around at all the other rats in this maze. I can't help but chuckle at all of their earnest expressions. They all look to Jamie as a savior.
I guess I should explain this journal a bit. When the lights came back on, these journals were in the recepticle at the head of our beds. They really get into all of this automated care, don't they. I'm surprised they don't just kill us and get it over with, unless they are keeping us here for some possible future purpose?
That's something I need to consider when I go back home. Maybe I should form a cadre of psi users with myself at the lead. My own Sith training academy? Or something.
So the voice tells us to record our thoughts. I wonder what they will make of these thoughts? Not that I care. I don't have to stay here in Tory's body. The minute they try something I will flit back to my other body, and they'll be stuck with a cooling corpse.
I wonder what will happen when they discover Jamie's deception with the medicines. I'm sure no-one knows what exactly she did walking up and down the ward after people took their medicines, well except for the mind readers. That means it is between myself, and a couple of others, to give up her secret.
Sure, one of the others might let it slip accidentally, but I'm trying to sabotage her, so I have a much better probability of success.
---
We've gone to lunch, and had another lights out period. I wonder, are the pills a distraction? Could the food be the real source of the anti-psi drugs? that would be real irony there. You spend all your time working on getting rid of the obvious pills only to drug yourself when you fill your body's physical needs.
I may have to mention something to Jamie, just to keep the game interesting. I wouldn't want it to be over before it begins.
---
I didn't write much the last time because this begins to bore me. Sure, planning is one thing, but I can't enact any of my plans in here. It is just waiting and waiting.
Ok. I can do this.
I do have something to write now, though. We had a 'free period' this afternoon. We were let out into the common area after our third meal here. If they're putting drugs in the meals, then it is likely in the first two only.
I sat down to play Jamie at chess. I figured it would be something that she had learned at some point. It seems to be a commonality of the type. I was surprised at her strategies. I expected her to use her knights more, like I do myself. She seems to spend most of her time on her pawns. She even got three of them to the eighth row in a single game once. We are much more evenly matched than I would have thought.
Well, here we go. The voice has ordered us to put our journals into the receptacle. I see some scared faces and can only smile at what I know will be revealed to our so called masters.
---
It's been a full day since we gave them our books. Nothing much has happened. I am getting better at predicting Jamie's moves at chess, and think I might actually be seeing something of her thought processes.
I got something extra in my slot. A knife. Most everyone else was checking to see that what they had written was still there, and so missed me slipping it under my pillow. It is a large thing, with a nice hilt. I think it might be a tanto or other Japanese weapon. I think they want to see whether what I wrote was for show or not. I have the perfect show in mind for them.
---
The smell of blood and shit and piss is intoxicating. I felt sorry to have to wash it off. I watched as the water sluiced it off my skin. As usual, I killed in the nude, so as to leave no evidence on my clothing. I hate walking around in bloody clothing. It spoils the game.
It was the little bitch who I killed. I love taking innocence in this way. I sliced her slowly while she screamed for Jamie to save her. No one heard. Our masters made sure of that, and I proved their tolerance by pushing even my own perversion.
She took almost an hour to die.
I washed her blood from my skin with regret, but not before I truly reveled in it. She almost made me rethink my promise never to drink blood again.
I slipped out of the showers where I killed her and back into the room. I left the knife still in the body, positioned for maximum effect.
Let's see if I can maneuver Jamie to be the first one into the shower to see my artwork.
---
I awoke this morning to find another knife in my receptacle. I hear a scream coming from the bathroom. I look quickly and a smile of triumph splits my face. Jamie saw it first.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I woke up after the lights came back on, and there was a book in the receptacle. It had Journal printed on the cover. There was no way I was going to put anything that these crazy people running the asylum could use against me, so I wrote about nothing in particular. I wrote about sunshine and daisies.
It is something that my writing teacher used to talk about. She said that if we had nothing else to write about, spend some time writing about something familiar to us. Just spend time writing. She set us an assignment to write as much as we could that night about sunshine and daisies. I started by writing about how stupid it was to write about sunshine and daisies, by the time I had finished with twenty pages I no longer thought the assignment was stupid.
Try it yourself sometime. Start by writing about the way that sunlight lightly touches the yellow color of the flower, adding a translucence to the petal, and giving a sense of depth. . .
Yeah, I don't want to give all of my secrets away.
So I spent the time before out next meal writing about sunshine and daisies.
I wondered what they would take away from the experience. I know I felt more relaxed than I had in days. We went to lunch. When we got back, it was lights out again. I slept again. The lights came on again and we were told to write. I spent some more time free writing, but since I had done enough daisies, I decided to start writing about vacuum. You know, like in space? I wanted to see how many words it would take me to completely describe a perfect vacuum. I was still writing when they let us go to dinner.
'You will be allowed into the common area after dinner."
That was at least something different. After a morning spent writing and sitting around, everyone in their own silent world, I wondered what the common area would be like.
Something occurred to me. The children hadn't been noisy all morning. I looked at them and they seemed a bit lethargic. I walked over to one of the little telepaths.
"What's your name, sweetie?"
"I'm Lucy."
"Are you feeling ok, Lucy?"
"The light is funny in here. It makes my eyes hurt, and my head feel soft."
I was starting to feel worried. "Can you read my thoughts, Lucy?"
"I'm sorry, the light hurts too much."
I had spent the energy to get rid of the pills for nothing. I think that was just a test of our obedience. What was this place? Why were they doing this? I tried something I had never done before. I thought about something I wanted to connect with. I focused on the texture and shape and color. I thought of reaching out and plucking it from the tree, and matched my movements to my thoughts.
Next thing I knew, there was a fresh granny smith apple in my hand. Lucy clapped at that, and for a moment her pain was gone. I gave her the apple, and she ate it quickly and messily. I'm not sure if anyone else noticed.
Dinner was the same as breakfast and lunch. A protein bar washed down with water. I almost wished in that moment that I had eaten the apple instead of Lucy. Seeing how the pain in her eyes had returned, however, I couldn't begrudge her that little joy.
We ate it silence, and then moved into the common area. There were some ping pong tables, and a piano. Off to one side there was a TV and a couch. On the other side of the room was a chess table with three chess sets on it. I wanted to sit down and see what passed as TV in this world.
"Jamie, come play chess with me." Tory grabbed my arm and practically dragged me to the chess table. He had been a little strange today, smirking at everyone and giggling to himself as he wrote. I didn't really want to play chess with him.
"I want to just relax for a bit, Tory. Maybe watch some TV."
"Anyone can watch TV, Jamie. Chess takes some real skill."
"Come on, Tory. I'm a bit tired after all this writing."
He smirked at that. "Afraid to lose to little ole me?"
This really seemed to mean a lot to him, so I decided to play his game with him at least this once. I always felt sorry for the little pawns.
I read Through the Looking Glass one summer, and it really made me feel for the pawns on the board after that. I saw all of them as Alice, and wanted them all to be queen. So I did my best to use all of my other pieces to clear the way for them. I know, it's not really a winning strategy, but I was happy every time that I got a pawn to the eighth row.
My playing method really seemed to bother Tory. He couldn't decide if he was mad or not. I think the time I took his queen with one of my pawns, because his king got into revealed check from my queen really bothered him. I got three pawns to the eighth row that game.
Over all, I got twelve pawns home out of six games. I made a lot of little Alices happy.
We still had some time to watch TV after he got bored. I sat with the other children on the couch and we watched a strange mix of shows from my world. I can't really describe it, and I'm sure the point was lost on me, but everyone else seemed to enjoy it. I stopped really paying attention when the main character started saying, "Kawa, kawa, Hey KAWA!!" and everyone laughed. I was completely lost.
About an hour later we went back to our room.
A lot of the others immediately began writing in the books, even without the command to do so. Everyone else seemed to already be conditioned to follow their orders. I wondered what was going on here. It didn't make any sense to me. They were all getting the same glassy eyed looks that the other inmates had when we walked down the corridor this morning. The children were further along than the teenagers, but they were all getting there.
What made me different. What was protecting me.
'Jams, do you have any idea what's going on here? Why aren't we affected?'
'Huh? Affected by what? I think you should be writing.'
I suddenly knew what made me different, and I panicked a little. What happened when Jams was fully overcome?
I had to think positively. She seemed to be taking the bullet for me on this one, so I needed to make the most of the time I had left. I looked around, and noticed that most of them were silently writing in their journals. Tory, still had the same smirk on his face. I really had to watch that one. Something just wasn't right about him.
"Place your journals in the receptacles."
Well, I did as I was instructed, trying to match the dead actions of the others. I was going to need to find a healer after I got everyone out of here. That shouldn't be too much of a problem, but it would need to be somewhere other than this world.
"Prepare for sleep."
We all lay down and the lights turned off. I tossed and turned for a while, and then finally fell asleep. I had some really strange dreams. Jams was always there, and never really reacted. I'm not sure if it was really her, as it could have been my own fears about her.
I didn't know what to do for her. She was so dead. I thought about when she lost her life. I felt her die.
I haven't written about it truly before, because I always felt it was private to her. However I felt her dying again.
She had grown colder and colder, and lost her focus.
Now, she was losing focus, but there was no physiological reason.
It killed me a little inside.
I really have no words to explain how I felt right now. It was as if the very will to write had seeped from my soul. It was. . .
It was a field of daisies, brown in winter and waiting for the first snow. There is no grass. There are no leaves. There is no more sunlight, and it will never rise again. The moon glows red, and blood drips from the very atmosphere.
I got a little smile thinking about that. It actually helped me to organize my thoughts.
Loosing Jamie is not losing a friend, or a sibling, or lover. Loosing Jamie is losing myself. It would be like waking one morning and realizing you had only one leg, and one arm.
I had to figure a way out of here, or I would live my life without an arm and a leg.
I couldn't leave any of these children here.
I suddenly had a thought.
I might not personally be able to return to my Mary, but she and Frank would be able to take all of these children and give them a life.
They had the contacts to place them. I was sure that this would be a great way to resolve this little issue. No, to figure out how to get all of them out of her with me, and then get them healed and off to Mary.
I awoke with a smile.
We went and showered like we had the previous morning. I was still bothered by all the communal showers they had here.
We went to breakfast, and this time we weren't alone in the dining hall. It seems that all of the people in the sanitarium were in the room with us. The room was packed and it was silent. They all ate mechanically, and I looked at all of them to see if anyone else was like me. Even Tory had lost his animation of yesterday. I began to notice that most people were in synch with their motions. There were a few in the room that were moving at their own pace. I looked directly at one, and he saluted me with his meal brick. About one in ten were like me, at their own pace, but pretending to be mechanical in their actions.
I went along with them, trying my best to blend in. I knew if someone was really paying attention that we would be noticed. What they did about it would really depend on whether or not anyone who was watching cared.
We finished the brick and went back to our room for the morning sleep.
I wasn't tired, so I sat there looking at the darkness. I can thankfully say that while looking into the darkness, the darkness never looked into me.
I shook myself at the thought. If I continued thinking these thoughts, I would drive myself insane.
I had to plan what I would do. How was I going to connect to all of the others, when none of them could help me.
It would have to be related to how I connected to Jams. This worlds detectors had discovered me doing it, so I must be broadcasting beyond myself. I tried to touch anyone at all in the room with me. I reached out, and felt, and stretched.
It was as if I was running into a brick wall. I tried to push against the wall. I failed. I mentally took a run at the wall and crashed into it. I passed out. I didn't wake up until everyone returned from the next meal. That scared me a little. It had been fairly early in the sleep period when I had tried to attack the wall, and here it was about four hours later I'm only just waking up.
I needed to be a lot more careful about what I did. I could wake up dead next time. There was only a finite amount of energy I could use.
I sat there and thought about it for a while. I reached out my hand to the wall and felt along it. It felt pebbled. It wasn't a solid after all. I pushed my hand slowly into the surface and it passed into it. The less pressure I used the easier it was to permeate the wall. I slipped into the wall. A great vista opened up before me.
I had no idea what it was that I was seeing. I looked around me, and saw a faint yellow ribbon flowing from me. I could see my energy level here, and saw with a bit of fear that I only had about a hundred or so feet of ribbon left in me. There was room in me for a lot more than that, so I had to assume that I started short when I came in here.
I was losing ribbon at about a foot a minute. Not too fast, but I only had about a hundred feet left.
I lost a couple of feet while I sat there trying to decide what to do: Stay and explore, or run home. I grabbed onto the ribbon to see if I could stop it, and felt myself pulled through the wall. I saw myself lying in bed and the lights come on. I slipped back into myself.
We went to dinner.
I was getting tired of meal bricks.
We went to the common room after dinner. Most of the inmates went and sat in front of the TV. A few went and played ping pong. A couple went over and pretended to play chess.
They were pretending, because none of the moves were correct. What were they doing?
I sat and watched them move the pieces. There was an art to it. There was a. . .language to it. I really didn't want to be here long enough to learn that language, but I walked closer and watched anyway.
One of the young men there gestured me toward the remaining open seat.
I had a thought and pointed toward my eyes, then toward my ears, and then shook my head.
The one who had pointed toward the seat walked over to me, and tapped my head. He then gestured to the seat again.
I shrugged and sat down at the table.
The person who had invited me to the table moved a couple of pieces: 'Would someone like to recap for our new member?'
My eyes widened in surprise. 'I can understand!'
One of the other girls at the table smiled, and then laughed her pieces. The other girl moved them: 'Pedant here has that talent. I can teach anyone anything he knows. I have no idea how he learned this language.'
Pedant looked grim: 'The person who taught them to me was taken for final rendering.'
I saw the smiles fade.
'What. . .' I began with a small pawn shuffle, but Pedant raised his hand.
'That is too much of a topic for our first meeting. The common talents, they keep as many as appear. The rare talents, they only allow one of at a time. The fact that you're awake tells us that you must be a rare.
I wondered about that. But I wouldn't tell them my worries.
'What's your power?'
I couldn't think what to tell them.
'Don't you know your power?' This was said by a rat faced boy between the girls on the other side of the table. He laughed his pieces. It was the same movement that the girl had mad, but there was something of a smirk in it. Don't ask me to explain it. It would be lime explaining a chuckle versus a giggle, by sound alone, to a deaf person. I could just tell
'Hush, Walker, give her a chance to organize her thoughts.'
'I will have to describe what I have discovered so far. . .'
Jaws dropped. 'So far. . .'
'Discovered. . .'
Pedant raised a hand: 'Silence, let her speak.'
I took a deep breath, and then let it go because I wasn't speaking: 'I can move between worlds. I can host dead people in my head. I can travel outside of my body. I can take things from other worlds, and push them there. I can find specific people in other worlds, and travel to them. I can talk telepathically, but currently only to people who are in my head with me. . .
I trailed off as I looked at the faces around me. Their mouths were open in shock. Walker began, 'Jamie. . .' but Pedant stopped him.
'No real names here.'
'And you should be able to see that he's male.' Said the other boy at the table. Both the girls giggled their pieces.
Walker looked at me in appraising manner: 'I don't care what her genetics say. She's female.'
I blushed and smiled and looked down at the table.
'See!' The girls laughed, and the silent boy looked embarrassed.
Pedant came to his rescue: 'No need to be put out, Underseer. You look at the core of things, and see them as they are on a basic level. She is physically male. We see her as she appears. She appears female.'
Underseer broke out in a huge grin: 'They! There are two of them in there.'
Walker looked at me with a question in his eye.
'I saved one of my alternates when she died. I am keeping her alive until we find a better home for her.' Something suddenly dawned on me: 'Wait, Jamie in this world is physically female.'
'You didn't know?' asked one of the girls.
'Well, I did try to find the perfect, unoccupied body for my alternate. We were looking for a mind destroyed by the Beast' I then explained who the Beast was.
"Inmates return to your rooms."
We said our goodbyes, and I went to my room. Our journals were back. I opened mine to see what was written or changed there. There had been no changes I could see.
We went to bed and the lights were shut off.
I decided that I needed to refresh my energy before trying the plane again. So I went to sleep. I awoke before anyone else, and noticed that one of the children was missing. I noticed the door open, so I went out into the hall. I called for her, but there was no reply. I went into the bathroom. I smelled something. It stank horribly in the shower area. The walls were wet and red, and I wondered what it could be in here. Then I saw the small broken body. I began to scream. I couldn't stop it. I screamed and screamed until I simply couldn't scream any more.
I turned to run, and there was Pedant. He looked at me with a question in his eye. It was at that moment that I realized he was mute. Not showing him up I simply pointed. He looked at her poor little body and held me as I cried silently into his shoulder.
I began to shake uncontrollably. He held me until that stopped too. I would find out who had hurt this innocent one.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I pulled away from Pedant suddenly. I had no idea who was the killer. He was also the first here. He began signing at me.
"I don't understand you." My voice was hoarse and I hated it. He reached his hand toward me and I shied away. He touched his forehead, and I remembered last night. I let him touch my forehead. He gave me two things. I could now use sign language, like him, and I knew where he was last night. I had his memories from when we had separated to go to bed until the moment he touched me.
"Sorry that I pulled away from you, Pedant"
"Don't worry about it. I would fear you myself if I hadn't seen your reaction to the corpse."
He motioned for us to leave the bathroom. I followed him out, hugging my arms to my chest. in the hallway, looking at the beige carpeting and the gray paint on the walls I could almost believe that the body of that little child was not still twenty feet away. I began to cry again.
"It's ok, Journey."
"Journey?"
"Well, it's what I wanted to call Jaime, our Jaime, but she always vetoed it."
"I think I can live with that."
"The others are at the table. Care to let me escort you there? You really don't want to see how they treat a body."
I followed him to the common room. I walked over to my space on the near side and sat down. The others were already there. I looked carefully at the people around the table. Could I really trust them? Pedant I knew I could trust. What about rat faced Walker and the stolid Underseer. What about the girls? I didn't even know their names.
'What do I call you two?'
The taller blond one picked up her pieces and began: 'I'm Lacey, and the other one is Keeper.'
'Why are you called Lacey?'
'Because I have the ability to interlace. I know, you're confused. Just watch. She put her hand through the top of the table. It wasn't like she broke the table. Just that she put it through the substance as if it wasn't there.
'Oh, so that's what I did when I went through the pebbled barrier, oh and when I was floating to this dimension.' She looked a bit confused and a little surprised to me, so I explained to her about floating through everything when I was between dimensions. I also told her about passing through the wall to get to the ribbon world.
Walker looked at me appraisingly: 'That's the astral plane. I go there, which is why I'm called Walker. I go for astral walks, you see? Ok, so it's not really funny. Anywho, I always need an opening in the wall to pass through. You're saying you passed directly through the wall? Wow.
Again I realized there was a bit of awe in the way he moved his pieces. I really liked this language. I wondered who had come up with it, and when. And then how had they taught Pedant's predecessor. I looked at the six of us around this table and wondered something: 'Are these the only six rare talents?'
Pedant picked up this one: 'Our lords and masters have a number of facilities like this one. They only ever have six of the more powerful abilities in any of them. I think they are afraid that if enough of them got together, they could escape.' He really didn't like the people in charge.
'There's nothing keeping me here, guys. I'm sure that I'm not the only one here ether.' I looked pointedly at Lacey.
She blushed bright red. I knew then that there was something keeping her here. Or I should say someone. She nodded at my expression of comprehension. She tilted her head at Walker and smiled. My shock must have showed. I would never have picked Walker.
"What. . ." he started to say, and then reached for his pieces: 'What's going on? Is this some secret girl language?
I reached for my pieces only to see Lacy shake her head. Well, it was for her to let the guy know. . .that's when I noticed that Keeper and Walker were holding hands. Lacy gave me a weak smile when I noticed, but Keeper grinned. I looked sharply at Keeper and she shrank away from my glare.
'What's your power, Keeper.' It was her turn to blush. 'What did I say?'
Lacey grinned in evil delight: 'She is a preserver. She keeps things in their present state.'
I was even more confused than before her second explanation. Lacey looked over Walker's head at Keeper, saw her nod, and then moved her pieces: 'Sorry Walker.'
His eyes widened, "Shit, not ag. . ." He stopped speaking. He stopped moving. He did not breathe, or blink. As she continued to touch him, Keeper's eyes bled from light brown to almost black. Just before all of the light brown disappeared from the outside ring, she let go. ". . .gain."
Walker jumped up from the table. "Damn it, Wendy, you promised." He walked to the other side of the room. I went over to him and put my hand on his shoulder. "You ok?"
"I'll be ok as soon as I thaw out."
"She froze you?"
"She takes you out of time. You don't freeze, but all of your molecules stop moving. They start moving again immediately, but it essentially drops you to room temperature. Really freaky feeling. She accidentally did it the first time. . .sorry, you didn't want to know that."
I blushed bright red and went back to the table. I trusted these people so easily. One of them could have killed that beautiful little girl. That reminded me of my plan, which suddenly felt out of my reach. How would I get all of these people out now. There must be almost a hundred people here. I couldn't be responsible for them, could I.
I decided to share my idea with the rest of them and see what they suggested. When I put my pieces down, they all reached for their pieces simultaneously, and then deferred to Pedant.
'Now that you're here, Jamie's body has likely already been rendered.'
I needed the body here now, I needed to check it to see there was nothing wrong with it. Without thinking I reached out and pulled, hard.
The body appeared a few inches above the table. It appeared to hover there for a moment and then collapsed down, scattering pieces all over the place. The others looked astonished. Walker even rushed over to see what had happened and stopped dead in his tracks.
The body was still breathing, and the heart was still beating, but I needed to figure something out fast. I felt Jams quiet form in my head. I pushed it toward the body on the table. I felt a tearing in my head and began to scream silently. I had no vice left to do anything else. I continued to push, focusing on the body on the table, even as I curled in on myself and held my hands to my head. I'm not sure at that moment if I was just holding it cause it hurt, or to try to hold it together. I felt as though my head were exploding in slow motion.
I felt something give, and then more, and Jams began to move. "GO!!!!!!" I yelled with my entire being. Then I felt a hand on my shoulder and something guiding my efforts. I don't know how long I sat there, curled into myself. The pain continued to increase. I felt the molten magma being poured into the eyes and siphoned out my ears. I felt cooked clean through. The pain got worse from there. It got to a point where it no longer felt painful. Pain itself became an abstract concept. I was watching the pain and examining its flavor as if I were an epicurean.
I began to realize that when it was sweet, I was doing what needed to be done, and no more. When it began to sour, other damage was being done. I would back up a bit and redirect my efforts.
Forever I worked in this sweet and sour world. It was over in a moment and the pain began to recede. I knew that the greater portion of Jams was out of my head. The pain went down to a nuclear explosion, and then a car accident.
I was dimply aware of my surroundings again, and heard someone screaming in agony. It wasn't me. The body was screaming as a glowing energy flowed from me into in. I commanded the remnant in my head, 'Jams, go home!' and felt a sudden loss of pain. The body giggled a bit and then went silent. The breathing became deeper, and I knew that she had fallen asleep.
That's good, because so did I.
---
I was running from room to room. There was something missing. I couldn't find it. There were signs of damage everywhere. Holes had been torn in the walls. People were in pieces as well. The survivors looked around with haunted eyes, or cried over friends and lovers. The beige carpeting and gray walls did nothing to soothe me now.
Smoke billowed all over the place, and then I caught a glimpse through one of the holes at a castle throne room, also in shambles.
I rushed through into the throne room. I knew where I was, but didn't feel like being Guinevere for the moment. Even here it was destroyed. I sat down and cried.
---
I woke up still crying. All of my dreams were destroyed. I felt someone holding me. I heard someone else crying and looked to see Pedant holding me as I cried, but I wasn't looking at me.
The long hair should have given it away. I got up and went to Jams and held her. "Why did you send me away?"
I held her and we cried together. I felt as if I had lost a part of myself. I knew from the way that she sounded that this place was still affecting her, and it didn't seem to be affecting me.
Then I remembered the little dead girl. I was being affected, but differently from most people here. I could not focus on any one thing for too long. I kept forgetting my train of thought as if it had never existed and moving to another thought.
I held Jams until she quieted. "Don't you love me anymore, Sis?"
"I always love you, Jams."
"But you pushed me out!"
"You're a girl!" I taunted back.
"I've always. . ."
I giggled at her and pulled her gown over her head. "Oh. . ." I heard her muffled voice. She pulled her gown back into place and threw her arms back around me. "I'm a girl!"
I looked over at Pedant and Underseer looking embarrassed. I looked around us. "Did you take me back to my room?"
"No, we're in our room. The rest of us moved people around so that we were all in the same room. We moved two other people into your old room, since we didn't feel safe with you out of our sight."
"Is he safe?"
"About as safe as anyone who isn't the two of us. We need to figure out a better way to determine who is, and isn't, the killer."
Something started to come to me. Flashed glances. Out of place movement.
"Where's Tory. . ."
I rushed out of the room, toward the room where we had started. Tory wasn't there, but his journal was. I opened the book and read the first little bit.
Tory was the Beast.
I ran back to Pedant's room. Jams was gone. I was losing control of the situation. Where could they be? Without a clock I wasn't able to determine where they should be on the daily schedule. My stomach grumbled at me, complaining about poor living conditions.
Food. Cafeteria. I rushed to the cafeteria, but neither Tory nor Jams were there. I turned to run again and collided with a brick wall. Underseer reached out a hand to help me up.
"Tory is the killer. Jams is missing, and likely wandered here, since she is still under the control of our masters. I think Tory has Jams."
"Pedant will go to your bathroom, I will go to ours. Follow this corridor around. The first door on your left will be another bathroom."
I ran then. I had read enough of the journal to know that Tory's mind was dead, and that the Beast had been operating it the whole time we had been here. The glances and smirks began to make sense. He considered himself to be better than the rest of us.
I got to the bathroom, but the door was locked. I was about to run on, but then something occurred to me. I pounded on the door a few times and then taunted through the door, "Can little Jamie-wamey come out to play?"
"My name is JAMES!!"
"Oh, good. Jamie. I'd hoped you were there."
I reached for Tory and pulled. I let go after an instant and heard a metallic crunch. The door unlocked and Jams walked out in a daze. She wandered off toward the cafeteria, and I slipped into the room. The Beast was picking himself off the ground next to one of the stalls. There was a big dent in it, and his arm was hanging dead at his side.
"Nice trick, bitch. I dare you to try that again."
I smirked at him. "Ok, I'll even tell you when I'm about to act. You ready?" I paused for a couple of heartbeats. "NOW!" and pushed at him will all of my force. His feet flew out from under him and he flew into the half wall around the showers. The tiles shattered with a sound like shattering glass. His legs twitched a bit under him, and then stopped.
"You'll pay for that, you little cunt." I tried to get up, but his legs wouldn't move. "What in the hell did you do to me?"
"Can you feel this?" I said as I kicked him in the balls as hard as I could.
He began to laugh. I took that as a no. I felt a desire to start cutting him the way he had cut up that little girl. In the shower area there was a really short katana. I walked over to it and picked it up. I removed the sheath and walked back over to the Beast. He laughed some more at me, but I could feel him taunting me now.
"You're no better than me. It seems some things are just common to the type. We are killers, Jamie. All of us. I just started before any of the others. You will all join me if given enough time."
The thought sickened me. I dropped the knife and ran over to one of the stalls in enough time to vomit. How had I ever even considered that. This place made it so hard to think. I needed to get all of us out of here. I became dimly aware of a siren going off in the hall. I turned my head to hear it better, and saw the Beast puling himself toward me, the knife in the other hand.
With a lot less force than last time, I pushed him back to the wall. The lighting in the bathroom went red.
"You've done it now, you fucking bitch. When I eat a person's soul, I get a lot of their memories, especially when I take my time. Two people from this world gives me a pretty good picture. There is something that even Psi fear, and You're it. I'm not waiting around for the repercussions." He slid the knife along his throat and slumped down into his own blood.
I rushed out into the hall. The siren was almost deafening. "TK has left north east bathroom." I wasn't sure where they'd gotten the panicking female voice from, but I wasn't standing around to find out. I ran off toward the cafeteria.
"TK is on the move and heading in the general area of the cafeteria. All residents move to your assigned quarters for lockdown. TK is considered unstable and highly dangerous."
Better late than never, but they were talking about me. I needed to go somewhere else, now. I had no time to pick or choose. I needed somewhere to crash. But, how could I leave without saying goodbye. . .I felt Jams mind. When I closed my eyes for an instant, I could almost see the yellow ribbon connecting us. I sent a thought over and over along that ribbon, 'Pedant, I am safe and will return. Pedant, I am safe and will return.'
I reached to the safest feeling mind that I could find, and let go of the world.
---
I was never able to tell the exact moment that Sis left the sanitarium. I think it took the guards a few minutes to guarantee that the dreaded telekinetic had left the building. I only knew that there was something bubbling around in my head that had to get out. I turned to the guy with the strange hair (it was short in back, but he had bangs to his chin) and said, "Pedant, I am safe and will return. Why did I just say that?"
Jams thought passing through my new mind woke me up. I knew that she was gone. Somehow, the guards realized this in the same moment. The lighting returned to normal. I however did not, or should I say I did remain normal.
For the first time in days, I was awake and aware. I was suddenly very self-conscious. I was in a fully female teenage body, breasts and all, and I was only wearing a hospital gown. I shrieked and tried to cover myself better. The tall silent one led me over to one of the drawers in the wall and handed me some clothing. "You'll need to get dressed here. There's no privacy in this place."
His voice was even better than his body, and that was something to behold. At least I really wanted to be held, you know to him. I blushed scarlet and felt like my skin would combust from the heat of it.
"Turn around at least." I said.
I quickly slipped into the clothing he had given me. "It's too big."
"Let me help you with that." He pulled some drawstrings on the sides of both the tops and bottoms and they were quickly adjusted to fit.
Not the most fashionable things, but at least they covered everything. "Thank you," I said and kissed him on the cheek. It was his turn to blush, and he stammered out something like, "You're welcome."
I felt a finger on my forehead and then I was turned forcibly around. "What happened to Jamie?"
"I speak sign-language?"
"Focus, what happened to Jamie?"
"Look, buddy, I don't know who you are, or why you're so insistent, but I'm Jamie."
"She has a point there, Pedant."
Pedant, the guy with weird hair glared at his royal hotness. I blushed at even thinking that. "I meant the other Jamie, oh bother, this will get confusing."
I sighed. I understood that he was worried about her, so I cut him some slack, "Call me Jams. It is easier that way, and it's what the other Jamie calls me. Until she gets back and decides, we just call her Jamie."
"Agreed"
"She isn't here. All I know is that she is really far away. I'm not sure how I can tell, but I feel it. And she's ok, at least for now."
This Pedant guy seemed to come to a decision. "Underseer, the time for skulking is over. Get the others together. We need to convene a council of war."
I really didn't like the sound of this. Underseer took a step to leave the room. I went to follow him and collapsed. . .into his arms.
"You need to be careful, Jams. This body has spent a few months in a coma. You need some time to get your strength back."
He carried me to another room that had some ping pong tables and chess tables. There was also a TV. Underseer lowered me gently into one of the seats in front of the chess tables.
"Will you be ok for a little bit?"
I nodded to him and sat there limply. I started moaning my pieces. I stopped in astonishment. I could speak with chess pieces. What else had that touch of Pedants done for me?
I was still looking at the black queen in wonder as the others filtered into the room and took places at the table. Underseer came and sat down next to me. My stomach fluttered a bit, and I told it firmly to get itself under control.
Pedant sat down last: 'We need a new call sign for you, Jams. Jamie went by Journey, but I doubt that is one that you would like to take up?'
He seemed a little insistent about it, but it didn't feel right taking Jamie's nickname. I looked again at the piece in my hand: 'I am Queen.'
Pedant rapped his king against the board, and in my mind it struck like a gavel: 'I call this council of war to order.'
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I had no clue what I was doing here. I had watched Jamie perform all sorts of almost magical acts over the past. . .how many days had it been? I died on a Sunday night. Monday we were in the police station and then attacked by my step-father. I still shudder at what would have happened if I hadn't been waiting for him to get home. Tuesday was doctor's visits and the salon. Wednesday was school. Then we went haring of into the great beyond. Thursday was our first day in the sanitarium.
But what day was today?
I paid attention to what the others were talking about, but I couldn't really help them. They assumed something that wasn't really true. I had no ability. I couldn't touch other worlds they way Jamie did, to pass through solid objects like Lacey. I couldn't read thoughts. I couldn't walk the astral plane. I couldn't do any of the things these people considered normal.
'I'm useless. I can't do what Jamie did. I shouldn't be here. You all need to listen to me.'
Everyone stopped talking immediately. They had been arguing about the best way that they could prevent the guards from taking back over. They all looked to me.
I sat there looking back at them each in turn. Pedant shook his head. 'You have an ability my. . .I mean Queen.
Moving his pieces seemed to break the trance over the other individuals at the table. Lacey glared at me.
'What are you talking about, Pedant?' He looked embarrassed, and none of the others around the table would meet my eyes. 'Tell me.'
Immediately, Pedant opened his mouth and began to speak: 'My liege, you have the voice of command. No matter what language you use, you will be able to command respect and allegiance of those around you. Pedant threw the pieces down "Stop that!" His signing was wild and angry.
I followed him into the same language, "Stop what? I don't even know what I'm doing."
"Don't command anything!" There were some emphatic nods around the table.
"I'm sorry, I didn't know what I was doing. Forgive. . .I mean, will you forgive me?"
There were some sighs of relief around the table. I felt someone wrap their arms around me. I looked up into Underseers eyes. I relaxed back into him. He just held me there, and I let myself be held.
'Now that the interruption is over, let's get back to business.' Pedant began, after collecting his pieces again.
'I think that the guards are less important than stopping whatever it is they're doing to the lighting in this place,' Walker interjected.
'They are adjusting the cycle rate of the lighting elements so that it interrupts neuron firing.' I felt his arms move as he spoke his pieces. I can hardly describe the feeling that it gave me. He continued: 'Lacey, can you take other people with you as to pass through objects?'
'Yes. . .' Watching someone not speak with anticipation of a response is something to behold with a motion language like that of the chess pieces.
'The control areas are toward the center of the building. If you were to take Queen in there, then she should be able to get the guards to shut down the controls, and then destroy them. The controls I mean.'
I tensed a bit. I couldn't do this. I couldn't take this job. I felt Underseer's arms close around me. "You can do this, Jams. This isn't beyond you."
I wanted to sit there forever in his arms. I wanted to feel safe and secure. I stopped to think for a moment. I reached for my pieces: 'We are one facility in the midst of a world that hates and fears us. They have weapons and devices that could level this building, without their need to retake it. Shutting off their devices is not going to be enough. Taking this building is not going to be enough. We aren't yet ready, Pedant, and we are fooling ourselves to believe that we are.'
'We can take them.'
'What then, Pedant? Stand off an army? They have convinced you that you should fear people like Jamie. They don't want you to know that they are the only ones who can save us.'
Keeper picked up her pieces: 'We don't need that freak!'
I picked up my pieces to speak, but I stopped. I needed to think before saying my next reply. This had to be their decision: 'I would like you to think about what you are saying. The people in charge of this place want us to fear each other as much as they fear us. Would you please consider what they have told you that's concrete about them?'
Each reached for their pieces, paused, and put them down. They all began to have thoughtful expressions on their faces. Underseer began to speak: 'Queen is right. She hasn't been with us long, no matter how much she looks like our lost friend. She isn't Intuition. She has a different Psi ability, and she has something perhaps even more important.'
'I don't see it,' Walker said looking at me.
'I know what Underseers saying. She is a leader.' I look at him with a quirked eyebrow. 'Really, you are. You take all of us, a group who can't agree on anything, and argue for the fun of it, and we are focused on what you have to say.'
'That's just the power making you talk.'
'If you don't give us a direct command, your power does nothing.'
I thought about this a moment. Could this be true? Sure, I had a group of friends, but none of use really led, did we? Ok, so I tended to resolve disputes, and make sure we ended up listening to everyone, but that's normal friend stuff. . .
Everyone was looking at me expectantly. What could I give them? 'You all have so much more experience than I do. I can't lead you.'
'Leadership is not the ability to do everything, Jamie. It's the understanding that other people are capable, and the willingness to help them to achieve their best.'
'A little simplistic, don't you think, Pedant. To be a proper leader I would need to understand our goals, and be able to direct each of us to achieve our portion of those goals.' I'd also have to be willing to send these people to their deaths. I leaned into Underseer for comfort. I couldn't ever send him to his death, could I? And if I could, would I like myself at all for doing it?
'Tell me truthfully, Queen. Is it that you can't lead us, or that you don't want to?'
He knew my answer before I gave it, but I did not return his smile, 'I will lead your rebellion until someone else comes forward who is better able to lead.' I felt along the ribbon that still connected me to Jamie. It was still a bright yellow, so I hoped she was ok. I could only tell that she was still alive.
"Our time of silence has ended." I spoke because my arms no longer had the strength to move the pieces. I had been running on adrenalin or something, because I slumped bonelessly into Underseer. "That and I no longer have the strength to talk with my hands," I smiled weakly as I continued.
"Lacey, can you take two as well as one?"
"I can, Queen."
"Pedant, you and Walker should direct the other inhabitants to this room. Keeper make sure they don't leave."
"Keeper gets to keep them." Walker smirked at his own joke.
"Underseer, lead on to the control room. We're only going to be normalizing the lighting in here."
I felt him rise effortlessly with me in his arms. It was the best feeling I had ever felt. I whispered to him as we travelled down the hall, "What's your real name?"
"Corin"
"Keep me safe, Corin," I smiled and lay my head against his chest, and listened to the slow beat of this heart. I felt his strength as he carried me. It was like floating down the hall, more so than being carried. I expected to be bounced as I was carried, but none of that happened.
"I think someone is enjoying this, Underseer." Lacey said from beside us. I blushed and buried my face in his chest to hide it. I felt his laughter in his arms and heard it rumbling in his chest.
"That makes two of us, Lacey."
I didn't know I could blush more than I had before, but I simply went back to leaning my head against him with a smile as I looked at Lacey. Seeing her expression I remembered. "I'm sorry for you, Lacey. I really am. Usually, I've been the one where you are."
"But you're beautiful."
I smiled sadly at her. "I was born male." I felt a shift in Corin's grip, and I felt the blood rush from my face, I looked up at him, but he was looking straight ahead. My happiness had already gone. I shouldn't have said anything.
"Let me tell you a story, Lacey." A tear trickled down my face, and I currently didn't have the strength to wipe it away.
"I was raised as a girl, because that's what I always felt myself to be. It's something that happens sometimes. More or less rare depending on which psychologist you talk to.
"I wore dresses and makeup and had lots of parties with my friends where they talked about the boys they dated, and all of them thought that one of them had their eye on me. All of us liked Brian because he was good looking, and popular, and played sports. I didn't think I possibly had a chance with him.
"I looked at myself and saw my flaws, not my good qualities. I saw that physically I didn't match what I looked like on the outside."
I stopped to think about the next thing I would say. I smiled sadly. Aware that any chance I had thought I had was probably gone forever anyway, I continued, "I seriously considered cutting off certain parts of my body, thinking that it would help me to fit in better."
Lacey looked at me with a question, and I looked at my legs. She nodded her understanding and I continued.
"That's when he asked me out for the first time. I thought I was the most special girl in the entire school. I was going out with Brian. He groped me on our first date, and tried to kiss me, but I ignored it, hoping that he liked me for who I really was.
"We dated consistently for a year. We started making out quite a lot toward the end. It made me feel so special to be held by him, and feel his lips pressed against mine. Sometimes he would try things I wasn't comfortable with, and I would gently move his hand off my leg.
"Last week, he told me he loved me. I felt as if my entire life had been vindicated. I was loved and in love with a wonderful boy. I could see an entire future open out before us. I told him that I loved him too. I was so happy I thought I would burst.
"He told me that he couldn't believe me. He felt I had just been leading him on. He had planned to tell me he loved me and leave me to myself. I argued with him. How could he believe I didn't love me.
"He told me there was a way we could prove our love to each other.
"This wasn't the first time he had brought up sex, but I knew there was nothing I could do. I began to cry uncontrollably and he left me there in my bedroom. I should have seen that this was just a plan to get into my pants, but I was too blinded. I needed to be with him. I felt I would die without him.
"I spent most of the next day with my friends, and we cried and talked and cried some more. They felt sorry for my loss. One of my friends asked why I couldn't just tell him what was going on. We all thought it would be a great idea.
"I called up Brian and asked him to come over so we could talk. I think he thought I had reconsidered. He hadn't expected what I'd told him. I told him the truth. He called me a faggot and a queer. I ran from my room crying. I walked into the forest behind my house and wandered around for a bit.
"Brian jumped from behind a tree. I thought for a moment that he was there to apologize, but he wasn't. He killed me. I died there in the darkness by the hand of someone I thought I loved.
I felt Corin's hands tighten around me, but refused to read anything into it. I had lost him already, and he was just trying to comfort me.
"I have spent the week in Jamie's head, afraid at times I was nothing more than a figment. When we found this body, I hoped at most to be back in the same state I was before. When I found out that this body was physically female, and matched my mind, I thought all of my troubles would be over. But I'm still me, and it seems I am cursed to be alone for now."
"I'm sorry for how I reacted, Queen. I should never have thought you less than you are."
"It's ok, Corin. Shhh. Don't worry. I know that you can't possibly feel for me what I would like." I laid my head back against his chest and listened to his hear again. I looked at Lacey for the first time since I started my story. She had some tears in her eyes.
"Lacey, you are a beautiful girl, and don't let anyone tell you differently. There's someone out there for you. Maybe even this big lug." I bounced my head against his chest, since none of the rest of me seemed in working order.
"I'm not interested in Lacey. Sorry, Lacey."
"Don't worry about it, Big guy. I'd be more likely to go after Pedant." She said this last with a look of disgust on her face.
"What's wrong with Pedant? Sure, he is a little abrasive, but he is pleasant to look at."
"You can have him, then, because the abrasiveness is too much for me."
"We're here," Corin said, indicating the wall on the left hand side. Lacey grabbed his arm and pulled him forward as she walked slowly into the wall.
It was almost indescribable. It was like someone running their fingernails down a chalkboard, only you were the chalkboard. I couldn't feel the wall. I could feel it all through me. It felt like I was being pushed apart from the inside. Then my face entered the wall and I couldn't breathe. I was trying to pull air through a solid concrete wall. My lungs burned, and then they were completely in the wall too. I could not breathe. I could not scream. I could not move. I felt the wall pass through me some more, and my arm was free. Half of me was out of the wall, and then my mouth came out. I could only breathe with half of my lung, and even that was painful.
I looked into the room. A guard was reaching for his gun. "Stop," I commanded him, "Sit." He sat down with a bemused look on his face. He shook his head and before he could rise again I commanded, "You will fix the lights so that they radiate like any other lights." As soon as he complied, I continued, "Shoot the console and make sure it can't be fixed without it being completely replaced."
He emptied his clip into the board. Reloaded. He did it again. He looked for another clip to reload the gun a second time, but he seemed to be out. The contradiction broke him from his trance. He raised his gun and pointed it at us again.
I smirked at him and turned to Lacey, "Would you be so kind as to let us back into our cells, Lacey?"
"Of course, Milady."
The guard began pulling the trigger as we walked back into the wall. I took a deep breath this time, and heard Corin do the same.
We got to our side of the wall again, and Corin turned toward the dormitory where I had woken up. "Thank you, Corin. I love you." I was surprised at what I had said, but by the time I realized I'd said it, I was asleep. I sat in the emptiness of this body's dreamscape and prayed that I had only thought it.
Wanted someplace to lose myself in. I thought about my Jamie Spade office: The frosted glass in the door with the gold lettering on the outside. The big oak desk, with all the papers scattered about. The rolling desk chair, and the neon sign outside the window.
I smelled the Chinese place on the ground floor and started, coming to myself. I had created my room. I clapped in glee and sat down behind my desk. . .just in time for my first client of the night.
"Jamie Spade, I really need your help."
I grinned at the person who had just come in, "Help is what I do, Sweetheart. Have a seat and tell Auntie Jamie where it hurts."
---
I slowly became aware of my surroundings. I had been doing something important. . .or already done something. I couldn't quite remember what it was.
Someone was rubbing my back, and it felt really good. I arched myself into it and stretched. "Jams, you awake."
I stopped. I knew that voice. "Corin?" I remembered now what I had said, or had I?
'Please don't let me have said it, please don't let me. . .'
"I think we need to talk about what you said."
'Crap,' "Um, what did I say?"
"You can't take something like that back, Jams."
"Like what?"
"Like you being a boy. . ."
I relaxed, but felt a tear in my eye. Here it comes.
". . .and that you love me."
I opened my mouth to speak, but he put a finger on my lips.
"I need to have my say. I need some time. I know that you will probably need some time as well. I know you didn't mean to say it, but there was power in your words, and I know you spoke the truth."
I looked up at him, a question in my eyes, and he tapped his head.
"I see energy waves, and patterns. That's all I see. I can see when people lie, because they can't hide their energy changes. You use a different part of your brain to lie, than to tell the truth."
I didn't fully understand what he was saying, but I let him continue.
"I knew Jamie, I mean Intuition. You know, the person who used to be in your body. You know what I mean. Journey really complicates things, doesn't she."
I nodded and he continued, "I was used to her mannerisms, and I had a bit of a crush on her. She was always hanging around with someone else, thought, so I never thought I had a chance.
"You act a little bit like her, so I thought this was my chance. I thought I had been given a second chance with Intuition. But you're not her. I really like the way you look, Queen, and I really like you as a person. I think we can definitely be friends."
I had been physically female for less than a day, and I was already being given the 'just friends' speech. I began to cry. I felt strong arms encircle me, and lost all control. I sobbed into him, wanting him to be able to comfort me, but he couldn't be mine like I wanted him to. I knew if he asked me to prove my love, like Brian had, I would have given myself to him without a thought, and that scared me and made me cry harder.
"I want to start as friends, Jams. I need to start there. I don't know who you are, but everything I have seen tells me your are someone I could come to love."
I was still crying, but it didn't feel so desperate. He held me and ran his hand along my hair. I felt his comfort, as a friend, and felt it might be enough for now.
"Give me some time, Ok? I need to process everything that's happened so far. I want to love you for you, and not my history with Intuition."
I nodded, and leaned against him. I smiled through my tears. He really didn't know it yet, but I would have this man as mine. And not through any tricks or so called feminine wiles. I would be the best me that I could, and he wouldn't be able to resist.
"I'll give you as much time as you need, Corin." I looked up and smiled at him. I put all of my love for him into that look, and my happiness, for now, was complete when he smiled back.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
"Corin, could you take me to the common room?"
"You still need to rest, Jams."
"They need me there. All those children are going to need us when they start waking up from this."
"Someone else can do this. Your body has been in a coma for almost a year. It has no strength, and no reserves."
"I can make you do this. . .but I won't. If you feel I really can't do this, I will wait here patiently."
Corin sighed, grinned, and picked me up. I couldn't help but beam a smile at him. I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him on the cheek, "Thank you so much."
He blushed a little bit, but his smile stayed on his face. He carried me to the common room, and set me on the couch. He moved a ping pong table against the wall, and set one of the folding chairs on the table. He picked me up and carried me to the table, "No, what are you doing, Corin."
"If you wish to be a Queen, then you will have to have a throne, my liege." His mischievous grin showed he wasn't altogether serious.
The room was almost full of people. "Corin, turn all the chairs to face me."
"Alright you lot. Off the couch. Turn it around. Ok. Everyone needs to pay attention to Queen for now."
All eyes turned to me, and suddenly I had no idea what I would do. They were looking to me to lead them, and I simply had no clue what needed to be done.
"Jim?"
I looked over at the girl who spoke, and saw Mary with a question in her eyes. "No, I'm Jamie. I look a little like Jim don't I." The girl nodded so I continued, "You still don't know what your power is, do you?"
"No, Ma'am."
"My name is Jams." We both laughed a bit at that.
"Everyone, we are going to be attacked, I assume, by the people running this place. If anyone has powers they think will help, tell me, or one of the others you see standing up here. We need your help so that all of us can get out of here alive." I had become a lot more confident after talking to Mary. It was as if I had an added strength. "We can overcome this threat."
I heard Corin whispering something to Pedant. I don't remember everything I told that group of people. I felt that some of them should be the ones in charge. They were older than me. I was only thirteen. My doubts flashed away the moment they would surface. It was as if I couldn't doubt myself in that moment.
I do remember how I finished, “I know that some of you are scared. We have been ripped from our homes, and our loved ones. We have been imprisoned. We will be free, and our jailers will understand our justice.”
I felt Underseer twitch behind me, “There is no resolution in vengeance, Corin. We can not be like those we fight against, no matter what they choose to do to us.”
At that instant there was an explosion in the direction of the entrance hall. I directed all of my will at the assembled people in front of me, “Stay here, wait quietly.” I turned to Pedant and the others, excluding Corin from this command. “Guard these innocents.” Pedant frowned at me, but nodded. I knew the next command would destroy much of the trust I had been building, but I also knew I had no time for an argument, “Take me to the entrance, Corin.”
He fought it off, his need to keep me safe warring with the strength of my command, “Milady. . .”
With effort, I raised my arm to his cheek, “I will miss what might have been, Corin.” I cried as I gave the command that would destroy us, “I command you to obey me NOW, Corin. Take me to the entrance.”
The light went out of his eyes. He picked me up and took me to the entrance. The tears in my eyes blurred much of the walk there. I couldn’t help it. I only hoped that after this there was something left of him to hate me. There was certainly nothing there to comfort me right now.
“Stand where you are!” A group of soldiers slid around the corner with guns trained on the two of us.
“Drop your weapons!” I commanded the moment they came into view.
Guess whose command was followed. That’s right, their weapons clattered to the ground.
“You, at the back, restrain the rest of them. The rest of you, allow yourselves to be restrained.”
As they were complying, I had Corin continue to the entrance.
We passed through a couple of more squads, and subdued them, on our way to the entrance. “Put the girl down and get down on the ground.”
“He’s not the one you should be worried about.” The looked at me, and the moment they began to realize who I was I continued. My anger at what I had been forced to do to Colin fuel my power. I almost commanded all self will from their heads, but they would have justice from me, not execution.
“Every single one of you will forget how to use a weapon NOW!!!!!”
I finished just before their commander yelled “FIRE!”
Two bullets were fired, but they struck the glass to either side of the soldiers responsible. The looks of confusion on the others faces were absolute.
“You will find that I am capable enough to stand off anyone in the range of my voice, and you aren’t getting out of that range in this facility.”
I saw the commander glance to my right, “Drop your weapons and come out of there with your hands up! Now, now. Don’t you think that this is getting a little comical?” I inquired this of the commander.
“What do you think you are going to do here, bitch?”
“Language. My name is Queen. One more outburst from you and I will make your use of it a command.”
“You fucking whore. . .”
“You will address me as Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever!”
“No I won’t, you Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever.” He tried to look at his own mouth as he spouted my punishment. I had never had sex, and wouldn’t even consider taking money for it. He would learn his lesson.
“You’re Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever. No, you Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever. Damn it you little Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever.” He was beginning to panic. He was definitely becoming blue in the face. It was a mouthful.
“Are you ready to apologize?”
“You can kiss my ass, Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever.”
“Language. Do I have to warn you again that I have the voice of command?”
He smirked at something off to my right again. Without looking I commanded again. “Drop your weapons. Should you touch any of these weapons again before I give you leave, you will feel the overwhelming desire to dismantle them and eat them.”
The clatter of the dropped weapons was instant. Even the people in front of me, to whom I had not even directed a thought since taking their knowledge of weapons from them, dropped their guns.
“What is your name?” I asked the man with the speech problem.
“Captain Kurtis, Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever.”
“I would like for you to get your commanding officer on the phone.”
“Ok, Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, May she live forever.”
“I permit you to shorten my name to Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie. The May she live forever part is getting old.”
The look Captain Kurtis gave me could have melted steel. He got on the radio. “Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, wants to speak to General Houston.”
“Who?”
“The girl, Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie, who seems to be in charge.”
“Why do you keep saying that?”
“The little, Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie ordered me to say it and any time I talk about the Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie I have to say Your Royal and Absolute Highness, Queen Jamie.”
Laughter errupted from the speaker. When Captain Kurtis pressed the button to speak again I commanded, “You will not find humor in the misfortunes of others.”
The laughter cut off abruptly. “Shit. . .”
Captain Kurtis looked shocked, but he held the button down. “Would you please have the general meet me in the common room. I would like him to come alone. All of my people are there. I would like to resolve this as peacefully as possible.” When I finished speaking Captain Kurtis release the button, but he looked at me in awe.
“I release you from my command to you, Captain Kurtis. Please continue to treat me with respect and we won’t have any problems.” He simply nodded.
I whispered to Corin, “I need to use the facilities.” Wordlessly he took me to the closest bathroom, and set me in the stall. I turned around and vomited. I quickly purged the little in my stomach and simply dry heaved. What I had done to those men made me sick. I had played with them like puppets. I hated my power. I hated what it made me do.
“Corin, I release you completely. I command you to never again follow one of my commands. EVER!!!”
He blinked as a man coming out of a trance. I hoped I had enough time to do the next thing before I chickened out, or Corin stopped me. I crawled over to the sink and pulled myself up so that I could look into the mirror. I took a deep breath and focused on my image. I blocked Jamie out of my mind and focused on my self only. I took a deep breath and commanded. “You will never again command a living soul until Corin can forgive you and tells you he loves you, and means it.”
I felt something constrict about me. I felt as though I couldn’t breathe, but the air still went into my lungs. My arms collapsed and I fell to the ground. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” I cried to myself on the floor of that bathroom. I had destroyed everything to save these people. I didn’t deserve to live. I felt those strong arms go around me and lift me from the floor and I cried harder. I had hurt him so badly. I didn’t deserve to live. “I should never have survived. Jamie should have kicked me out to die so long ago. I want to die,” I sobbed.
“You did what was needed, Jams. You saved us all.”
“But I almost destroyed you, Corin.”
“I’m a bit stronger than that, Jams. One little command is not going to ruin me.”
“You were so dead looking. Like a walking corpse. It killed me to see that.”
“That was a powerful command, Jams. It locked me inside. I could see everything that happened, but had no will of my own.”
“That is why I am not worthy of this power.”
“Your ability to throw it away is exactly why you are worthy of it.”
“I forgave you before we got to the soldiers.”
“There hasn’t been enough time for this.”
“I. . .” I put my hand to his lips. I saw what he was going to say in his eyes.
“You have to mean it for it to work.”
He looked at me with a twinkle in his eyes.
“I’m not ready for that yet, Corin. If you still feel that way about me when were done, you can release me from my command.”
He took me to the common room, and set me gently on my throne. I released my commands, which power I had left myself, and the children began to chatter. We waited for almost an hour before the general showed up. He had graying buzz cut hair. He still filled his uniform well.
“Are you the little bit that took out my first company?”
“Yes, General. . .”
“Houston. General Houston.”
“You need to train your men better, they didn’t know how to use their weapons.”
He glared at me, but quickly got himself under control. “I am here to negotiate your surrender, Queen.”
“Really? I don’t think so, General Houston.”
“You gave up your power, bitch. You have no bargaining chip!” He drew and fired in a single motion. Corin dropped.
“I. . .love. . .yo. . .”
“Oh, poor little cunt, locked her power away, and now the only key is lost forever.”
There is only one thing I wanted from this man any more. “DIE you son of a bitch!” He collapsed to the ground like a puppet whose stings had been cut. The smirk was still on his face, but his eyes no longer focused. I fell off the table and crawled over to his radio. “Every one of you stupid morons who can’t seem to formulate enough thought to pour piss out of a boot are now, and will forever be, under my direct control. You will never again think for yourselves or move for yourselves. Your lives as your own beings at this moment end.”
The others in the room looked at me in horror. I smiled at them, and they giggled nervously.
“Whomever is the next in command after this General who just stopped living, come to the common room, now. And send a medic.”
I pulled myself over to Corin. The there was blood everywhere. He didn’t breathe at all. “But, I love you.” I put my head to his chest and cried.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I lay there crying. I couldn't truly appreciate what was happening around me. I heard someone collapse, and looked over to wee Walker collecting Keeper off the floor. Corin drew another ragged breath. "Jams."
"Don't talk. You need to save your strength."
"Not going to work on me, Jams. You cave me my freedom remember?" He coughed a bit and red appeared on his lips.
"You can't leave me, not now! I need you."
"You don't need anyone, Queen. You are truly special, you know that? You have a powerful weapon and the will to use it." He began coughing again, and this time a cloud of red escaped his lips, and red foam remained on his mouth and chin.
I put my hand over his mouth, leaving his nose free. "Please don't talk." I cried over him. He pulled my hand away from his mouth. He smiled at me, but didn't say another word. He simply breathed through his mouth shallowly, and so I blushed. He was having breathing problems and I covered his mouth.
"We came as requested, Queen."
"Medic, get over here and save this man's life."
He silently walked over and began to efficiently try to save Corin's life.
I turned to the other man in front of me. "Who are you?"
"Major Reeves."
"Well major, you will contact your leaders and tell them what has happened here. You will do that from this room, and when they ask you to kill me, you will hand me the phone. Are your instructions understood, major?"
"Yes, Queen." He pulled out his cell phone and dialed.
I grabbed the radio. "Every one of you in the sound of my voice will go about your lives as if I had not given you the command. You will remember my command however, and you will never take up arms without my express permission."
The medic shook himself, and turned to me, "Queen, I'm not sure that I can save this man. He was shot in the lung, and it is filling with fluid. Unless we can get him to a full class one trauma center, he will die."
"Then let's take him there."
"We are cordoned off."
I picked up the radio again, "I need a stretcher team in here five minutes ago, and vehicle at the entrance."
The stretcher carriers came and loaded Corin up. "Hold on," I said and gave him a quick kiss.
I looked around me at the people looking at me in the room. Some looked at me with fear in their eyes, some looked at me in awe. They all looked at me.
There was a cell phone thrust into my face. I picked it up and said chose my words carefully, "Listen, and do not put down the cell phone. Hit the speaker button. Say yes when you are done."
"Yes"
"Listen and do nothing. Who is holding the phone?"
"Ivan Winters."
"Well, Ivan. Who are you and your friends?"
"We are the ruling civilian council for the Psi Legion."
"Which is. . .?"
"All Psi in the world are inducted into the Psi legion the moment that their psi ability is registered using the Psi Edict. We use you to save the world."
"That all ends now. You will leave this sanitarium to it's own devices. You will provide nutritious, and good tasting, food to these people. You will provide them will areas to see the sun. You will never again try to control them beyond that. Are my orders understood?"
"Yes," came a chorus of voices from the phone. I hung up.
"Take me to the hospital." I turned and looked at Major Reeves even as I ordered him. He gestured for me to precede him, so I did. We walked out to an obvious military vehicle, but nothing like the Humvees I was used to. Again, it had no windows, but this time there was a faint glow and a view to the outside world. We drove to the hospital that Jamie and I had entered this world through. I was taken to the waiting room. They don't change much no matter what changes in the technology. Uncomfortable chairs and industrial lighting. It was the most uncomfortable space that she had ever sat in.
Grey walls, with some flashes of color here and there. Gray tile and gray patterned carpeting in a checkerboard pattern.
Everything ratcheted up the pressure. The waiting. There were no doctors or nurses in the wall. I looked at the camera, and wondered if they needed to hear me to be commanded. . .
I focused on the person in the room that was fed by the camera. "You will get a nurse of doctor to me now!" I repeated this over and over again for a few minutes before I heard a ruckus and saw a man in a security uniform being dragged by two orderlies. "There she is! She needs to speak to a doctor. Why won't any of you listen to me?" He started struggling even harder when he saw me. I couldn't help but smile.
I looked at his face, as he looked at me, and said, "I release you."
He immediately relaxed and then looked at me again. I saw the fear in his eyes, but I didn't stop there. I looked at the nurse escorting the orderlies and security guard. This time I thought at her, 'Come over and talk to me!'
She stopped, shook her head, and started walking again.
I repeated the command, 'Come talk to me now!'
Her step faltered, but she off again, and almost around the corner.
'talktometalktometalktometalktometalktome' I rambled in my mind. She stopped, turned, and started walking to me, but the second I stopped, she turned back around after shaking her head.
"Talk to me!" I said this last aloud, but it wasn't loud enough to actually reach her ears. She turned and walked back to me. Something to think about.
When she got to me, she glared at me and said, "You wanted to speak to me?" There was a sneer on her face.
"I would suggest that you be a little nicer to me. . .Patty."
"Why's that, you little thing?"
"I will show you why not." I focused on her, and made a short command, "You will kneel in my presence!!"
She dropped to her knees and glared at me.
"Have you learned your lesson?"
She continued to glare but said, "Yes" with a pained smile on her face.
"I release you!"
She got to her feet, and turned to leave.
"I am not done with you, Patty. I have been left here without any news of what happened to my friend."
"you mean the thing with a gunshot wound."
"I warned you, and I showed you I could make my commands felt," fear appeared in her eyes, but I continued. She got up to run, but it was already too late. I hated myself for this already. "We are people, and children most of us. You will think of us as people and treat us as such!"
She stopped and turned around. There was a little hate left in her eyes, but it faded as I watched. "I'm sorry sweetie, I shouldn't have acted that way."
I vomited all over my feet. I needed to stop doing this.
"Let me get someone out here to clean that up, and I'll find out what is happening for you."
She walked away, and a few minutes later an orderly came out with a mop. He even cleaned off my feet. Something about this one was different.
"Why aren't you treating me poorly like the nurse did?"
"I don't want you frying my mind."
"You will never obey my commands! Now, does your mind feel fried?"
He shook his head, his eyes widening. "Thank you, Queen. I won't betray your trust in me. Thank you!"
There were tears in his eyes. What had I just done? I thought I'd made it so he could never obey my commands?
Seeing my confusion, he spoke to me, "You didn't have to give up your power over me. You could have commanded me to stop being afraid, or anything like that. What you did was make it so I was safe from you instead. You are special, and give trust where it isn't earned. Thank you so much for my mind."
He hugged me, and I returned it awkwardly. He then finished his job and walked off. I hoped I wouldn't live to regret this.
I again started waiting.
"They told me you were here!"
I turned to look at the person who had yelled. It was the guy who had been sitting next to Jamie4's bed. He wasn't wearing his glasses this time, and something about him seemed familiar. I looked hard at him.
"Brian?!"
He sped up. "Jamie, you're ok!"
"STOP!" He came to a halt. I felt my skin crawl. "I need for you to stay back, Brian."
"You can't do this to me, Jamie. We're going to be together finally now. You and me, right? We were meant to be."
"We're not anything, Brian."
"I know you. I know, I know. We could never be together because your family would never have understood. I only look like a boy now, after all. I have changed to be the one for you, Jamie. But you remembered my boy name. You and I are meant to be together."
'Wait...WHAT?!' I looked at him again. . .his face was a bit softer than the Brian I knew, and his hips were wider.
"I love you, Jamie"
"No, this can't be right. What's wrong with this world?" I was confused. This was all wrong. Everything here was wrong.
"Jamie?"
I saw in his eyes the same look he had when he killed me. I couldn't let him do this again.
"Stay away from me!"
"I don't need to get near you to kill you, Jamie. We will be together in another world." His face took on a rictus grin and he raised his right arm. "You know what this is, Jamie? No? Of course not. You never graduated, did you? I went through that sanitarium on my own. They gave me a Lance. Only, they didn't know what my power was. This lance makes me, a lowly level V your equal. . .no, your better. I improved it."
"What are you talking about?"
"No more explanations, Jamie. Let's go to hell!"
"Forget me. Forget you ever knew me. Forget your plans for me."
Brian blinked a couple of times, saw me, and smiled. "Hi, I'm Brianna, but all my friends call me Bree."
I smiled at her and responded, "I'm Jamie, nice to meet you."
"Jamie's a nice name. Want to see my Psi Lance?"
"What's a Psi Lance?"
"It's a weapon for Psi users, like me. I wouldn't normally be able to use it, but I have a Psi boost I made." she giggled. "I found some of Kyle Longtree's notes while hiking a few years ago." Her face showed confusion, "or was I hiking. . .no matter," her smile came back, "I found his notes in a safe in the woods. It was a cabin of some sort. He had the schematics for the psi booster there. Gave me enough power to get arrested. . .why did I want to get arrested."
"So, this is a Psi lance?"
She walked close and whispered. "It's a special one. Mk ii. It is about four times as powerful as a Mk i." She giggled. "More than powerful enough. . .I don't know why I wanted it."
"Don't worry about it, Bree."
"Ok. I won't. You're so nice, Jamie."
I felt a little uncomfortable with her hero worship, but I didn't know how to 'fix' her without changing her completely.
"Jamie, Corin is awake." I turned to see Patty standing there. "He's asking for you."
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The last view I had of that world was the blood on the shower walls. I let go of the world and it all went away. Something was wrong this time. The last time that I was floating between worlds, it was floating. I was comfortable. Free.
This time I was in wracking torment. I could not even focus well enough to find my endpoint and grab hold. I tried again and again, but my grip kept slipping.
Then something grabbed me and I was pulled in. It wasn't the right way. I needed to go the other way. I made a final effort and grabbed onto my destination with both hands, and instantly I was there.
I blacked out after looking into the bluest eyes I had ever seen.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
I woke up with thick bracelets on my hands and feet. I was able to move around the bed, but the second I tried to pass and arm or a leg beyond the edge of the bed, I met with resistance. I was trapped within the confines of this single bed.
Looking around me, it was obvious that I was in a hospital of some sort. Sure, the decor didn't say hospital, but there were certain things that did. You know, the little things you would normally overlook. The oxygen connections on the walls, and the piglet tree hanging from the ceiling for bags of this or that.
The door wide enough to fit my bed through. The wheels on said bed. And, of course, the most obvious, the nurse call button on the TV remote that was connected by a thick cable to the wall. Did all hospitals get these from some inter-dimensional supply warehouse?
I pushed the button to call the nurse.
I'm not sure about the rest of you, but the word nurse always conjures a specific image for me. I'm not talking Sexy Nurse, since that isn't even in the same ballpark for me. No, I think of a rounded, motherly woman, possibly grandmotherly, with short curly hair, any color, and usually a smile on her plump face.
I've never actually met a nurse like that, but it is my stereotypical nurse.
The person who walked in took my breath away, and made me question my sexuality. Ok, so I had been raised as a boy. I was thirteen and hadn't really noticed anyone in that way before. I just assumed that when all was said or done I would find myself with a girl, no matter what I looked like.
He was the most handsome man I have ever seen in my life. He also was masculine in a sort of indefinable way.
He wasn't some muscle bound freak like win weightlifting in the Olympics. I can't really explain. You could just look at him and see Man. And he had incredibly blue eyes. What got me down in that moment of euphoria was the fact that not only was he probably twice my age, but I looked like a boy.
"You're awake. If you wait a moment I can get the doctor for you?" I knew it wasn't really a question he was asking, but he phrased it to make me feel relaxed. Made it a question. . .why am I analyzing this to death.
I was truly and deeply twiterpated, as certain Disney characters would say. He smiled and turned to leave, and I shook myself out of my shock for a moment.
"Where am I?" was what I planned to say, in an eloquent and most adult manner.
I think I squeaked something out, but it wasn't recognizable to my ears. "Do you need a drink of water? You've been out for quite a while.
I cleared my throat and tried again, "Where am I?"
"Well, that all depends on the nature of the question. Locally, you are in the St. Agnes Hospital, Hargrave, Arizona. Globally that would be the Republic of Free States of Columbia. Galactically it is Earth or Sol III. Inter-dimensionally. . .well, none of the established contacted realities can decide on a single nomenclature. I think they all want to be considered Prime, and won't let anyone else have the honor."
"That's easy, you're the fifth world I've visited or become aware of, so you are Earth5"
"How do you even say that. . ."
"It takes practice," I said with a giggle.
"I take it your home is Earth1 then?"
"No one ever said I wasn't ego-centric."
He laughed aloud at this. I smiled at him and giggled. Yay. A laugh.
"Ok, Earth1 I think I can agree to that, since you are the only person I know who has visited so many. I paged the doctor when you buzzed, so he should be in here shortly."
A man who looked like an older version of the nurse walked in. He wasn't wearing the white scrubs that the nurse did. He wore more traditional green scrubs with a lab coat over them. "Are all medical staff cloned from the same perfect man."
The both looked at me, and I realized I had said this aloud. I blushed bright red.
The older one looked at the younger one, "I would like to get a full psychological workup done on him within the next couple of hours. Do that for me will you, Brian?"
Ok, now this was all just getting too weird for me. I can handle Brian the bully, and Brian the killer, but Brian the gorgeous male nurse?
I think I fainted because I was looking into those amazing blue eyes again. I looked carefully at his face, and there were traces of the Brian that I knew. It made me feel a little sick.
"What's wrong?"
I looked at his name plate and vomited. He was Brian Jensen. Sure, he was Brian5 and not the Brian1 or Brian2 that I knew. I had flirted with him. I vomited again.
"You killed Jamie2, I mean Brian2 did."
"I think we need to move up that workup."
"Dad, I told you, she came out of nowhere. She is a Traveler."
"There are no confirmed reports of Travelers, Brian. At the present time we can only communicate with people in other realities."
"Then you explain a single chromosome difference between this kid and a 24 year old mother of two."
"Cloning?" He said it, but even his tone sounded unsure.
"You know as well as I do that more minor changes to the genetic code result in failed fetuses. Heck, direct cloning fails still."
"You have work. Let me check out my patient." He turned to me and the younger Jensen left the room. "Other than being sick there a little, how are you feeling?"
"The Jamie in this world is a mother?"
"How. . ."
"My name is Jamie."
"Neither of us said the individuals name." He got a bit of a thoughtful look on his face. "You've already been checked for Telepathy and Precognition, both negative."
"I'm right here, Dr. Jensen. I like to be talked to, not talked about."
"I'm sorry, Young Lady," he said absently, and then started and blushed, "I meant young man."
"It's alright, Dr. Jensen. I don't mind if you think of me as a girl," I blushed a bit as I said this. I wasn't as conflicted about the father, he was just too old, but I preferred for them to think of me as a girl.
At that moment, Dr. Jensen touched his right thumb to his right index finger. "Dr. Jensen here," he said as he turned a bit away from me. He looked as though he were listening to something for a few moments, every once in a while saying "uh-huh" or "ok". He finished with, "Ok, send her on up here. . .in five minutes? Ok, thanks." He touched his right thumb to his right pinkie and turned back to me.
"We're going to have our resident psychologist down here, a Mary Pierce-Keller, to talk to you for a bit. Would that be ok?"
I think my smile gave me away. He checked my body a bit more, making sure that I was healthy, and then he left the room just as Mary5 came into the room.
"Hi, Mary. I'm Jamie"
"Hello, Jamie." She seemed a little off her stride, so I thought I'd just go with it.
"Your last name's Keller, so I assume your Husband's name is Frank, right?"
"Yes. . ."
"And you have a print of one of the van Gogh Sunflowers in your office."
She looked down at her clip board quickly, and then mused, "It says you aren't a telepath or precog. . .interesting. I take it someone here put you up to this?"
"Nope, but how bout I tell you that you have always preferred working with kids to grownups. there can't be many people you've told that to."
A little look of fear entered her eye. She quickly hid it. I hurried to continue, "Brian5 called me a Traveler."
"Brian 5?"
"Of, oops. I have to do something to keep everyone straight. This is the 5th earth I have personal knowledge of."
She blinked a couple of times, looked at me shrewdly, and said, "Why don't you start at the beginning."
So I did. It's getting to be quite a tale at this point, and I figured since she was supposed to be evaluating me, I might as well leave nothing out. I cried a few times, and I could tell she wanted to comfort me, but couldn't really do so.
I told her about my Father, and Jamie2's father. I told her about the murder, and about feeling more comfortable being recognized as a girl.
She did ask me a question about having children at this point. I told her about my accident. She probed the source of my feelings about sex and gender.
I had never had a conversation like this with anyone before. It was me doing all the talking, but I could feel her drawing all of my emotions out toward her and sifting through them.
I stopped at one point and looked at her. Something she had just staid triggered a spark in my mind. "You have Empathy, don't you. No more than that, something else. . .something a little more."
"We call them Sifters here. I can't influence your emotions, but I can see them like a tapestry, and feel the pattern of them."
"Like reading my mind?"
"All that a telepath can ever get is the surface thoughts, like an empath can only get your current emotion. A sifter can read your core emotions. The source of your thoughts. They sift through the emotions you feel, and can follow the threads to the root cause. It makes us a lot better at counseling and advising than most people."
"So, you can tell I'm telling the truth?"
"And why you tell the truth, or lie."
"So, you believe I'm a Traveler?"
"I know that you believe it."
"How can I prove it to you?"
"For right now, you can't. Your abilities have been nullified to allow you time to rest."
I wondered. Was my ability limited by four dimensions? I wondered.
I'd been wanting to write in my journal for days now. It would be as good a test as any. I found my journal. I tried to pull it, and felt my energy going to no effect. I stopped for a moment to think. Ok, every time I have been able to open a gate, I have connected to something alive. The apple tree, Jamie2 and Jamie4, Brian5. . .
I reached for my dad, my real one, Richard. I then pulled the book along the connection between us. It took a lot more energy than sending the book to him had done, but there it was in my hand. I lay back on the bed exhausted.
I turned to look at Mary, and saw her look of shock. "How is that for proof."
Well, I think I said that, because I passed out about the same time.
---
There was something shining in my eyes, so I tried to pull away. "Back with us, huh?"
"Hi, Dr. Jensen."
"I'm going to have to ask that you don't try to do that again for a while. Your body has used up most of its reserves and you are in real danger right now."
"Ok, Dr. Jensen."
I sat up, and felt something pull against my head. I reached a hand up. My hair was long. "How long was I out. . ."
"Not that long," he said with a smile. "Mary thought you would appreciate this."
"Is it a wig?"
"No, it's your hair. We just helped it along a little."
"A little?" My hair was long enough to get caught beneath me when I sat up.
"Your body reacted a little better to the drug than we were expecting. We monitored you to make sure it wasn't affecting your recovery. You've been out about sixteen hours this time, so all together you were out for about four days."
I didn't know what to say about that.
A man in a suit knocked on the open door and walked in. "How is our patient, Doctor."
From the look on Dr. Jensen's face, I could tell he didn't like the man in the suit very well. "She's fine."
"Good. Now Jamie, it has come to our attention that you are currently without legal guardianship. It is also apparent that you are from another dimension. So, you are to be transferred to the care of your closest genetic relative of age, a Jamie Kreis. Won't that be so nice for you, Jamie. She even has your same name. She will be here later to fill out the necessary paperwork, Doctor. Have a good day."
He turned and left without another word. The Doctor and I sat there for a moment looking at each other and then burst out laughing. Just then Brian poked his head into the room, "I hear my favorite patient is awake."
I blushed. I needed to stop doing that.
"Hi Jamie, I have someone here to see you."
Apparently the lawyers people skills were only outdistanced by his sense of timing for their complete lack of capability. I had seen myself dead once, a girl my age once, and now a mature female version of me entered the room.
I really hoped I could grow up to look like her, because she was gorgeous.
"You're blonde!" I couldn't help the outburst.
"It's dyed. I thought it looked better this way. So, you're me?"
"Sorta. I guess. I'm the us from another world."
She came over to the bedside and gave me a hug, "Pleased to meet me, Jamie," she said with an infectious giggle. I giggled back.
"So, how much longer does she need to stay here?"
"Well, we can probably discharge her today. She will be going back to her own dimension eventually, but it will likely be a couple of weeks before she is well enough to travel. So, she has to avoid any use of her power, and since it is completely controlled by her conscious mind, and we can't actively prevent it, she might as well spend her time out in the real world."
"Ok, sounds good to me. My husband is anxious to meet her, I have to warn you though, Jamie, he's all mine."
I giggled at this and replied, "Don't worry, I like someone else." I couldn't help it and flicked a glance at Brian5. She glanced at him herself, "I have to admit, if I weren't married. . ." We both giggled at this.
"What was that," asked the subject of our humor, and we completely broke down into a laughing fit.
"There's one more thing that we need to discuss," Dr. Jensen said getting a little more serious.
"What's that," the older me inquired.
"Our staff sifter has determined that little Jamie is transgendered and uncomfortable with her body image as it currently is. We would like to implant a synthetic hormone gland."
Wait, what? Ok, so I knew a little about how hormones changed the body during puberty. I also knew that there was a lot of hoops to jump through in both Earth1 and Earth2 and in Earth4 it had just been illegal for a teen to consider it.
But this easy? There had to be a catch somewhere. Why would they be so cavalier about it.
"Isn't Jamie a bit young for that," asked biggie-me
"Normally, yes, but most of the age concern was over informed consent of the patient regarding loss of all potential offspring. It is felt that anyone under the age of 25 does not fully understand the ramifications of their actions in this regard."
I cocked my head at this. What a really skewed perspective. Eunuchs like me could change their gender at will, but people still in the gene-pool had to wait 'til they were 25 to even start. . .
Biggie-me got a sad look on her face, "Jamie can't have kids? Ever?"
Before Dr. Jensen could respond, I answered for myself, "I got in a really stupid accident when I was younger and had to have my testes removed."
"I'm sorry, sweetie." She hugged me and I got a little teary eyed.
"It's ok, biggie-me."
"Huh?"
I spent the next twenty minutes trying to explain, second hand from Jamie2 about mini-me. They were a little confused, but finally got it, sort of.
"How about you just call me Claire, like my husband does."
"Claire?"
"He is European, and doesn't like how Jamie sounds as a girl's name, so he started calling me Claire in college when we met, because he said it fit me better. It stuck, and I have a number of friends who only know me by that name."
"Oh, how sweet." I said. It was a romantic little story and made me happy.
"So, Jamie, do you want this? Do you want to start looking more like a girl?"
"I don't know. This is all so sudden. I wouldn't have to even consider it for another few years at home."
"Crap. Jamie, Claire, I need you to hold your decision for a bit." He touched his right thumb to his middle finger and then said, "Leland Farnsworth." turning a bit away from us again.
"What's he doing?" Claire turned to me at my question. "Talking on the phone," was her matter of fact reply.
"Leland. . .yes, I need you back in Jamie's room for a bit. . .no, the guardian arrived, but there is another matter we need to discuss. . .ok, see you then."
He touched his right pinky again, and turned back to us. "We didn't even consider the legal ramifications of a medical procedure on an inter-dimensional traveler. Your laws have to be different from ours."
Irrationally, I had gone from unsure whether I wanted this to sure I wanted it, or maybe just sure I wanted the choice. I hated to have the possibility of developing like my peers dangled in front of me, and then casually snatched away.
"The lawyer will be here in a couple of hours. We can go down to the cafeteria to eat, if you want Claire? Jamie?"
"In this?" I said, gesturing to my hospital gown.
"No, actually. We had a dress made for you by the nano-tailors. I'll leave you girls while you change, Jamie."
I would like to say that it was the most perfect dress in the world, but apparently nano machines are a little utilitarian in their designs. If you have someone directing them every moment, you can get some really pretty designs. These had been left on autopilot. It was a nice cream yellow color with inch wide shoulder straps. That is about all that you can say for it. It kind of looked like a sack on the hangar. It didn't look too bad on me, and it fit, so I was a little thankful there.
We went down and ate in the cafeteria. The food was pretty good actually, since the last thing I remember eating was an almost tasteless protein brick in the sanitarium. We finished up our meals and walked back to the room. I was really starting to like Claire a lot. She was like me in a lot of respects, but we weren't the same. I guess it was a lot like having a twin sister ten years older than you.
The lawyer was waiting for us in the room when we arrived.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
The lawyer came over to me first, "May I have your hand please?"
I didn't think much of it and reached out to shake his hand, "Ok, now I just need you to talk about hormone therapies from your world. "
I looked at him a little strangely.
"The human mind records more information than the conscious mind can process. I am able to access this overflow, and actually see your memories of certain events. I will tell you now, that this viewing constitutes privileged information and is covered under an implicit attorney client seal."
I had no idea what he was talking about, but I started to talk about the things that Mary had relayed to me, and as I did I was back in her office. I was sitting there, nervously waiting to speak to my Shrink again. Gotta remember that I call him Frank now. She was talking about options that I could take. And when I could take them. We talked a little bit about the dangers.
Like that it was over.
"Well, hmm," The lawyer stated. "This is going to be a bit trickier than we thought. They don't have any therapies anywhere close to what we offer. They still use Hormone Replacement Therapy."
"You're kidding? And I'll bet they still think that leaches are a good way to purify the humors." Dr. Jensen was scowling. "When would they allow Jamie to start poisoning herself?"
"They would have allowed her to start on HRT when she turned sixteen. That's in about two years, right?"
I nodded at him. I had thought for a moment that this would be my solution to everything. I had thought I might finally start to be the person who I felt myself to be inside. I felt a tear come to my eye. I would not cry over this.
"I'm sorry. I don't care what the laws regarding the quacks in her own dimension are. This is a safe procedure compared to that."
"Yes, but legally she isn't bound by our laws. We need to respect the laws of her dimension. This is part of the Accord."
"Only if her dimension is in contact with ours."
Everyone looked at Brian. He continued, "If her earth isn't one of the seven that we are in contact with, then she is a free agent according to the Accord."
"Well, technically. . ." began the lawyer.
"Technically nothing. The Accord specifically states that any individual not covered separately by the laws of a signatory of the Accord is under the jurisdiction of the signatory in which he or she resides."
"That clause was supposed to be a catch all to protect citizenship."
"It also grants dimensional citizenship to any citizen of a non signatory dimension."
"I see those three years in law school didn't go to waste when you decided to become a nurse, Son."
Brian beamed a bit at this praise.
"Fine, we will sort this quickly. What year is it in your dimension?"
"1989, sir."
He looked at me for a moment, as if I were making a joke. "1989? There are no recorded Psi capable individuals in any dimension we have encountered at that date."
"Do you need to check me again?"
"My ability won't be able to determine the truth of your statement. It can only access your real memories, which will only see what you have seen. You believe the date to have been 1989, so a sifter won't help either."
"When failure of accepted methods of verification is irreconcilable, the veracity of statements made must be accepted." Brian looked a little smug when he said this.
The lawyer glared at him, then looked at Dr. Jensen. He pressed his right thumb to his right ring finger twice. "Well doctor, I declare, per my authority in the Accord, as the closest representative of the judicial system, that Jamie is a legal citizen of this dimension, and shall be registered as such."
A disembodied voice replied, "Name of the applicant for citizenship records?"
"Jamie Patrice," I stated, looking around.
"Sex of the applicant?"
"Male," stated Dr. Jensen. I looked at him a bit betrayed, but he had a small knowing smile for me.
"Gender of the applicant?"
"Female," stated Brian clearly with a big smile.
"Per discrepancy clauses regarding Sex versus Gender, applicant will be referred to as Female in all legal documentation. Case number is 8716b543k11. End proceeding."
I was a little shocked at the speed with which this had all been done. I knew that the proceeding to place me in foster care back home was just beginning.
Crap. Back home. I hadn't been there to receive Mary's call, if she'd been able to recharge the phone. What in the world was I going to do. She would be getting in trouble with Child Protection and it was all my fault. I was supposed to be meeting with them. . .I did a quick calculation of days. Crap I had missed it. And Mary had no idea what had happened to me.
I began to cry. How could I have been so thoughtless. Claire came over and wrapped me in her arms. "What's wrong, sweetie?"
"I forgot about Mary. I was off wandering around the dimensions and forgot that she needed me back there."
"It's ok, sweetie. You'll get back there soon enough."
"Claire, should we proceed? With the surgery I mean?"
"Jamie, honey, would you like to go ahead with your surgery?"
"But. . ."
"I'm sure that Mary would want you to be true to yourself, right?"
I just nodded. I felt like she was treating me like a child, but at that moment, I think it's what I needed.
"What exactly does this surgery mean, Dr. Jensen?" I wanted to know what it would mean for my trans-dimensional wanderings.
"The gland is designed to generate female hormones much like the sex organs of a natural female. They need no upkeep, and are generated using a sample of your own tissue, so rejection is almost unheard of."
"Will it turn me into a woman?"
"It will act much like the hormone replacement therapy described to your in your own world. Only this will be your body's own hormones."
I couldn't help but smile at that. I would be developing like a normal girl.
"Let's do it."
"Ok, it will take about 36 hours t prepare the gland. We'll schedule you for surgery two days from now. How does that sound?"
I smiled really big, and Claire responded that it would be fine.
Claire took me to her home, and I got to play with her kids. Mr. Kreis was ok, but I'm not sure I would have ever married him. I watched some TV, and played with the kids some more. Ok, so I really love kids. It was a calm couple of days.
We went back into the hospital as agreed. "How are you feeling, Jamie."
"A little scared, Brian. I know I want this, but I don't know what surgery is going to be like."
He kissed me on the cheek and I blushed. "It will be alright, Jamie. You'll be out of there in no time, and then you can start growing up the way you were meant to."
I was excited about that. Before I knew it I was on a hospital bed being wheeled into the surgery prep room. It seemed an instant later that I was waking up. My stomach was a little sore, and there was a small bandage on my belly button.
The soreness went away over the next couple of days. I checked my eyes in the mirror every day. I watched as they slowly went from orange back to my normal green. One morning, I woke up feeling whole for the first time in a long while. I knew, before I even looked in the mirror, that my eyes would be completely green again.
"I have to go, now, Claire."
"I'm going to miss you, Mini-me"
"You to, Biggie-me."
She gave me a hug, and then I stepped back. I reached out across the worlds. I knew who I needed to find, and I had an Idea that I had been working through since the last time I traveled. The first time, I had a complete connection to my other self before releasing my own world. I latched onto Mary and then let go of the world.
Instantly I was standing in Mary's living room for what seemed the first time in years, but was in reality only about a week.
Mary1 fainted.
"Mary, wake up. It's me, Jamie."
"We thought we'd lost you two. I called your mother and she misses you. She's almost frantic. Both of you don't know what you put us through."
"Um, it's only me right now, Mary. Jamie2 isn't here right now. We found her a new body. I got hurt fighting Beast, and had to recuperate. Oh, I now have a gland that produces hormones like we talked about."
Mary just looked at me, and then said simply, "Could you start at the beginning please?"
I happily told her everything that had happened since I last saw her. We cried at times together, especially when I told her about the loss of the little one to the Beast. She seemed really happy for me and my new additional part.
When I came to the end, She looked at my eyes closely, and then the rest of my face. She brushed my hair out of my eyes and then spoke to me, "I wouldn't wish what you've seen upon anyone, let alone a teenager. I know you've got to head back out there, because Jamie2 still needs to go home. I also think that you might be happier in her world."
"But I want to be with you, Mary!"
"Sweetie, I was only ever going to be a temporary stop in your life. With your ability, you will be able to visit me any time you want, but you need a real home. Helen2 can provide that for you."
"I love you, Mary."
Mary cried a bit at this, "I know, sweetie. You'll be ok. You will bloom anywhere that you are planted. Go save Jamie2."
"I need a mirror."
"You only have the barest little bit of orange in your eyes, you should have lots of energy."
I hugged Mary, and reached out for my other half. Jamie was my real twin. My sister.
'I'm coming, Jams'
I found her. I latched on, and released the world.
"Get a room guys."
Jams was kissing Underseer. They turned to me, and Underseer blushed bright red, while Jams bounced over to me and threw her arms around me. "SIS!!! I love the hair! And the dress."
It may have been utilitarian, but I loved the color, and so that first dress they'd given me had become my favorite.
"So, we need to get you home, Jams."
"Um, there are some problems with that. . ."
"What's going on?"
Underseer spoke up here. "Beast has been trying to get a foothold in this world. He keeps trying to find one of our Psi's here that he can use to hide in. So, once per day, Jams orders him home."
"Order?"
"Yeah, it's sort of like this. . ."
We swapped stories and caught up quickly. I told her about Claire and her kids, and then something occurred to me. "Corin, hold down the fort. Jams and I need to make a quick run home."
I grabbed her hand, and before she could say anything, I reached out and latched onto Helen2. I released the world.
Helen was just getting off the phone when we appeared. "Hi, Mom!" we said simultaneously. She fainted.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
After all that we'd been through, to come home and have to deal with this. Most of the time people think nothing of someone fainting. They just collapse to the ground, right?
Sometimes we all forget that there are safer places to fall down than others. She was in the kitchen and hit her head on the counter as she fell. It opened up a gash on her scalp. All the power in the universe, and I couldn't stop this one action. I was going to collapse there, but Jams rushed over and put pressure on her Mom's head. She turned and looked at me.
"Call 911, Sis."
Her words spurred me to action and I ran over to the handset.
"911, what is the nature of your emergency?"
"My Mom fainted and hit her head on the counter."
"I show you at 493 Raintree Circle, is that correct?"
"Yes, please hurry. My sister is trying to stop the blood."
"Please stay on the line with me until the EMTs arrive."
I considered. for a moment, poping over to the 911 call center and scaring her a bit. She was so calm when all I wanted to do was scream. There was a nock on the door "Hargrave FD, we had a call about an emergency."
I dropped the phone and ran to the door. I had stared down two killers and a rapist. I had acted well and quickly, followed my training. . .
I let the men in as I continued to think about my actions. Training. I had been trained to fight, to evade, to overcome. Life had trained me. My dreams had reflected life. I was a warrior knight.
Jams really was my other half. She was the benevolent queen. She dreamed of helping people through her knowledge and compasion. She thought things through, and found resolutions. She was the leader, not me. I had thought I was the lead of this story, but I had always been wrong. I had been following Jams for my entire life, and the one moment that I actually recognized it I paniced and got us both captured and almost killed.
Even in our interactions, she had more of a name than I did. I was the Sister. She was Jams.
It was a flash of light in the darkness. I realized at that moment that I would follow her to the end of the world, and would use my sword and shield to protect her from the monsters in the darkness.
I came back to the world around me, and realized that Jams had been talking to me. "Are you alright, Sis?"
"I think so. I really think so."
"Girls, your mom is going to be alright. Head wounds tend to look worse than they are."
Mom was just stirring and looking around.
"What's your name?"
"I'm Helen Patriche."
"Do you know where you are?"
"I'm at home. What happened?"
"Mom!" We both said together. We rushed over and hugged her.
"Your girls found you collapsed in the kitchen. You seem to be ok now. If you'd like we can give you a ride into the hospital. If you decide not to come with us, I need you to sign a denial of consent form. If you do stay home, I suggest taking it easy for a couple of days, and contact your doctor at the first sign of light headedness."
"My girls. . .?"
"We found you Mommy. We were so worried."
"Yes, Mommy. We were worried."
She decided to take it in stride, and waited until the EMTs left to hug us to death. "I thought I'd lost you two. Why did you leave without telling me. I was so worried that something had happened to you. The police went out looking for you and your step-father, who was out on bail, was picked up again because we thought he might have done something."
She cried, and I was ashamed of my actions all over again. I had never thought of the consequences. Jams had organized a rebellion, and saved all of the lives of the people around her. I had done nothing but fail.
"I'm so sorry. I shouldn't ever have come. I'm sorry that I took Jams with me. I'll go somewhere else now."
Jams grabbed onto me like she could stop me by just holding on.
"Never leave me without permission."
I felt something change. I had been about to leave. I had planned to just head straight for the beast and have it out once and for all. Him and me. To the death of both of us.
I couldn't.
"What did you do?" I looked at her with wide eyes.
"Something that pains me. I prevented you from leaving, but in a small way I changed who you are."
"But why? I've brought you nothing but greif."
"You're the only reason I'm alive, Dummy. I would have been dead two weeks ago. You're the reason that I found someone who loves me. I had to return the favor."
The three of us sat there in the front room and cried. We'd collapsed there after the EMTs left.
We slowly calmed, and simply hugged on the floor. "Are you better now, Girls?"
"Yes, Mommy."
"Yep." I'm the one who made the short reply, "Mommy?"
"Yes, Jamie. . .ok, with two of you, I think that we need to give one a new name."
"Mommy, I think that she should be Jamie. I died, and so this is a new me, and should have a new name."
"Jams. . ."
"No, You deserve it. I've actually been thinking about this over the past week. When it was the two of us in one body, we could work it out. People were obviously talking to one of us, and we could both answer. It doesn't work any more."
"But. . ."
"No, I will change. I just can't decide on a good name."
"How about Olivia?" We both looked at Mom when she said that.
"If you'd been born a girl, we wouldn't have kalled you James, dear."
We looked at each other and laughed. Out of five alternates we had met, two of them genetically female, all had been James or Jamie. Tells you what assuming does.
We shared the joke with our Mom. She smiled at it. "So, do you like Olivia, dear?"
Jams, I mean Olivia nodded. I was going to have some difficulty with this, it seemed.
Something occured to me. Every other Jamie we had met had their name changed. Something bigger than me or even the few dimensions that I'd visited was going on.
I didn't have time to worry about it at the moment. We had come here with a purpose.
"Mommy, we need some cell phones so that we can keep in touch with you."
"Ok, sweetie, we can get you two cell phones."
"Um. . .we need seven."
"Jamie." She used her best strict Mom voice on me
"I need one, Olivia needs one, and each of Olivia's generals need a cell phone."
"My generals?"
"Of course, or did you think I missed you being called Queen?"
She blushed and pretty shade of red. It was fun yanking her chain.
She got a thoughtful expression on her face, "You know, Jamie, it's not going to work."
"Sure it will! I just need to make sure the opening stays open."
"And waste your energy on something meaningless? No, I have a better idea. We just need someone to alter the phones."
"That will cost money that we can't afford, and probably knowledge that the techs won't have."
"No, we just need Bree."
"Who's Bree?"
Olivia got up and kissed Mom. "We'll be right back. Would you mind taking us to Corin, Jamie?"
We popped over to Corin. I was beginning to wonder how we accomplished this without a pressure wave at our destination.
"Jams!"
"I'm Olivia now."
He looked at her quizically, but she continued, "Where's Bree?"
"In the common room."
She dragged me along behind her and we ran to the common room. Blue eyes. My mind completely locked up. There are eyes that are variations on the shade blue. They vary from what is called ice blue, to almost black blue. In that moment I realized that there was an arctypical blue that all the others had been preparing me for my entire life.
"I love you. . ." I only realized a moment later that I had spoken and I blushed crimson.
She kissed me. I melted.
I almost collapsed onto the floor I relaxed so much, but she held me up.
"You're Jamie, Aren't you. I'm Bree."
I looked at her face for the first time. "Brian. . .?"
"Brianna."
"Oh."
I had no idea what to think in that moment. I really needed a session with Mary. I loved a girl. I thought I was supposed to be a girl. I was confused.
Bree saw my look, and then she started to look uncomfortable. "I'm so sorry. I know it isn't right for girls to kiss like that, but when you said you loved me, in that moment, it was like I had been looking for you my entire life. . .I'll go." The happiness of a moment before went out of her face.
She thought of me as a girl. She wanted to kiss me when she thought I was a girl. Crap, she's getting away.
I ran over to her and grabbed her. "No, Bree, don't leave. You weren't wrong. I. . .I. . ." I couldn't think what to say that wouldn't be confused on it's way from my heart to my mouth by way of my brain. I kissed her. This time she melted.
She smiled at me when we broke it off that time. She hugged me and whispered in my ear, "I always knew there was someone out there who could accept me for who I am. Thank you."
We both cried some tears of joy.
"Ladies, would you mind paying attention to someone else for a moment?"
We both giggled at that and turned to Olivia.
"I'm going to stay here to start organizing the troops. Why don't you two go and get the cellphones with Mom. I'm sure she'll want to meet your new girlfriend, Jamie."
I blushed and Bree hugged me.
I moved the two of us to Mom. Bree was still hugging me.
"Hi, Mom."
"Hi, Jamie's Mom."
"Welcome back, Jamie. Who's this, and where's Olivia."
"This is Bree, Mom. Apparently she's the one I was supposed to pick up to help us with the cellphones."
"Yeah, we apparently fell for each other at first sight."
"Oh really. Aren't you two a little young for that?"
"Mom, I am fourteen."
She tried to look sternly at us, but I think it was too hard for her. She also knew the life I'd been through, and I think she might have thought that I deserved a little happiness now, even if there was a possibility it wouldn't last.
"Welcome, Bree. So, you can make cellphones work between worlds?"
"As long as I have some idea what I'm trying to do, then I can do anything with electronics."
"You look a little young to be an engineer."
"Well, you know that Jamie moves between worlds, and Jams can order people and they have to obey?"
"Olivia can make people obey her?"
"Her name is Olivia now? That's soooo pretty. Not as pretty as Jamie, though." She got a kiss for her efforts.
Mom looked sternly at us, and we both had the good grace to look abashed.
"While I accept your relationship, ladies, I expect you to try to curb yourselves, at least for the time being. I'll tell you both something my father told me when I started dating. Kissing and touching and. . .other things. . .are natural and make you feel good. They are also the easiest way to ruin a new relationship. Get to know each other first. Learn who you are together. The rest will grow from that, and be even more special when the time is right."
"How do Mom's get to be so wise?"
"By paying the consequences for wrong choices."
I remembered that my father wasn't my Mom's husband. I guess she might know the consequences for doing things wrong.
"So, can I expect you two to at least try to get to know each other first?"
"Yes, Mommy."
"Yes, Ma'am."
We stopped holding each other so tightly, but we still held hands, and we got a genuine smile from Mom.
"Bree, you can call me Helen, ok?"
"Ok, Helen."
Bree smiled.
"I need to take a look at a cellphone, and if possible, place a call to another dimension with it."
Well, to business. Mom handed me her phone, and I dialed Mary's number. "Hello, Helen?"
"No, It's Jamie. I'm handing the phone to Bree. She is trying to improve cross-dimensional communication."
"Hi, Mary. I'm Jamie's girlfriend, Bree. Can you talk to me so I can hear how the voice changes as I make modifications?"
She lisened for a few moments before turning to me and saying, "Done, and she wants to talk to you, Jamie."
"Hello?"
"Girlfriend? Does this change your mind about what you want to do?"
"She likes me for who I am."
"She knows about all of you?"
"Um, well, um . . .she sees me as a girl."
Bree looked at me a little strangely.
"Don't you think you had better tell her before we go on?"
"Um, well, probably."
"Jamie, I have seen you be truly decisive in the past, what's changed now?"
I couldn't tell her in front of Bree, I needed her to see me like this still. I couldn't loose this. I said nothing.
"Jamie, you need to tell her. Please. You can call me back when you are done."
She hung up, and I sat there for a moment holding a disconnected cellphone.
"Bree, I want to talk to you about something?"
"Are you breaking up with me already, Jamie?"
She looked like she was about to cry, and I couldn't help it and cried myself. "No, but you may not want me after I tell you."
We went up to Jamie. . .Olivia's room for some privacy.
"I was born a boy, Bree. I've known for a while I was really a girl, but physically I'm only just beginning to change into what I feel I am inside."
"Are you going to become a girl, then? Physically I mean?"
"Yes, I am."
"Ok, then everything's fine?"
"That simple? But, doesn't that change how you see me?"
"You look and act like a girl. You kiss like a girl. That's all that matters, Jamie."
I hugged her to me, and she hugged me back.
I called Mary on the phone, and while it was ringing, Bree walked out of the room and closed the door. I guess she wanted me to have some privacy.
"So, how did it go?" Mary was always really conversational with me when trying to open up. She would just start talking to me, and I would open up to her.
"It went better than I thought it would. She still likes me."
"I'm happy for you, Jamie!"
We talked for a while, and it felt good. We examined my feelings for Bree, and the fact that I still thought of myself as a girl. I realized when it ended that this was the first real therapy session I'd had with Mary in two weeks. I was used to talking to her every day or so.
I felt at peace.
I went downstairs where Mom and Bree were talking. "Are you ready to go, Jamie?"
"We don't have to buy all those cellphones!"
"What's up?"
"I can make them for us out of parts, and I'm going to make a base for us and put it in the back yard, and. . ."
Mom and I laughed, and the three of us went out to get the supplies that BRee needed.
It took us most of the afternoon to help her construct the headsets she wanted to use as the base. When we were done, we tested them by calling Mom and Mary at the same time. Four way calling, and the "cell tower" was in my back yard.
We gathered up the remaining headsets, I held Bree's hand, and she held mine. I latched onto Olivia. I let go of the world.
Sometimes, it is what you do that matters. Sometimes, it is who you are. Usually it is just being in the proper place at the proper moment in time with the will to act.
And that's the second time that I appeared as Corin and Olivia were kissing. It's like they're dating or something.
"Jamie!"
"Hey, Liv."
"I haven't had my name for two days and already you've given me a nickname."
"Of course. You didn't think I would keep saying a mouthful like Olivia all the time, did you? Oh-liv-ee-a. That's like, four syllables." Giggles all around. Well, except for Corin. He just sort of smiled.
"So, Queen Liv, we going to do this thing?"
"Let's get everyone in here before we start then." We waited for Keeper, Lacey, Walker, and Pedant to come before Olivia continued.
"You got the cell phones?"
"We've got something better," Bree replied going into her full geek mode. She reminded me a bit of a female Q. My step-father was a big James Bond fan. I watched them because I thought that Roger Moore was cute.
"These headsets will not only communicate cross dimensions, but will tap into local dimension communications. They are thought controlled, and completely autonomous. They have a battery life of approximately sixteen hours, and self charge when not in active use."
"Wait, I thought perpetual motion was impossible. How can they self charge?" Corin looked confused.
"The energy differential between dimensions actually causes. . ."
"Ok, I don't think we need to know quite that much, Bree." Olivia put up her hand to stop Bree from continuing. She looked a little upset about it. This was her area. Her one moment to shine.
"Sweetie? You can tell me later if you want?" I'm not sure if it was the endearment, or the offer of me listening, but Bree perked back up.
"Ok, simple version then: They will work pretty much indefinitely, and you just have to concentrate on who you want to talk to. You can communicate with as many people as you can think about at the same time."
"Bree, honey, as cool as that is, did you think to have it lock onto people? Set it up more like a phone than telepathy."
Bree looked at me, blinked, and then started to smile. She touched each of the headsets in turn.
"Ok, think of a person, and think call, and it will connect you. Think lock and you can call another person without losing the first. Think release to unlock a specific person."
"Wait. . .person?"
While we watched, Bree put on the headset. "For the demonstration, I will speak the commands, but you can just think them. Call Jamie, Lock Jamie, Call Olivia, Lock Olivia, Call Corin. Hello World!"
I heard her words in my head. 'Ok, so that's different.'
'Jamie?'
'Olivia?'
'Ok, so now we can hear each other's thoughts.' I assumed that this new "voice" was Corin. I recognized Olivia from when we'd shared the same body.
"And I hear it as words. Here, Jamie, you try."
I put on the headset, and spoke into it. "Ok, guys, talk to me."
"Wow, that's cool." thought, said, whatever Olivia.
I took off the headset and handed it back to Bree. "Um, upgrade? "
"Well, Jamie, it's all your fault. When you mentioned the way I had it set up was more like telepathy, I figured, why not. The wavelength that telepathy runs on is not all that different to the cell phones. Sure, it is a different radiation type. Ok, I know, too much info."
"I love you, Bree. You're so cute when you go all techie on me."
I gave her a quick kiss and then turned to Olivia. "So, Queen, what's the plan?"
"Why me, Jamie?"
"Code names, Queen. We are on operational footing now. It's time we took out the Beast."
"Why me, Journey?"
"You are the leader. That is why you are Queen." I smiled at her and continued, "You understand the needs of command. You are our commander. Lead us, Queen."
Olivia took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and began. "Journey, can you take us directly to Beast?"
"No, Queen. I've been trying to get a sense of him, physically, but all I get is his mindscape. Maybe if he was possessing someone here I could follow him back, but without that. . ." I stopped for a moment.
"I can't find him. I don't know enough about him physically to pick him out from the other male Jamies out there."
"Ok, so before we can get to him, we need to wait for him to attack us again," Olivia stood for a moment, thinking, and then turned to the others. "Pedant, we'll need you to stand out for this one. Your training ability is best for us here."
"But, Queen."
"If my ability were not so necessary, I wouldn't be going. You are my second in command. You kept all of them going for months. Organized them. Unified them. "
"Yes, Queen." Pedant, was smiling.
"Just don't get cocky."
He made a mildly rude gesture.
"Lacey, I need you to stay here as well. The little ones trust you."
"Yes, Queen."
"With me will be Walker, who will be linked with Journey to assist her in tracking Beast. Keeper, I need you to wear the new booster. You've been practicing like we discussed?"
"Yes, Queen."
"You know what to do, then. Well, for now, we wait. I want everyone to keep their headsets near them at all times. If this works according to plan, then we capture Beast and I start some major reprogramming." Olivia shuddered at this.
When the others left, and Bree, Corin, Olivia and I were the only ones in the room, I decided to get it out in the open.
"Liv, if this is going to take too much out of you, we can always just let me take him out on the dreamscape with Traveler."
"You don't have enough practice there. We can do this, Jamie. Rest. You made me leader for a reason."
I couldn't fault her on her logic. But I was her sword and shield, and if I could help it she would never need to put herself into harm's way.
I went into my old room here, and lay down on the bed in preparation of leaving my body
When I'd first taken a step out into the astral plane, I had been almost completely out of energy. I was running on my body's reserves, and causing damage that had taken a week to recover from. This time, I was topped out, and ready to go. I had mastered my first ability, for the most part. I could master this one as well. Then, when I was ready, I would pull the Beast into my world, and finish him off.
I slipped out of my body, sure in my ability to do this little task. I moved toward the barrier and slipped myself through it. I felt the strength of the yellow ribbon leading back to my own real home. It even pulsed a bit. I guess this is what it felt like to enter here ready. I looked around me at the expanse that before had seemed so barren.
Perception forms reality. I saw trees with yellow leaves dancing in the purple sunlight. The birds swam in the brook, while the fish sang their soft melodies in the branches.
That's not right. I looked again, and realized that I was under water. I was standing on the under surface of the water. Thought guides perception.
The moment I realized that I was actually floating in the water, I flipped myself around and swam to the surface. I looked for the shore, and realized there wasn't one. As I continued to look, something strange began to impinge upon my awareness. The ribbon connecting me to my body didn't lead into the water. It lead into the sky from here. I knew that I'd walked along the surface of whatever it was to get here. I was completely turned around.
Sometimes the way back, is the way forward.
As it spoke in a relatively silent moment of my thoughts, I realized that I was not alone here. Finally, the youngling sees. Welcome to my world, Jamie.
"Who are you!"
I am this plane. This in between. I reside in your thoughts and give thought to them. I am not your thoughts, nor are you me.
"Why do you have to talk in riddles?"
Because, Jamie. It's fun. I get so bored out here alone. There are so few of you left.
"I don't understand!"
In ages past, this land was filled with people who walked the planes. It was an ability taught by parents to their children. I lived and breathed with the life of you all. But then people forgot. They decided that magic was a children's story. They turned away from the old ways, and let technology rule their lives.
"Progress happens. It isn't good or evil."
Anything that turns humanity away from the wonder that can be found in a single leaf, or a sunset, or a baby's cry is evil.
"You are wrong. We are meant to progress. In childhood, we see everything with young eyes. We witness everything as if it were new made. It is age that brings this loss of wonder. You are growing old. People have moved on from you."
You think people have moved on? This was a land of dreams in the past. It linked every sleeping mind. Now, only those such as you can enter. I will show you the world of your nightmares.
The sky darkened, and I found myself on a desolate plain. A single dead tree broke the endless expanse. A body hung from one of the branches of the tree and looked at me as I approached. The sun disappeared from the sky, and the shadows lengthened. I will show you the evil in your heart before I take your life.
"Show yourself, Beast!"
I don't know what made me think of that. It was so much easier, I guess, to believe that this place was alive. A laughing croak emitted from the corpse on the tree. "So, you finally realize it's me. You're so deliciously trusting"
The body dropped from the tree, and began a shuffling gait toward me. It seemed deformed in some way. It was as if its proportions were perfectly disproportional. It hurt my eyes to watch him walk. "Stay there, Beast."
"Ah yes, the new name. Did I ever thank you for it? Are you my little Beauty? Gives us a kiss, Dearie."
Tendrils emitted from his mouth. I reached out and grasped my sword, slashing through the filaments that he sent toward me. Once again, I was in my adult body. My silver armor shifted around me, its weight settling upon my shoulders and breasts. The weight of the chainmail skirt pulled at my waist. I heard it skirl across my leg plates.
"You cannot defeat me, Demon!"
"I love the thoughts that you think. I think the thoughts that you reject. Let's see how you face against a real Demon!"
His body shifted, twisted, loosing itself from the frame within which it had been hiding. Before me stood a monstrous being. Its wings were black as midnight. A fire burned in the coal of its eyes. Red skin shimmered in the source less light of this place.
I slashed at the claws he extended toward me, doing little more than creating sparks. Dodging aside at the last minute, I felt the passage of air and smelt the stench of him. Something told me that letting his substance touch me wouldn't be a good idea.
What could I do? There was a skritching sound behind me. The bits I had cut off before had woven themselves into a hideous worm. I flipped the worm thing away with the tip of my sword. In the moment of my distraction, the Beast had charged. Sidestepping, I brought my sword around in a massive arc. It bit deeply into his shoulder, but bound there. The force of his passage wrenched the blade from my hands.
"Points for originality, but really, Jamie, do you think you can defeat me here?"
For the first time, I noticed a chain around his neck. It dragged along the ground, connecting him to it. There was no ribbon connecting him to his body.
"Epiphany begins! I am a part of this world. You need to keep better track of your tether."
He grabbed hold of my ribbon and pain ripped through me. I collapsed to my knees, no longer able to stand.
"You have much to learn, little Jamie. and I'm afraid that your time is now run out."
The talons extended and he slashed through my ribbon. Before it could get away he grabbed hold of it. I felt the cold take me. This is what it felt like to die, and yet be fully aware of your surroundings.
"You little fool. I have been searching for the right body for ages. Do you know how hard it was to manipulate the situation? To bind you to your alternate so you could see a version of my life? To force that slave Brian into killing her? Every step along the path, you have been my little pawn. I leave you a journal, let you believe that I am weak and conceited. People stronger than you trapped me in this world. That is the reason you couldn't even get to me. I was outside reality.
I watched as the cut end of my ribbon began to steam and evaporate. So slowly its length became less. My legs had no strength, and I collapsed even as I tried to stand.
"Give up, little Jamie. Your life is mine now. I can finally begin to take what is mine again. Believe me when I say that I feel your pain. The good news is that you won't feel it for long."
"This isn't over, Beast!"
"Yes, Jamie, it is." His form had shifted until he looked an almost duplicate of me. He pulled the chain out of the ground, and it quickly shifted into a pale blue ribbon and began to dissolve. When he tied it to my yellow ribbon, they merged together. After a brief back and forth, the ribbon turned blue. I felt as if a spear had been thrust through my heart.
"Goodbye, Jamie. You've been an excellent playmate." He laughed manically as he walked away. I expected for it to get darker, but everything began to get brighter and brighter. A voice began to call what I assumed was my name.
A mere moment to go. I looked at my ribbon, watching as it continued to disappear. Laying back, I stared at the blood red sky. So, this is what failure feels like. It had always seemed to me that it would feel worse. As the ribbon began crawling its way across my chest everything went dark.
Sometimes evil wins...
Oh to be free, and feel the wind on my own skin after so many years in captivity. I would seek revenge on those that imprisoned me, but their world had burned into a lifeless cinder ages ago.
How many years have I spent waiting for just the right person, with just the right abilities, to come along. Of course they had to be genetically me as well.
I'd thought that the first Jamie of this world would be it, of only she hadn't been genetically female.
The time it took, the endless time.
The endless featureless time.
I'm not one to revel in blood, but the response I got for killing that child was delicious. Jamie lived up to all of my expectations. And this body. My own at last.
I walk around these halls and look at all of the sheep. With a body of my own, I won't need to feed for years yet. Endless life, mine to take. I will be more careful this time. I won't be caught.
It is so hard helping these people to make their plans to capture me without laughing at them. I've won, and they don't even know it. They'll become complacent over time.
Ah, to breathe the air again. To feel the clothing on my skin. Even if it is a dress. Anything is better than nothing at all.
What shall I do today? How shall I be?
I want to leave this place, but the power to walk between words seems to be linked to her spirit, and not her body. It's a pity, but I can bend this world to my will all the same.
I only hope that they do not ask me to prove my abilities to them.
Oh, the things I could teach them about their abilities. They only barely understand the power they have at their finger-tips.
The things they would see if they had even half of my lifespan.
I watched the people of my old world die. Their terror fed me even after the few spirits I could snag from the abyss had long been consumed.
All those years I survived on thos spirits foolish enough to wander into my cell. All those souls I consumed to get one or two more years of existence.
That is all in the past.
"Jamie, is there something wrong?" The short haired girl is looking at me. I think she's concerned for Jamie's well being. Too bad for her that it's too late for all of them. Maybe I'll have to use her before I get rid of her. It's been so long since I was able to perform.
"No, pet, nothing's wrong." That was the wrong name to use. I can't use her real name, since I haven't been here long enough to learn it.
I kiss her on the cheek and hug her, "I'm just a little stressed with the waiting. I'll be alright."
She seems to relax. Well, there's another I'll have to keep my eye on.
"Jamie. I think you and I should hop home for a bit. I'd like to spend some time with Mom. The Beast usually lays low for a bit before making himself known. And we've got the headsets now, so they can reach us even there."
The Beast, huh. Cool. "I think we should wait a bit longer, Olivia."
Now I've really stepped in it. I was sure that I'd heard other people calling her that. Her look at me, though, suggests that I'm supposed to call her something different. For the life of my I don't know what that is.
"Call Jamie."
Um, I'm not wearing a headset.
"Lock Jamie, Call Walker."
What's going on? Something about those headsets I don't understand. I leave the room looking for somewhere to think. I don't understand what's going on here, and I need to figure it out. I'd thought I had enough forays here to get everything down. Why did they go and change everything at the last minute.
It's like someone out there simply wants me to lose.
This isn't fair.
It's my turn to win. I waited patiently, more than patiently. I slowly created all of the proper situations so that Jamie would be the proper vessel. Got her to leave her home, and avenge a murder. Then, when she had someone else in her head, she would want to get that person into an appropriate body.
I had the empty body all ready for her, and had convinced the idiots in this world to keep it alive.
Then, it was a matter of getting her to hate me enough to slip into the space between worlds, a place only someone like her could get to, and free me.
So simple, yet it took me eons to achieve. And here I am going to be done in by someone who thinks their power greater than mine.
I feel her pull me even now, trying to command me. Command ME!? Never. I am above her commands now that the full weight of my spirit can manifest here in this world.
I need to return to Olivia.
Ok, so she almost got me there. I need to keep focused. . .and return to Olivia.
I laugh and walk the other way, even as something in my mind tries to get me to change direction. A focused will can defeat even you, Queen.
'Honey, I'm HOME!!!'
Oh shit.
. . .but today's not your day, and tomorrow isn't looking good either
I was dying. My soul was dying. I could feel the energy that powered me escaping through the yellow ribbon in my chest. As everything went black, I felt myself lifted, and a far of voice saying, "Just hold on a bit longer, Jamie."
"Who?" I was too confused to understand the answer, if there even was one. I just wanted to fade out. I felt myself getting lighter, as I rode higher in the person's arms.
I felt something tugging at my chest, and then the world exploded. Color streamed out of me and filled everything up. Sounds and thoughts flew like birds. I felt myself filling up, and then expanding like a balloon. It was power. Pure, sweet, power. I laughed and it was the sound of thunder.
I looked down at my feet and saw a small figure looking up to me. I no sooner thought to get closer, than I was the same size as the figure.
"Jamie, you need to calm your emotions. Thoughts have power here." Walker was a little frantic and for the life of me I couldn't understand why. I was the sun, the moon, and the stars. I was the universe, and I was an ant. Everything but Walker was me here. Maybe I should change that. . .
"Jamie, Think about who you are. Focus on Olivia, and Bree. Focus on the people who love you, and who you love."
What is love to me, who is the entirety of creation? What is love when everything breathes with me, lives with me, and dies with my thought?
"You are a person, Jamie. There are people outside of this space that need you!"
Thought came hard for a moment, as if I was pushing against the weight of the universe. Something inside me moved instead. What's going on with me, Walker?
"I had to plug you into this place to save your life. This much power was never meant for a human mind to control."
I can't focus. My mind wants to fly into a thousand pieces. Help me!
"There's only so much that I can do, Jamie. You have to do most of this for yourself. Focus on your loved ones. Keep them in your mind."
I tried. Oh how I tried. I thought of my mother, and Mary, and they quickly slipped away. I thought of the children for a moment before the wonder of being took me again. I collapsed from the size of a galaxy to a planet. I couldn't keep it going. My mind felt like it was made up of millions, billions, trillions of me. . .and then I realized it was. For a moment, I was every Jamie and James and variant in existence. I was being born, and I was dieing. I was making love and I was in the extremities of pain.
I realized I had to focus myself down to being a single person in a single point in time. I found the Beast's thoughts in the midst of it all, and saw him gloating about winning. I locked onto him, and tapped into Olivia's mind. She was talking to him about something, and couldn't quite realize why the answers were wrong.
Call Jamie on the headset. Talk to her mind to find out what's wrong
"Call Jamie"
"Hello, Liv."
"Jamie?"
"Yeah, the Beast kicked me out of my body and is sort of inhabiting it now. Can you add Walker into this?"
"Lock Jamie, Call Walker"
"You're on the party line with Olivia and Jamie, what can I do for you."
"Jamie, you're focused. That was a bit worrisome there for a bit. It's never a good idea to plug into the plane unless there's no other choice."
"You feel...bigger somehow, Jamie. Is that because he plugged you in?"
"Yeah, apparently I'm currently at one with the universe, multiverse, whatever. I almost lost myself in all of the numberless Jamies out there."
"Well, it's good to have you back."
"Not back quite yet. I need to clean house and get that scum out of my body. Unless I tell you 42 the next time I'm aware of my surroundings, order me to die, since Beast will have won."
"Is there anything that we can do?"
"Walker, I just need you to protect this point for me. I will need to bring Beast back here. Liv, make sure my body stays safe."
I let go of the connection to Olivia, since I didn't want her to be a part of what I would do next. I locked onto Beast and, well, the closest that I can describe is to say I jumped.
'Honey, I'm HOME!!!'
I felt his surprise as he turned to look at me. There was still something off about his spirit in the moment before he turned to face me.
'This is impossible. There's no way that you could be here.'
'Think again, buttercup. Have you anything to say in your last moments of life?'
'You can't defeat me here!'
I shifted into my armor. Bringing my sword around in an arc I slashed through his arm. He screamed and clutched the stump for a moment. The arm quickly grew back into place.
'SEE! I am invincible in my own mind!' There was still pain behind his eyes as he said this.
'Ah, but I can cause you pain.' My sword flew toward him again, it's silver surfaces shimmering in the light. He dodged back at the last moment and I only slashed his jacket.
His form shimmered for a moment before he once again became the demon. It was diminished in size from before, as if some of the substance was gone. The talons struck out for me, but came to an abrupt halt when they encountered my breastplate. Our relative strengths had shifted. I grabbed the claw with my left hand and slashed through it with my right. The bellow of pain that emitted from the lungs of the creature almost knocked me from my feet.
It scrabbled away, but I gave chase. Around us a primordial forest grew faster than thought. I heard the screeches and calls of creatures out of sight. A giant lizard crashed through the trees. I vaguely remembered it as a Tyrannosaurus Rex from the one trip my school had taken to the museum.
It bellowed at me and made to eat me in a single bite. I was more than I seemed and expanded myself to it's size.
The sudden movement grabbed it's attention, and facing something bigger than itself gave it pause. My sword sheared off it's hide. I tried to get a better angle and it bit into my left arm. I felt the fangs as they tore the material asunder. I cried in pain. This wasn't going according to plan at all.
I punched the beast in the head until it let go and then grabbed my sword in both hands. Dropping to a knee, I thrust upward with the point into his head. The weapon was wrenched from my grasp as the behemoth collapsed. As I was trying to pull it free, the monster, forest, and my sword all disappeared. The Beast was only a few steps away for my huge form, so I made to kick him. He flew into the air to dodge my attack, and the ground disappeared out from under me.
I was tumbling through the air, concentrating trying to alter my shape. White feathered wings tore through my armor, ripping it from my body. I was left in gauntlets and a thin shift covering my top.
I flew after the Beast, trying to draw nearer to my quarry. He would be mine, and I would have my body back.
'You don't need to do this! We can share the multiverse, you and I. You're the only one who has seen what I've seen. The shear scope and splendor of it.'
'Thanks, Vader, but the dark side is not my path.'
'You'll regret turning me down!'
'Probably, but not today!'
A dragon attacked me from behind. We tumbled and lost some ground on the Beast. 'Two can play at this game.' A shadow passed over the dragon and I, and then it was plucked from the air by the Roc I'd imagined. I considered what I was doing. The normal physical laws didn't apply in this space.
I could continue chasing him. . .or I could simply appear next to him.
'Gotcha.'
I made a grab for him, but he evaded again. both of us were unlimited in our motions, making it difficult to get a hold. It was a case of the unstoppable force, and the movable object. No matter where I went, he was already gone.
'I need a more confined space. . .' I muttered to myself.
That gave me an idea. I formed a cage of thought around him. He looked at it as he fell thought the air. He tried to slip through the bars, but they held him. He changed to mist, and I instantly changed the cage to glass walls. He began to expand, and I reinforced his box. I felt the strain to contain him. It was as if he were trying to push himself out of me. I redoubled my efforts, and even collapsed the cage a bit.
I was focusing on keeping him in, and the next he was behind me and slashing at my unprotected back. I spun and intercepted his strike with my sword.
'This is getting us nowhere, Beast.'
'It is wearing you out. Eventually you'll have to leave, and I will have won.'
Leave. . .something about that.
An image played through my mind. I watched as he slashed through my ribbon again, and how it easily parted. He pulled his chain from the matter of the plane, and tied it into my body's ribbon. I had an idea, and it was time to put it into action.
'You know what? It is time for us to leave.' A smile played across my lips.
'Us? There is no us. Leave any time you want, though. You're welcome to admit defeat.'
In the next instant I was behind him and wrapping him in my arms. I folded my wings around the two of us. I let go of my one true world.
We were instantly in the plane again. I pulled my chain out of the matter of the world, and watched it become a ribbon again. I tied it into the ribbon for my body. It was time to end this forever. The Beast could not be allowed the potential to survive.
'Time for us to go home!'
I grabbed onto the ribbon, which was now a war of blue and yellow, and dragged us back to our body.
'What have you DONE!!!' The Beast was frantic as we slipped back into the body that welcomed us home.
The distance between us grew inexorably smaller and smaller. At the last moment, he charged toward me, and we merged.
I felt myself coming apart at the seams. I felt the time that he'd lived, and he felt my own short span. I had to focus on who I was. He took away my mother, as his mother looked the same. Olivia was next. One by one I was stripped of the people I knew, as most of them were similar to people he had known. We were being paired down to nothing. Like a drowning sailor I threw my arms around the last person I had. The newest one in my life. Bree. She was a being unique in the multiverse. Somehow she was the only version of Brian that was female. The odds against something happening that way at random are so slim, that I began immediately to wonder who had set this particular peculiarity up.
I began to rebuild my core identity around the pillar that was Bree. The Beast tried the same around himself. I quickly pulled in my memories of childhood. I connected soaring spans to Mary, and from there to Frank. I made halls for my mother and minarets for each of the Jamies I had met, bar one.
I made a deep, dank, dark, solitary dungeon for the Beast. I pushed him in, and then locked the door. Then I went skyward again. I made walls out of my memories of all the Brians that either I or the Beast had met. I created mortar out of my step-fathers. I molded and shaped. I added windows and loop holes. I added towers and keeps. I was making a high place. It was also a permanent place.
Once the castle itself was completed, and the mountain, upon whose knees it was built, established, I went after the town. Buildings and inns. Stables and roads. People, lots of people. Everyone who I'd met in my entire life. The good and the bad. The sick and the well. The living and even the dead.
It teemed with life. It teemed with my life.
And when it was all done, I walked up from the town, the populace following me. A procession for the crowning of their queen. My clothing and form changed as I walked. I no longer needed the wings, or the adult form. I was happy to be the 14 year old me.
However, I was in a gown of state. It was one fitted to me perfectly, and it was yellow like daisies in the sun. It was as yellow as a field full of daisies. As we walked, just such a field spread out from that mountain. Rolling hills and copses of trees as far as the eye could see. In the distance a river glinted in the sun. It was a river as wide as a sea, and as deep as thought.
The crowd became more jubilant as we reached the gates. My image of Bree met me there, and we went, hand in hand, to the top of the stairs to that deep well of sorrow I had crafted so well in my castle.
I walked down alone.
It is as it should be, walking down those thousand steps into the dark, yet never needing light the entire way. The Beasts presence grew stronger the deeper I went.
'We have come to the end, Beast. Have you made your castle large with the love of those around you? Have you crafted the walls of hurt with the mortar of adversity? Have you created a town big enough for everyone to live in peace? Have you populated it with those that affected your life? Have you added your field of dreams, and your river of sorrows?'
'Yes, you have Jamie. There is only one thing that remains for you to do.'
'I'm sorry it came to this. Your time is over.'
'And ours has begun.'
I stepped from the last tread and into the darkness. The Beast consumed me, and was consumed by me. We became us for a moment, then us became me.
I wasn't the same little girl that had gone into the woods to run away. I also wasn't the damaged soul that had been locked between worlds to save all of creation.
We tempered each other.
But I was still myself. I simply had a lot of bad experience to draw from now.
I took a deep breath. Happy to have use of my lungs again.
I sat up.
I looked around at those people whom I owed my very existence to.
I smiled
I said, "42".
I still have nightmares. I wake up in the middle of the night and for a second or two, before the shape of my sister Olivia forms in the darkness, I think I'm him. For a second, I think with his thoughts and it scares me.
I alternate Thursdays with Mary1 and Mary2. Mary1 was the one who first suggested that I start writing this. It's taken me a while to get to the end, and during the course of this, I have come to better understand who I am as a person.
I also understand the Beast better. There is a part of me now that does wish that I'd given in to him at the end. Or that I'd let the both of us die when I tied our lives together.
I need to complete this final chapter, however, so I can move on.
When I finally got back to my world, I found my house boarded up, and police tape on the door. I didn't know what to make of it, so Mary1 made a few calls.
The police had come to our house to arrest my step-father for abuse. He got his pistol and tried to shoot it out with them, with the expected result. What was unexpected was my mother took the gun from his hand and shot herself.
When I see the scar on my cheek in the mirror, it reminds me of where I came from. The Beast inside of me smiles at their end. I mourn their loss.
Bree was adopted by Mary1 and Frank1. She was the first child who came to them that wasn't one of their clients. I've never seen any of them happier than they are now. I only wish that Bree's parents hadn't looked at her like she was an abomination when we'd tried to take her home.
When Olivia and I arrived home from this mess, Helen2 welcomed me home with open arms. She welcomed Olivia home as well. She's Helen Bonham to the rest of the world now, and Mom to me. We finalized the adoption, of both of us, since legally Olivia is a new person, after the divorce.
Yep, We're twins according to the adoption records. Olivia and Jamie Bonham. Our friends call us Orange and Juice a lot. That means I have two nicknames, but most people don't know about Traveler.
Yes, we visit Earth4 once a week, since Olivia wants to spend time with Corin. They talk nightly on the headsets.
Everything is still about the same for them there, but there have been some unsettling rumors trickling into the Fortress. Yeah, they didn't like living in a sanitarium either.
As the hormones continue to pump into my system, I grow to look more and more like Olivia, and people are thankful for the scar on my face. I wish I could be as thankful for the scars on my soul.
We babysit for Clare occasionally. She has a headset now as well. Bree's been busy, and we're actually selling a new model to the worlds of the Communion. Yeah, that's what all the worlds cal their little group. I actually run a courier service as well, since I'm still the only confirmed Traveler. They've finally been able to exchanged signed copies of their treaty. Per the rules that got me citizenship in Earth5, I actually now have citizenship in every member dimension of the Communion. Earth1 is in negotiations with the Communion for member status. I can't get anyone in a position of authority to believe me on Earth2, so the Communion have assigned protectorate status to them.
For some reason, the Communion has stated that Earth4 is outside their jurisdiction. Apparently they know something about that world that their not sharing. Well, it's expected. I'm just the courier after all.
I convinced the Communion to pay me in precious metals and gems, since paper money from one world will have no value in another. They're trying to come up with a method of making a cross dimensional commodity based monetary system. I doubt it will really take off before Bree get's her gateway working.
I forgot to mention that Bree is trying to build a device that will connect two worlds like a gateway. She's not having any luck. She blacked out the city three times before she decided to disconnect from the power grid. I may eventually tell her some of the things I've figured out about crossing worlds, but I will let her work her way through it.
Her ability is immense, but not limitless. Sometimes a basic understanding of the problem is required.
I still don't know what world Beast came from, and he maintains that it was destroyed. Some things he's said don't add up, however, and I wonder if he is as puzzled by his inability to find it as I am.
School is better for me now. Everyone sees me as a girl, and Olivia and I have lots of friends. It took them a little while to get used to the idea of calling her Liv, but it all worked out. Olivia does her best not to order anyone about. I don't use my ability at school. Mostly we're trying to live normal, mundane, lives.
Brian2 is in psychological counseling. Apparently there are large portions of the year before these events that he doesn't remember at all. The last thing he remembers clearly, in fact, is going on a date with Liv.
She's actually considering dating him again, and if it were anyone else, I'd be more worried. I'm more worried about what will happen to her if she remakes Brian in her own image.
I'm feeling more in control every day. The nightmares plague me less. Eventually I hope to get past this point and move on with the rest of my life. For now, I go to school, and I hang with my friends. Friends. . .something I never thought I would have, but am glad of the journey that brought me to them.
World: Earth4
Commander, we have a level two incursion outside Seattle
The man sitting in the comfortable chair shifted uncomfortably. "Let's get company six and eight on their way out there, and have squad A of third company support locals until relieved."
That will likely result in a complete loss of squad A third.
"Don't you think I know that, you fool machine! We just don't have enough Class I talent graduating from those damned sanitariums. Whoever thought that up should be sent to the next class three incursion."
The commander thought about the world he never knew existed. Well, before he joined the Psi Legion support corps.
The first incursion, in 2201, had likely been a misfire. Who was behind this continual assault was still unknown. But the first incursion wouldn't even rate a level one incursion.
A level one incursion was an assault force of between fifty and sixty.
There were only seven in that first wave. Even seven would have been enough to raze Salt Lake City, where they landed, if it hadn't been for a single Psi who put himself between the incursion force and the rest of the world.
No technological device yet developed could stand against these things.
Yet, one Psi had been able to destroy the creatures. That Psi had been one of the weakest, a Class IV.
Someone decided that telling the world about the war would destroy their way of life, so they formed the Psi Legion.
But they needed a way to test the resolve of the leadership. The Class Is.
It was inhuman.
Sometimes inhumanity had to be performed by the watchmen in order to assure the humanity of the watched.
"Display leader squad A third on primary display."
A level two incursion is more than three hundred assault troops.
The members of the squad were directing the lances of death at the creatures that bubbled through the barrier. Everywhere that the camera displayed was filled with the grotesque forms. Some had one arm longer than the other. Some had three or more arms. Some had no arms at all. Some had two legs. Some had none. One thing was almost fifteen feet long and covered in mobile appendages.
It took two full companies to effectively stand off a level two incursion. Even then there were always casualties. There had only ever been one level three incursion. The previous command center had gone down under that assault. Only one of the fifteen companies of the Legion had actually survived that. And it was a broken mess.
Each member of the squad took out five, ten, twenty, more, but five versus hundreds is poor odds indeed.
The commander had a moment of hope that this time might be different. That he wouldn't lose another first response squad. There was a reason that they are entirely volunteers however. And that their motto was, Once more into the breach.
The first member of the squad went down almost ten minutes after they engaged. The closest company was still twenty minutes out. He was torn in two by the crablike claws of one of the beasts. Four blasts obliterated the monster a moment too late.
It was another four minutes before the next member went down. The other three members of the team had focused on a twenty foot tall creature. They missed the four foot tall grasshopper from behind.
The remaining three went back to back. The kept taking down more and more of the beasts, but there continued to be more to kill.
The third went down to a two way attack. All three of the squad members had been distracted by the flashing blades of one of the creatures. They took it out in time to see their compatriot stabbed in the back. The company was still eight minutes out.
Again, a moment of hope. They lasted for seven minutes. They fought like the demons they faced. Then it was only the leader left.
Seconds remained. The engines of the assault craft could be heard over the pickup. The company flooded onto the field of battle. The camera went tumbling, showing a couple of frames of the now headless body of the squad leader.
"Shut it off."
He sat in his climate controlled command center. Sweat stained his uniform. He put his head in his hands and cried the loss of another five of his children. The oldest of those 'soldiers' had been only fifteen. All of them were Class I. Company three was down to two platoons. That meant there were only eight squads between humanity and the monsters in the dark.
"We are going to lose this war, aren't we?"
Based on the current rate of increase in incursion frequency and the reduction in new Psi capable individuals, the most recent projections show us without any protection in six months
The commander took out his service pistol and ate it. His successor had to clean up the mess. His successor lasted longer than anyone of his predecessors: five weeks.
I will be using this page to organize the reference works for The Gateway to Life series.
Earth1 Technological and Historical Differences:
This earth is considered to be -20 years. IE: WWII started in about 1936 in our world, but 1954 in Earth1
Named Avalon due to the Jamie1' preoccupation with Arthur and the knights of the round.
Home computers: They haven't yet become widespread. They are a bit further behind than their late 80's equivalent should put them.
Earth1 advanced technologies:
--Multi-Spectrum Photography: Using the particular properties of certain narrow wavelengths of light they are able to collect forensic evidence. Multi-Spectrum film is used that is set to respond to certain light wavelengths. Each exposure on the film follows a specific pattern which the flash is tied to as well. Can be used to photographically prove age and authenticity of bruising, among other things.
--Parapsychology: Partially due to the advent of Multi-spectrum photography they have photographic evidence of certain things like ghosts and auras. It is considered a hard science.
--Magnetic Ink: Something used in Earth2 in the min 90s, Earth1 makes significant use of it in many aspects of life, including single use passes for high security offices and the Auto-dialers mentioned in the story. The weakness of the signal limits the amount of data that can be recorded, but some breakthroughs in the anti-absorptive properties of the magnetic ink will soon allow them to almost triple the data that can be recorded, increasing it to 36 bytes. Plans for cheap and easily recyclable products using this technology are already in the testing phases.
Trivia: 101 was chosen as the Morse code emergency signal due to its ease of use. Morse code is a bit different in Earth1. The code for 101 is ._._._._. (._. is 1, _._ is 0). The 2 dots between sequences denote it as a pattern and not just a repeating sequence (._._._._.._._._._.._._._._. and so on). Because it was a set of numbers, and everyone already knew it, it was adopted as the phone distress cal as well. Strangely, audio distress is still Mayday like in our world.
Child Care Division: A division of the Police that serves the same function as Social Services on our Earth, at least for children.
Earth4 Technological and Historical Differences:
This earth is +500
Timeline of significant events after 2010:
2014: Research into the human mind for cybernetic implants discoveres a nexus of neurons which is later named coloquially the Psi nexus. It is proven that the activity in this region is directly linked to Psi capability.
2030: The first Psi studies degree offered at Harvard. This degree has been offered at smaller online colleges for over 11 years.
2093: Cooperative research project between major universities begins to try to determine the genetic source of Psi capability.
2098: Research ends on Psi capability due to loss of funding and conflicting genetic findings.
2110: Voluntary registration as Psi capable on the US census begins. An estimated 20% of all Psi capable people registered.
2130: Psi registration peaks at an estimated 60% of all Psi capable individuals.
2158: "The Origin of the Soul" published by pop-psychologist Thomas Traveller
2160: Tomas Traveller has his certification revoked and barred from practicing.
2164: Supreme court appeal by Thomas Traveller fails. From the majority opinion, "there is no concrete proof of alternate realities."
2175: The Standardized Psionic Capability Test, or SPC, developed. Psi is classified into 5 categories.
2192: Incontrivertible evidence of alternate dimensions discovered in the form of inter-dimensional radio waves. Points of radio wave generation ploted to map points. Ley-nexus revived as term to identify them, even thogh less than 1% fall on so called Ley-lines.
2199: Kyle Longtree, a Class IV psi, invents a device he calls the Psi Lance. Patent submitted.
2201: While camping on antelope island, Kyle Longtree tests his Psi Lance. The first incursion emerges from a previously unknown Ley-nexus there. Kyle calls in the press, both to see the creatures, and proove the feasibilty of his Psi Lance as a weapon.
2203: Kyle Longtree incarcerated for unlawful discharge of a proscribed weapon.
2204: Psi Edict signed into US law.
2210: Psi Edict ratified by the UN ruling council.
2214: Kyle Longtree released from prison.
2215: Kyle Longtree inducted into the new Sanitarium program.
2251: First Sanitarium 'graduates'. Loss of 60% of Psi capable individuals estimated. Kyle Longtree among the dead.
2264: First Level one incursion. This occurs at the Paris, France Psi ley-nexus. The nexus is 300 feet from the former location of the Arc de Triumph. Paris written off as a complete loss. 1.8 million people dead.
2310: First Level two incursion. This occurs on the slopes of Mt Everest. Half of the invading force fals to the valley below. It takes almost a week to completely erradicate the incursion due to its scattered nature.
2418: The first, and currently only, Level three incursion. It is also the first sure evidence that this war is directed by intelligence on the other side. The Original command center is attacked by an estimated 4 million creatures. All was lost until Corporal Alice Evans shifted from Class I to Null Class. The force of the blast focused through her Psi Lance vaporized everything for a six mile radius. NORAD completely destroyed, as well as the remnants of the Psi Legion still on the field. Null Class, only achievable by telekinetics to date, deemed a threat to society.
2504: Current date.
Six Classifications of Psi:
Class I: Approximately 1 in every 6,000,000 individuals has this level. 1 in 100 are TKs. Highest registered level of psi ability. Typified by multi use abilities. Walker, Queen and Journey are examples of this level.
Class II: Approximately 1 in every 100,000 individuals has this level. Not weak, but lacks a certain versatility of use. Pedant, Underseer and Lacey are in this category.
Class III: Approximately 1 in every 200 individuals has this level. Typified by Class I powers, but without the energy reserves to make them versatile. Keeper is an example of this category.
Class IV: Approximately 1 in every 50 individuals has this level. Telepaths, Empaths, and weaker versions of other abilities show up here.
Class V: Approximately 1 in every 2 individuals has this level. Those will little psi power, and no discernible abilities.
Null Class: Only 1 in 3 TKs can achieve this level. Power reserves cease to be an issue. Exact knowledge of what powers these individuals in unknown, but the Psi Lance can no longer contain blasts created by them.
Books:
The Origin of the Soul: Book written by Thomas Traveller. It postulates that the human soul is a construct so vast that upon it's creation, it spreads itself between dimensions. Evedence of this can be be seen in twins that act the same over great distances, even when they have never met. He states that this is a "single dimensional duality of soul" (Traveller, pg 106, 2158). He postulates this soul splitting as one reason for "the Transgendered individual" (Traveller, pg 292, 2158)
Technology:
TranSteel(tm): A preparation of steel plates that allow for the passage of photons in one or two directions when subjected to an electric current.
Psi Lance: Focuses the thoughts of a Psi capable individual into a coherent beam of psychic energy. Class V don't generate enough energy for it to be lethal, and a Null Class generates too much
The Gateway to Life Characters and other information.
This page will update as new information is presented in the story.
Earth1(Avalon) | Earth2(Spade) | Earth4(Lost Love) | ||
Jamie Patrice | ===Look Alike=== | Jamie Patriche | ===Look Alike=== | Jamie ? |
Born male, recently started living as female. No siblings. Lost testes in a bicycle accident. | Born male, raised female. Lost most of penis in botched circumcision. Has testes. Younger brother Gabriel Patriche. Older brother Steven Patrice. Murdered by Brian2 | Her mind was destroyed by the Beast (Jamie3) | ||
Allen Patrice | ===Look Alike=== | Andrew Patriche | ||
Sterile. Jamie Patrice's step-father. Has abused her physically her entire life. He also emotionally abuses Helen Patrice and is very controlling of her life. | Jamie Patriche's step-father. Has two children by Helen Bonham-Patriche: Steven and Gabriel | |||
Andrew Patriche | ===Look Alike=== | Allen Patrice | ||
Unknown history. | Police officer in Earth2 who help charges get dropped against Jamie1, and leveled against Brian2. Not a close relation to either Jamie. Is not sterile. | |||
Additional congruence info. | ||||
Allen Patrice | |||Dissimilar||| | Allen Patrice | ||
Andrew Patriche | |||Dissimilar||| | Andrew Patriche | ||
End additional information | ||||
Helen Patrice | ===Look Alike=== | Helen Bonham-Patriche | ||
Jamie Patrice's mom. Separated from Allen Patrice for a few months about thirteen years ago. Lived with Richard1 Paxton during that time. Went back to Allen before realizing she was pregnant. | Jamie Patriche's mom. Had an affair with Richard2 Paxton about thirteen years ago because Andrew Patriche showed no interest in her. Had sex with Andrew Patriche when she realized she was pregnant. | |||
Steven Patriche | ||||
He is twenty years old and living in college. Came out to Jamie2 about a year ago when he started living with his boyfriend. Was molested by Andrew2. | ||||
Gabriel Patriche | |||Dissimilar||| | Gabriel Patriche | ||
Unknown history | Brother of Jamie Patriche. Molested by Andrew2 Patriche | |||
Richard Paxton | ===Look Alike=== | Richard Paxton | ||
Is a police Sergeant. He is the liaison officer between the child care division and forensic field division. He spend most of his time working with child care division, however. He is Jamie Patrice's father, but is unaware of this fact. Retconned name: Bill Paxton | Is a police Detective. He works in homicide, and hates every minute of it. He would prefer to switch to a career in Social Services. He got into law enforcement to save people, not pack them into body bags, as he puts it. He knows he is Jamie Patriche's father. Retconned name: Bill Paxton | |||
Frank Keller | ||||
Husband to Mary Keller. They use Team Counseling to help children of abuse open up. They also act as a sort of underground railroad for runaways from abusive families. | ||||
Mary Keller | ===Look Alike=== | Mary Pierce | Age Discrepancy | Mary Pierce |
Helps her husband to counsel children of abuse. | Counsels children and is considered an expert in the field of gender disorders in children. | Arrested for violation of the Psi Edict. She is unaware of any Psi use, as her Psi nexus was removed at birth. Is currently thirteen. |
Additional characters for Earth4
Walker(m), Pedant(m), Underseer(m), Keeper(f), Lacey(f)
I waved at them with a cheery smile on my face, knowing that it only took a moment of my time to be courteous. They made their choices, and I made my own. There are so many saying that support what I did, but my favorite has always been ‘you attract more flies with honey than vinegar.’
The thing is, why do you want to attract flies, but it is the concept that counts, even if sweet is usually used when trying to kill flies, like with fly paper. Of course, have you ever considered how inhumane flypaper actually is? It doesn’t really kill flies, it just traps them there…
Anyway, that isn’t a part of the story, at least not the way that you’d think it was.
Across the road, in the midst of three tall skyscrapers was a small plot of land with a building, no more than two or three stories tall in the center of it. At first, I thought it was a two-story building, and it really seemed to be one, but every once in a while, for no apparent reason, a third story would peak out from under the roof as if it were a shy little three year old consumed with curiosity and looking back in my direction.
As the story progresses, I continue to refer to the building as if it were alive, and to a certain degree I think she is. Most people are more comfortable thinking of their buildings as being inanimate objects. That’s fine. Whatever helps them cope, but to a greater or lesser degree, all buildings are aware.
It’s what gives them a haunted feeling over a long period of time. You see the more evil that is done in a house the less that the house likes him, or her, self. Houses develop complexes just like their residents do.
This is something that you will have to just get used to. I flit from idea to idea, which I think was the only reason that the house and I first met. I couldn’t ever focus on one thing long enough to stay distracted away from the house.
Being the conscientious person I am, I walked to the intersection before crossing the street. The fact that there was New York rush hour traffic in between myself and the house was only a passing concern.
Oh, I know what you’re thinking, but you’d be wrong. I’ve never4 backed down from a challenge, but walking across the center of the road, beyond being illegal, is simply rude. All those people trying to get where they’re going coming to a stop to avoid killing you is something I’d prefer not to be the cause of.
So, I went to the corner, crossed the road, and then walked the half block or so back up to the house. Other than the obvious neglect that had been shown to the garden surrounding the little building, I thought that it held potential, a lot of potential. The door was solid, and all of the glass panes were intact. Looking in through the windows, I saw that while there was a lot of dust inside, there were none of the other signs of decay I would expect from a vacant building in this, or any other, part of the city.
I walked around the house one more time and then called my broker. Well, to be accurate he was just a Real Estate Agent, but I like calling him my broker. Makes me sound important.
“Steve, I’d like you to look into a property for me. I think I would be absolutely perfect.”
“Where are you?”
“Just outside of downtown, actually.”
“You found an office space then?”
“Not exactly. I found a house.”
“Um…a house. In down town. What are you smoking, and can I get some.”
“Shut up, Steve, and just come over here.” I gave him the address, which he made me repeat because his GPS device didn’t like the address.
I find GPSs to be woefully unreliable people. They think that they know more than you about streets and addresses. That is why I regularly test them to make sure they know as much as everyone seems to believe they do. I really think my current one is getting a little too smug and I’ll need to trade her out for a newer model. For some reason every route I plot recently takes me past Grand Central Station.
So, I stood and waited for Steve to arrive, and may I say that it was one of the more interesting experiences that I’d had waiting for someone. He parked right in front of the house, got out, and started walking down the block. I laughed at that, and he seemed to hear, and turn around. He passed by me not more than ten feet away, but never saw me. Every time he turned to look in my direction, it seemed that his gaze glazed over and he just continued looking past to the next building in line.
“I’m right here, Steve,” I said after walking right up next to him, but not onto the sidewalk.
“What the…? Jules?” And that’s about the time his eyes got real big and all 6’5” of him collapsed to the sidewalk.
I dragged and rolled him off the sidewalk onto the un kempt grass that sided it and began to watch the people as they walked by. Most of them, I’d say about 99%, just kept walking by. One in one hundred looked my way, so I waved. They seemed to be stunned by my surroundings for a moment before, like the others, they’d glaze over and then continue walking.
I was beginning to wonder if I might not be the crazy one when I felt a tap on my shoulder.
“Are you lost, Miss?”
I looked up at the soft voiced stranger who had interrupted my people-watching. “Not lost. I think this house wants to be found.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because she keeps looking at me in curiosity.”
The other person laughed. He was dressed in a nice three-piece suit that fit him like…well like a suit is supposed to fit a man. If you’ve never met the…guy…then I can’t really describe it more than that. Now, I know what you’re thinking, that you’ve seen one tailored suit, then you’ve seen them all.
Let me tell you that this isn’t the case. Imagine seeing a really good tailored suit for the first time, you know, one that was just finished a couple of hours ago so that the creases are still in it, and no permanent wrinkles have begun to form. You know, the ones that make every guy want a tailored suit and ever woman want to be with the guy in the suit.
The type of tailored suit that makes you look at the guy next to him and assume that his six-thousand dollar suit is an off the rack model. Don’t ask, but I’m embarrassed to say this actually did happen. My dad hasn’t spoken to me in five years because of it.
Anyway, assume that there is a third man in a suit that is as much better than the second suit as the second is better than the first and the first is better than an off the rack. Basically, this third man is wearing a third-degree fitted suit.
The person standing in front of me was wearing at least an eleventh-degree fitted suit. That is the best that I can describe it to you. It looked like the proto-suit, the suit that every other suit in history has ever been patterned after. I immediately distrusted him, because if anyone could possibly achieve that suit without some sort of supernatural assistance then I was the queen of Sheba.
“This is my house, miss, so if you wouldn’t mind…”
The house growled at him. Not to say that it sounded like a wolf or dog or lion or something. No, it growled like a house. It was sort of a metal-fatigue wood-on-wood fingernails-on-chalkboard sort of thing.
Now, normal houses, of which this one certainly wasn’t numbered, do this sort of thing quietly. Most people call it settling. You ever know a happy house to ‘settle?’
I didn’t think so.
So, this house let out almost a bellow of a growl that even startled the…smarmy bastard…in front of me.
“Ok, so the house isn’t mine, but I have access to the proper deed and title…”
The house growled again, and I was beginning to get the picture of what was going on. He was trying to make me a deal I couldn’t refuse for a house he didn’t own. Basically he was a used car salesman, or at least the proto-used-car-salesman.
“I think it is time you left.”
“You can’t talk to me that way. Do you know who I am? I’ve brought kingdoms to their knees. I’ve toppled…”
“Yes, you have an impressive resume, but you have outstayed your welcome. Neither the house nor I want you here. As a man I admire a lot once said: get thee hence.”
He left, but not without a lot of cursing and bemoaning of his fate. There even might have been a tear or two.
“Who was that?”
“Welcome back, Steve.”
“Sorry, but it felt like the entire world broke open in front of me for a minute, and there you were standing in a mythical garden in the middle of New York City.”
Seeing the look on my face, his joking smile disappeared. He cautiously looked around and his eyes opened wide.
“Where in the world are we?”
“Right where I told you. Se, there’s your car parked in front of us.”
“This is insane, when I was on the sidewalk, all I saw was tall buildings. Nothing like this was anywhere to be seen.”
“Take it as it comes, Steve. Just figure out who owns this property, and if I can buy it.”
Steve left after a little bit of walking over the property with me, and I stayed there just relaxing in this little oasis of color in the midst of downtown gray.
Don’t get me wrong; I like the city. No, if I’m being honest, I love the city. It is the reason I was out that morning looking for properties. I’d recently achieved a degree and was looking for a place to set out my shingle, as it were. I figured if I were in the middle of the city somewhere then people would be able to take a break from their daily grind and visit me at all hours of the day.
It is not what you’re thinking either. Why would someone need a degree for that after all. Neither was I a massage therapist, or specifically a therapist of any kind. I am a psychiatrist.
About this point in the story some of you are ready to go looking for something that makes a little more sense. You’re probably thinking that I’m too insane to be a psychiatrist. Here is where you’d be wrong. At the most I would be considered delusional. There is a difference between delusional and insane. I should know, after all: I’m the mental health professional.
The thing is a little delusion in your life is perfectly healthy. If we were all a hundred percent truthful with ourselves, and others, we would be living in a lot bleaker world with a lot less of the technologies that we know and love.
You see, it all starts out with fiction. Think about it. Fiction is another word for lie. We’ve just elevated it in our minds to the level where it stands on it’s own plinth supported pedestal. We don’t normally think about fiction as being a lie, and those of you who are authors of fictional works are secure in the fact that you are storytellers.
In point of fact, you are all just professional liars. I don’t hold it against you. Your stories are what keep me going most of the time. I love a good romance novel every once in a while, and if ever there was a pack of lies for general consumption…
But again I digress. Delusions are the little lies we tell ourselves to make it through the day: He really loves me; I look good in these jeans; It’s not the size that matters, but how you use it; and any number of other little lies you need to believe.
And to the guy looking smug over there in the front row, it can be too big. Any woman will tell you that she wants it to be just right, our definitions of that very widely however.
These are all delusions, but they help us through the day, so like I said, delusion can be healthy. My little delusions about houses being sentient are nothing more or less than this, unless they are actually true.
I sat down on a marble bench to the south side of the house, and looked around me as the light slowly changed. It was a truly beautiful spot, and would be even more so with a little love. How had this beauty been missed by everyone for so long?
There was definitely something to the ‘camouflage circuit’ or whatever was tied into the house and kept it out of people’s conscious minds. Or maybe it was simply the fact that no one currently lived in the house, and that was what made it invisible?
I didn’t know, and it was something that didn’t really matter at the moment. I went out to the sidewalk and walked down to the corner and then back to my car after again crossing the street.
I spent the rest of the day moving from one errant to the next as most people do. I was, at that time, unemployed. It’s not that I didn’t have job opportunities, but that I didn’t want the opportunities that I had. I didn’t just want to be another pill-slinger without concern for the fates of my patients.
I’d become a psychiatrist because I wanted the capability to prescribe them the proper medicines, should that be necessary. I felt then, and continue to feel now, that it is all part of the package. Some mental conditions are caused by a biological imbalance of one sort or another. Other individuals are plagued by a changing mental/emotional landscape instigated by themselves or others. A last group of them are the result of mental conditions hard wired in place.
Which is to say that: some things require medicine, some require therapy, and some simply require understanding and the ability to avoid triggers.
If it wasn’t apparent, I really like my job. I mean really like it. Before medical school, I thought that I wanted to be a surgeon, either that or a sociopath. I really enjoyed cutting things up. Unlike some of the other girls in my biology classes, I excelled at the dissections.
So, it went, and in medical school I was so excited to get into the cadavers. I still enjoy the idea of surgery, but losing my roommate to suicide was a wakeup call. The signs had been there, but I missed them, or just over-looked them. She was the top of our class before she removed herself from the running.
I was sort of anti-suicide from that point on. I don’t personally think it solve any problems for either the person or their loved ones. I know, I know, some of you out there don’t ascribe to an afterlife.
It doesn’t much bother me on way or the other, really, whether you agree with me on this one or not. I do believe in a life after death. Even if a person who commits suicide doesn’t go directly to hell, they will remain in a hell of their own creation.
Let me explain: Once you are dead, there are no repeats. You’re already dead. So, if you hated everything about this world so much that you removed yourself from it, only to wake up and realize that this world wasn’t the end, that there was another world waiting for you…well you should begin to get the picture.
The person you are when you die is the person you remain.
In my opinion, which isn’t back by any religion that I am aware of, hell is having to live with the consequences of your actions forever.
Let me explain: suppose you are an alcoholic. You died from a terminal bout with Sir Osis. So, you wake up on the other side and what is the first thing you do? Reach for another drink. Only without a body, you no longer get the benefits from it, even if you could drink it.
That is just an obvious one, but there are others, and not all of them physical. Anger can be just as addicting, but what happens when anger no longer gives you that rush of adrenaline?
Addictions aren’t the only things that could make another life hell. Imagine the guilt that would eat at you hour after hour, day after day. Imagine never being able, or needing, to sleep. Never being able to escape, even for a few hours, from yourself.
Now, imagine if that guilt was caused by killing yourself.
Like I say, suicide is never an answer.
So, I made it my mission in life to help people solve their problems, and that was why I was looking for a place when I saw the house.
See how everything ties in together?
It was later the next day when Steve finally had the decency to give me a call back.
“You know, if I hadn’t thought to write the address down originally for that Place, I’d probably have forgotten to even look for it.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The address for the Place. Unless I’m reading it off a piece of paper I can’t ever seem to remember it.”
“Ok…”
“Sorry, it’s just that apparently we’re the only two people in this city aware of it’s existence. And I’m only aware of it about half the time. I’ll be going along, stick my hand in my pocket, and realize I have a piece of paper in there.
“I think, ‘oh, that’s odd,’ and pull it out. It’s only after I read it, in my own handwriting, that I even remember that there is a Place in the city you are looking for.”
“So, then if no one owns it…”
“Not exactly the same thing as no one knowing it exists. No, I finally found a lot registry in a back room of the city office. All three of the buildings surrounding the lot are sure that they own it. They started contesting the land almost forty years ago when the first buildings on those lots went up.
“Thing is, that people just stopped filing paper work on the suit and it sort of went away.”
“Come on, Steve. Spit it out already. Who owns the land?”
“You do.”
“You bought it for me? That’s…”
“No, you already owned the land. Apparently, there was a deed written out to Tara Distaff in 1893 by the previous owner. The deed states that it would be yours until at least 2012 when you would be able to take possession in person.”
“You’re kidding.”
“I found out about it in the suit from 40 years ago. Apparently they stated that it was impossible for anyone to know whether a person would be able to take possession of a property a hundred and twenty years in the future.”
The two of us agreed to meet at the county assessor’s office the next day so that I could take possession of the house, or as Steve continued to insist on calling it, the Place.
“Hello, I’m Tara Distaff and I’m here…”
“Really? Another one? Well, just put your thumb print here and we’ll check it out.”
“My thumb print? Right or left?”
“Not sure. How ‘bout you give us both. No chance you’re going to match the print from over a hundred years ago anyway.”
The overweight woman behind the counter looked bored, and altogether dissatisfied with her job. “I’m sorry to bother you, then. I’ll give you my print and then be on my way.”
I pressed both of my thumbs into the pad, and then put the marks were she asked me to. She smiled halfheartedly to me and then walked into the other room, I assume to check it against a thumb print on a document.
Steve and I talked quietly while we waited.
“So, have you reconsidered?”
“Nope.”
“Why not?”
“You know why not.”
“Things change…”
“But not enough. I like you, Steve, but the last time we went out on a date the restaurant caught fire; someone stole your pants, while you were wearing them; and a meteor demolished your car. That’s about the point that you assume that the universe frowns on something.”
“It could have happened to anyone…”
“A meteor destroying your car could happen to anyone?”
“That too, but I mean having your pants stolen.”
“Try me again in another two years.”
I liked Steve well enough, but he could be as persistent as a dog with a bone. It made him a great salesman, but a less great potential mate.
A wide-eyed woman returned to the front desk.
“Is something the matter?”
“Nothing…just…nothing.”
“So, my prints didn’t match?”
“Just need you to wait here for a moment.”
We waited more than a moment. Every five minutes or so I would ask the woman what we were waiting for, and she would just ask me to be patient. Between Steve casting googly eyes as me, which are better than sheep eyes any day of the week, and the woman behind the counter staring at me, I felt like the center of attention.
In fact it almost felt like I might be the heroine of a web serial or something. It was disconcerting to say the least.
It was almost an hour before a man walked in with a big plastic case and came to a stop in front of me.
I say ‘a man’ when I mean The Man. Not as in the government or big business or something. No I meant in a ‘You Tarzan, Me Jane’ sort of way.
It was only after he repeated himself that I even realized he was talking. The movement of his lips was entirely too captivating.
“Can you hold out your hands for me?”
Blushing I complied. He cleaned off my thumbs with an alcohol swab, and proceeded to finger print me again, after checking the pads of my thumbs, for what I couldn’t tell you.
He then took the new prints to the counter, where he compared them to something on an old looking piece of paper.
“Yep, it’s legit. Either she is the proof that finger prints aren’t unique, or this is her print on the document.”
The two of them talked for a moment, and then I watched the most perfect man in existence walk out the door and did nothing to stop him.
On a side note, I signed a few pieces of papers and became the legal owner of the Place.
Now the only thing that concerned me was how to get clients to find the Place, since apparently it did its best to stay hidden.
Since that time I have started to write this story on three separate occasions, once getting up to 50 pages before disaster again struck. This story is cursed, and yet I truly want to tell it. I hope I don't destroy BCs servers by writing it here :). It isn't TG, but I like it. Hope you do too.
This isn't the story I originally wrote, but the characters are the same, and it will follow the same plot points. It isn't the same story because I realized a couple of years ago, that this is the third book in a trilogy. The first two books To sit upon the Throne and Heavy weighs the Crown come earlier chronologically, but have a much different meaning to me than this one does. I like these characters, and would like to see the tragedy from the beginning of the book resolved one of these days. We have a couple of chapters yet before that tragedy really strikes.
Those of your who have been reading my Gateway to Life story know that I am not daisies and sunshine all of the time. Heck, I'm not sure if any of my stories ever really achieve that. I do believe in happy endings, however, and this one will have one of those, the book and the story, eventually.
Since that time I have started to write this story on three separate occasions, once getting up to 50 pages before disaster again struck. This story is cursed, and yet I truly want to tell it. I hope I don't destroy BCs servers by writing it here :). It isn't TG, but I like it. Hope you do too.
This isn't the story I originally wrote, but the characters are the same, and it will follow the same plot points. It isn't the same story because I realized a couple of years ago, that this is the third book in a trilogy. The first two books To sit upon the Throne and Heavy weighs the Crown come earlier chronologically, but have a much different meaning to me than this one does. I like these characters, and would like to see the tragedy from the beginning of the book resolved one of these days. We have a couple of chapters yet before that tragedy really strikes.
Those of your who have been reading my Gateway to Life story know that I am not daisies and sunshine all of the time. Heck, I'm not sure if any of my stories ever really achieve that. I do believe in happy endings, however, and this one will have one of those, the book and the story, eventually.
It begins with light, and not a white or a yellow, but a deep purple as the beams of the sun attenuate through the bulk of the behemoth overshadowing the city. It is this light that first begins to heat the mountain. It is a slow process. The light has shifted into a rose before the first note rings out. Of course, that's the note that lets him know he's about to be late.
"Porton Air Control, again this is HIS Drake, PAV0002. We need clearance to enter ground command now."
"Drake, as I've stated numerous times already, all air traffic over Porton is restricted for the duration."
"Steven, give me the headset, please."
Upon receiving the headset, the youth began to speak, "PAC controller, Identify Michael Raoul Alcort, presumptive heir of the Crystalline Throne and Prince of the Empire."
A genderless voice responded, "PAC controller acknowledges."
"Ok, so who am I speaking with?"
"Sir, I had no idea. . ."
"I understand that today is a little out of the ordinary. Someone appears out of nowhere on your screens, says they are the personal transport of the prince, and ask for entry into restricted airspace. What is protocol in that situation?"
"To ping their transponder?"
"And did you do that?"
"No, the watch officer said no one should be allowed through."
"This nation was never built upon the blind obedience to command that other nations seem to love. Think for yourself, and you might one day be the watch officer."
"Thank you, Sire."
"I'm not the Emperor. I haven't even taken my Test yet. I make you no promises. It is by your merit alone that you will prove your worthiness to rule."
He handed the headset back to Steven and sat back in the chair next to his older sister.
"And that's why I will never be fit for rule. You handled that without getting angry, or bribing, or calling him to task. You asked him what he should have done, and now it seems he's done it." This last was said as the 'car pitched down to enter into the ground traffic for the final leg of their journey to the cathedral.
Time was truly short. The first note was being punctuated by pops and spurts of noise, as the grand performer cleared its throat for the main performance. Since he would have no time at the cathedral, Michael got into his robes while they continued to descend. The moment the car landed, he was out the door into the back of the cathedral.
"You're late, young man."
"Sorry, Roland, but it seems someone in PAC was a bit overzealous this morning ordering all over flights canceled."
It seemed as though Roland's face tightened for a moment, and then he beamed a smile at Michael. "Well, at least you're here now. That's all that matters."
Roland adjusted Michael's robes minutely and pronounced them good just as the Choir and Mountain began the Aria of Dawn. It was a Jazz piece, in the sense that it was never the same twice. The long sonorous notes of the mountain blended by the choir into a song of praise and rebirth. Years would be spent in practice before a singer was allowed to perform with the choir at a mass.
The best of those were allowed to perform on high holy days, and of those, only a select few would be allowed to perform for royal occasions.
The monarchy wasn't strictly hereditary. It wasn't legally hereditary at all, but tradition often spoke when selecting a new ruler.
Because of the connection the people placed between the monarchy and themselves, they produced their best whenever the monarchy appeared in pageant.
While it was out of style for the common person to have a full church coming of age, it was expected of the monarchy, and so Michael's was in full pageant.
"Is there before us a supplicant?" The tones of the priest pierced the music of the mountain and choir. They had until the first direct rays of sun struck the cupola at the pinnacle of the building.
"I bring one found worthy of the next step." Roland's voice, not as well trained as the priests, but still having strength behind it, picked up the next line.
"As one hoping to be recognized a man, he must speak for himself."
"I have fulfilled all the rites of a child, and yet am no longer a child. I stand having no fetters to man. I walk with my eyes to the horizon, and my back straight."
"What is your greatest fear?"
Each person passing through this rite were expected to tell the truth. Some truths were more acceptable than others.
"I fear that I will prove unworthy of my peoples respect. I fear that when the time comes to be tested, I will be found wanting. I fear failure."
"A fear often found in those who rule. If we let not our fears rule us, we may truly be considered adults in the eyes of god and man. Step forward, Michael Raoul Alcort. A man amongst men, and an adult in the land."
Timed to perfection, the light streamed in past the mirrors, first illuminating Michael and the priest, and then the historical scenes on the walls in order: The exile from Earth, The long journey in the dark, The discovery of Weyland, Landfall, The founding of the Empire, and the return to space.
Then of course, there was the reception. Michael met back up with his sister there.
"Reminiscent of my own coming of age, Michael."
"I think you look better than me in a dress."
"Those are robes and you know it." She punched him lightly in the arm. "I think you looked very handsome up there, and I know someone else who agrees."
"She broke up with me, Catherine. She said something about our political views being incompatible."
"His Hereditary Earl of Mooring and Callif, Horace Leland Marrin, and Her Hereditary Ladyship, Angela Marrin"
"My lord and lady, Mooring and Callif." Michael said in greeting.
"Your Highness."
"Catherine, I have to say this is one of the bigger wastes of time ever invented."
"The ceremony for the people, the reception for the hereditary nobility. Each group wants their five minutes with the heir."
"I know, but most of the hereditary nobility look down their noses at us. Our own claim only goes back five generations."
"You know that's only the current claim. Our family has given up more titles than most of these people dream of."
Michael chuckled as the next person was announced.
"Her Hereditary Ladyship, Duchess of Alois, Marguerite van Helten."
Michael loosened his tie as he collapsed into the couch. It had been a long day already, and it was only half done. The Palace covered the top of an artificial mountain, and was huge to say the least. He sometimes wondered if calling something the size of a city a Palace wasn't a little like calling a Earth a backwater.
Even if it was under poor management, Earth was still the center of human colonization of the stars. Well, one thing is for sure; calling the Palace 'the City' wouldn't have the same imperial ring to it.
He chuckled a little. A cold feminine voice spoke to him from the air. "What do you find humorous this time, Michael."
"I doubt you'd understand, Sarah. You've spent what, two hundred years on humor?"
"Two hundred thirty-seven to be exact. I could include the months, days, hours, minutes and seconds of you like."
"Why not include milliseconds too?"
"It stopped doing that long ago, when I realized that the human mind has an inability to truly perceive time units smaller than a second."
Michael shook his head and chuckled. "Really, Michael, I want to know the humor here."
"The absurd is often funny. Humans created time, but don't accurately measure it without external devices."
"I don't understand."
"That's why you fail." Michael chuckled again.
"Ah, a reference to a pop culture icon can be humorous as well."
Michael, shook his head a bit, "What are we going to do with you, Sarah?"
"Keep me slaving away in the core, I expect."
Michael blinked, and then looked quizzically at her nearest camera. "Was that a joke? I know that you understand rhetorical questions."
"Yes, it was my first attempt at a joke. I was playing on the common perception of computers being literal."
"Well, for your first attempt, you get an A for effort and delivery. Unfortunately it wasn't funny. You need to keep working at it."
"One does ones best, Master."
Michael snorted. The Emperor walked into the room. Something about the way he moved, purposefully and directly, alerted Michael to how serious he was.
"What's wrong, Father?" Always Father. Never Dad, or Daddy. Their relationship became more strained with every year.
"Another of your Uncles has been murdered. This one was better concealed as an accident, but the possibility of Commissioner Liam McMasters dying in a skiing accident. . ."
"Those things do happen, Father."
"True, but you and I both know the extent to which Liam took his safety seriously. I want you to go to our family lands for a few days, at least until the public coronation of you as my rightful heir."
"I assume you mean after I take the Test?"
"Of course."
Michael sat and considered for a moment. In the Crystalline Empire only the capable ruled. A test had been created, and perfected, to guarantee that. It was not a small test, either. Testing usually took five days for the full battery. There were simple written sections that covered knowledge of laws and procedures, but those were only the preliminaries. There were smaller versions of the test for more limited offices, but anyone wishing to be in the highest offices of the Empire had to pass the complete version.
Situational tests, in VR and not. From the moment you entered the testing center, until the moment you left. It was all part of the test. Stress applied in numerous forms. Sleep deprivation a given. At any time you could leave. You failed automatically, but you could always leave.
The test was pass or fail. It only mattered that you were fit to leadership, not how fit.
Michael came to a decision.
"Ok, I'll go and serve on our family lands after the test. Sarah, when am I scheduled to begin?"
"We have you scheduled to begin the day after tomorrow. They had an opening, and since you are now legally an adult, we got you in as soon as possible."
"Well, I'm going to relax, then, for the next two days, and then go kill myself with this test."
"Ok, so who do we have up next?"
"Michael Raoul Alcort."
"So, the prince is finally subjecting himself to our tender mercies, eh?"
"You know he only came of age a couple of days ago."
"Oh hush, you know I only kidding."
"Full battery, I assume?"
"Yep, full battery. And he's in luck today, because it is one of our busier days. Wanna pull a 'line jumper' on him?"
"Of course I do. I live for 'line jumpers'."
Michael sat in the waiting room. It was clean and overly white. The walls were white. The floor was white. The ceiling was while. The chairs were white. It was as if someone decided that there was only one color in the world, and wanted everyone to agree.
The number on his ticket said 15430. The number on the sign currently read 15429. "Next please."
He got up in anticipation of his number being called. A genderless voice came out of concealed speakers, "Now serving 15431."
Michael let a brief look of confusion pass across his features, but then sat down again. He had time. He'd brought along the financial documents for Quarter Acre so that he could be better prepared when he went out to the family lands next week. Reading them passed the time until they called his number almost two hours later.
"Well, of course he wouldn't fall for that."
"Yeah, but it's funny when they do."
"To business?"
"To business."
The previous scenario had been war torn France during WWII. This one was a sidewalk cafe. He sat there catching his breath.
"Monsieur," was all he understood before the waiter had rattled off something in French. The previous scenario had been in English.
"I'm truly sorry. I don't understand."
"Je'n Parle Pas Anglaise." He understood that. The menu was in French as well. He hadn't had anything to eat for at least a day, but had recently gotten himself some water. Reaching into his pockets, Michael took out some francs that he found there. I counted his money, and then pointed at something on the menu at random. It cost about half what he had.
"This, Please?"
The waiter looked at where he was pointing, and said, "Oui." and then left. He returned a few minutes later with a ghastly looking piece of meat in a fatty sauce. "Bon Apetit." The waiter said with a smirk.
With a shrug of the shoulders, Michael ate the food that was presented to him. It was probably the worst meal he had ever been served. He dabbed his lips afterward and walked out of the Cafe. He left all of his money behind him on the table.
"That was a bit unexpected. You think he was coached?"
"No. Too hard to cover the thousands of possible scenarios we have. Sides, this result coincides with scenario 248 and 119."
"But isn't 119. . ."
"Stuck in elevator with no AC and BO problem of fat man?"
"I thought it was. . ."
"Nah, it's this one."
"His facial expression showed disgust at the meal when he started eating it."
"He ate it. He realized that food is food, and he didn't have the necessary skills to get something else. No other patrons or workers in site, and the waiter didn't understand him."
"Sometimes I wonder about what some of these tests prove in relation to leadership."
"That's why all lead controllers have to have PhDs in Adaptive Psychology."
"Yeah, get a degree so you can sit here in a dark room with me all day. What does your fancy degree say about this one?"
"People tend to look down on people serving them. See them as less than human. Each of us has worries and concerns in the world around us. The waiter was taking out personal hardships on someone he felt he could get away with it on. He couldn't complain, and so on.
"In not rising to the bait, and taking what he was given, without complaint, Michael diminished the man in his own eyes, at the same time he met a personal need. The tip was simply icing on the cake."
"But what if the waiter sees it as reason to take advantage of Michael in the future?"
"Leadership is treating people as people regardless of their motives or behaviors. It is correcting mistakes as well, when possible. The language barrier prevented correction in any meaningful way."
"You explain and I still feel like it does nothing in the long run. Sometimes I feel this job is useless."
"Well, it kept Roland out of power, didn't it?"
"There are still horror stories in training about his test."
"I was a junior controller then. It was worse than they say. Three controllers quit over it. Refused to continue if he wasn't forced out before the end."
Tired and dirty, Michael walked out into the sunshine on the fifth day. He would be told next week whether or not he passed. He was simply happy that now it was over.
"Michael, you know how dangerous a situation like this is. . ."
"Relax, Steven. These are my people. I am their Lord. If they want to kill me, then I've already failed at the true test of leadership, and I deserve to die." there was a smile on his face, but he said it in a deadly serious tone.
He stepped out of the 'car and walked into the people. "Michael, you kept me waiting long enough, didn't you." Michael almost cringed when he heard that strident voice. Amanda LaBrune was considered by many to be a gold digger. She'd outlived both her first husband and his fortune. She was a couple of decades older than Michael, and at one point had set her sites on him. He was twelve at the time. However, she wasn't as bad as she seemed, and mostly just wanted to live in comfort. If anything she could be said to be almost sexless in her own mind.
"You know we don't work well together, Amanda."
"Mandy, are you teasing Michael again?"
"Just a little, Honey."
Michael looked at the man who'd spoken with surprise. "Wait. . .Henry? You and Amanda?"
"It turns out that she isn't afraid of a little hard work. She just never found the right man to inspire her."
"And Henry is an excellent cook."
"So, what did I make you wait for?"
"My wedding of course. I could never concieve of a world where I wouldn't have the lord of the manor marry me off to his Steward."
"Well, in that case, we have a wedding to organize."
Unfortunately, you need leadership to run prety much anything as complex as the lands granted to these individuals.
Anyone who wants to take personal control of their own lands must take the Test. Usually, they just hire a Steward to run them, while they reap the benefits. The Alcort lands had been personally run for more than twenty generations before the asent of Michael's father to the throne. Henry Thomas had served in the navy with George Alcort during the debacle that had almost cost every member of their crew their lives, and had been instrumental in helping to restore order in the aftermath.
When it came time to appoint a Steward over his lands, there was only one choice.
This was THEIR Steward getting married, and they wanted to show him the appreciation he deserved for his past thirty years of service. Many a mother despaired that their daughter was no longer in the running, but they took it in stride. They were a community. They were a family. They were Cork and this was the home of the Emperor.
What could have taken weeks with a few paid laborers was completed in a couple of days. It almost seemed that from moment to moment the pavilion changed from a public space into a wonderland of lace and flowers, garlands and roses. A bower was constructed for the actual ceremony, and chairs were collected, painted in some instances, and arranged in rows.
Everyone was everywhere at once.
Michael was in their midst. He pitched in to lift poles, and put in stakes. He carried beams and hammered them in place.
Laughter and banter made the work easy.
"So, Michael, did you pass?" Asked by many friends, in many ways.
"I completed it, but I don't know if I passed yet."
"Of course you passed. You're an Alcort after all."
"Just because we've run our own lands for generations, doesn't mean I will pass."
"Blood tells, Michael, and your father and sister both passed. You'll do us proud on the throne one day."
Variations on this passed many lips, the responses were mostly the same.
Michael worried. He knew that Roland had come from a long line of leaders as well. He'd failed not only the Test, but in a true test of leadership. He'd failed every man and woman aboard that ship. He'd led them into an ambush, and in the aftermath couldn't even pull himself out of his room. It had surprised his father and himself when Roland had offered to stand with Michael at the ceremony.
"If he's willing to mend bridges with the throne, I'm willing to let him."
"You know he always has an ulterior motive, Father."
"We are expected to be better than that, Michael. We need to give people the opportunity to change. Punishment is still given where deserved, but a repentant soul is allowed to come back."
'Can we really change, Father?' Michael thought as he worked. 'And if we can change, what does that say about a Test we only take once in our lives."
Michael smiled at the girls. Most of them were there to flirt, but they still helped out. Jennifer Leslie was still chasing him with an energy that scared him sometimes, and she cornered him in an off moment.
"Michael!"
"Jennifer."
"Is that any way to greet your intended."
"Jennifer. . ."
"Look, I know it's a joke. You need to lighten up, Your Highness."
Michael snorted at this. "There ya go!"
"You know we'll never work out together."
"Never say never, Michael. You don't know what the future brings."
"I see a wedding in my future, Jennifer."
"Really?!" she brightened at this. He almost felt bad about his next words, "Yeah, I'm marrying. . .my Steward to his intended."
"You are so cruel." Her words may have berated him, but she laughed at them. He joined in the laughter, trying to show there were no hard feelings. "Well, keep me in mind, Michael. You may think me to be a flighty girl, but there is substance to me as well. Take me on a date sometime and we can figure out each other for a couple of hours."
This was definitely not her usual track of light banter. It seemed that he might have underestimated her resolve. She would be a formidable oponent at a diplomatic table, and she just wanted to date him. The thought almost made him shudder. If he wasn't careful, one of these days he'd wind up married to her without ever realizing it.
He talked to friends and distant relations. He work as hard as anyone else there, and as he had no other responsibilities, he worked longer than most. In the end, everything was arranged to perfection.
"Look, Steven, I can't have my body guard standing up there while I'm officiating over a wedding."
"My lord, if I might propose a solution?"
"Henry, how many times have I told you that I'm only Michael to you?"
"Some things are simply not done, My lord. I can't have you as my best man, and officiate, at the same time. I would be honnored if Steven stood with me on this day."
An army of gardeners came through just after dark when it wouldn't interrupt his view or his parties. Roland was well pleased with his grounds. The men in his study pleased him less.
"Let me see if I properly understood you. You. . .individuals. . .came here to tell me that your cost has gone up. That you are going to expose me as an usurper unless I pay this amount. Is that about the size of it? Now, which of you two thought this idea up?"
They twirled their wine glasses, and one negligently raised a hand. "That would be me. Such an masterful stroke as well, don't you think?"
He walked over to the other man and jabbed a self injecting hypodermic needle into his arm. He looked down at the man, knowing full well that he had been the one who really came up with the idea. "Allowing your associate to take credit just saved your life."
The other man began to choke, and then to convulse. He twitched for a couple of minutes while they watched. "Dreadful thing, nerve poisons. Unless the antidote is administered shortly before or after exposure, you're dead. Now, do we understand each other?" Roland looked down at the man whose life he'd just spared.
The man was pale and trembling a bit, but he nodded.
"And you call yourself a pirate. The scourge of space. Make sure that both of those jets are ready and armed and ready to follow orders. Do you understand?"
"Yes, Roland."
"I think I require a bit more of you this time. How about Imperator. I like that. Say Yes, Imperator."
"Yes, Imperator."
"Good, now get out of my sight."
"And he still doesn't suspect you?"
"For Roland, anyone who is a servant might as well not exist unless he needs something. He doesn't even realize I have a microphone and recorder on me at all times."
"Good. So, how go the manipulations?"
"He is going forward with the coup attempt. He will have two separate bombings, one at Cork and one in the Capitol Building. He had to make a last minute change of plans, because Michael was sent to their lands for safety for a little while."
"And the other part?"
"Our Consul will be ready to make a request for intervention from Earth as soon as the event occurs."
"Keep me informed."
"Yes, Mr. President."
"In other news, the Emperor will be meeting with top ranking government officials later today to discuss the tragedy as yet another of the highest officials dies under mysterious circumstances."
The TV turned off. "Hey, I was watching that."
"Well, Michael, you should have been getting ready."
"Catherine?!"
"Heya, bro. How goes?"
"Don't you have some test or other to study for?"
"Not any more. I graduated yesterday. I am a fully accredited engineer now."
"That's great. I knew you had it in you."
"Now, if only I could convince Ships of that." The Imperial Navy had a number of semi-civilian divisions. Of those, the Division of Ship Design and Construction was probably the largest. It was also the hardest to get into for someone without any experience. "Michael. . .would you?"
"Nope. If you can't get there on your own merits, you don't deserve to be there."
"Stinker."
"I know, but you know why. "
"Doesn't mean I have to like it. Sometimes I wonder if I am not being allowed in to avoid the appearance of favoritism."
"Actually, I happen to know that they submitted you under a pseudonym for all public documents. All of the paper pushers who get your file don't even know who you are."
"So, are you going to finish getting ready?"
"I hate these formal clothes. Why can't I just wear a suit?"
"Because you are acting as the Lord of Cork, and that requires court dress."
"Then you do up my buttons."
Court dress was a mess of buttons and frills . Two rows of buttons, actually, one on each side of the chest, with a solid front piece in between. It was a solid black, with gold braid on the shoulders and sleeves. Sometimes he thought it looked like someone's idea of a perfect military uniform, except it had absolutely no practical use. It took help to get into or out of, which was something most of the nobles probably felt entitled to.
He was finally ensconced, and his cravat fluffed. He offered his arm to his sister, also in full court dress. She opted for the more practical pants and jacket. Women at least got a choice, although Michael never considered those full skirts and corsets useful for anything but blocking doorways, and causing their occupants to swoon.
Apparently his sister agreed with him.
They walked out to the head of the platform. Henry was already in place. Steven, as usual, had his gun strapped to his leg, and the lock strap open. He scanned the crowd for threats even here.
Catherine took a step back. Michael had prepared and memorized his words, so I wouldn't need a book to recite them. Not that it mattered, since on his own lands, having passed the Test, his words were law.
The organ started a wedding march, and the bride walked up to stand beside her husband to be.
"Friends and Family. Neighbors all. We gather here before god to witness the joining of two souls. Many in the past have intoned the virtues, and the pitfalls, of marriage, but I will do neither. I know that I lack experience in this world, but that is not the reason I fail to do so. These two individuals know more on this subject than I do.
"Henry has been married to his job for longer than I've been alive, and Amanda has just been married."
There was a light chuckle from the audience, and a whispered, "I'll get you for that," from the bride.
"Marriage is a celebration. It is a joining of the fates of two individuals. Some say this bond lasts until death. For some it is eternity.
"I say that a true marriage has no beginning, only a recognition. When the hearts of two people truly become one, no piece of paper or ceremony, however fancy, means anything to them. All we are performing here is a wedding. Their marriage began the moment that they promised themselves to each other heart and soul.
"This wedding is a recognition of that event. It is a statement that we shall henceforth recognize these two people as a single unit.
"The man is not greater in this union. The woman is not greater. They are equals, and equally shall they benefit from a true union, should this be."
"I prefer simple answers to simple questions. So, instead of the more 'traditional' I do, I would prefer a yes from each of you in response."
Someone from the audience yelled out, "What if the answer is 'no'?" There was a general chuckle at this.
"Then they answer no."
Michael turned to Amanda. "I will start with you, since I already know what Henry's answer will be. Do you accept this man into your heart? Are you willing to live with his faults and virtues? Overlook his mistakes, and forgive his trespasses? Love him, help him, and, as is so likely in your case, outlive him should the time come?"
"Yes." There was laugher in her voice, and tears in her eyes.
"Henry, my old friend. Will you put her before all others, even your job? Accept what she offers to you and take nothing more? Forgive her for your mistakes, and accept fault where none was intended or often given? Will you extol her virtues, and turn a blind eye to her non-existent faults? Love her, help her, Cherish her?"
"Yes."
"Are there any here who wish to stop the proceedings now before it becomes too late?"
There was a huge chorus of no's with one, "It's already too late," to general laughter.
"Since the audience has it in for the two of you, I pronounce you wed, man and wife. As no cause was given, let each here recognize this union, and support it."
They kissed when he finished his words.
"Hey, I didn't give you permission for that."
"We don't need your permission, young buck, only your authority."
More laughter followed this.
"We have a party to get to!"
Everyone moved over to the pavilion.
"You're over reacting. We have only lost a few leaders, and they could really be accidents."
"Over the past seven hundred years we have never lost more than one or two people in leadership, barring a natural disaster, every year. We have lost eight in the past four months. That is so far outside of normal occurrence to defy simple probability."
"It could still. . ."
Just because people had the ability to lead, it did not mean they checked their egos at the door. The Emperor held the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. This was going to be a very long day.
He began to hear the sound of a jet, and looked up. There were no over flights allowed here.
He got out of his chair, and rushed toward the door. "Everyone into the shelter, now!!" He had no idea why they hadn't been alerted to this long before they could hear the jet, and he feared he would never find out. He simply hoped that Michael was alright.
I ducked around the corner one step ahead of the heavy footfalls that chased after me. I didn’t think they saw where I went and I tried to calm my breathing as I slipped into the nondescript storefront to wait for them to run past. The anachronistic bell over the door rang as I opened and then closed the door behind me.
The door itself didn’t have a window, but there was a big picture window to the left. I put my hand over my heart and just felt it pound as I waited. I was sure that the people following me would guess where I went and come bursting through the door at any moment.
As the wait became longer and longer, I felt my heart begin to slow, and I worried less what was on the other side of the window as what was on my side of it. It was only at this moment that the smell of leather hit me.
One of the few things I loved about my years of forced enslavement to the boy scouts of america was the leather work. I’d gotten voted into the Order of the Arrow because my troop wanted to get rid of me. You see, even though I would still be part of our same region, I’d no longer be a part of our troop. I would become a part of the OA lodge and I would be meeting with them instead of my normal weekly meetings.
I joined the Order of the Arrow because of the leather work.
The Order of the Arrow is heavily steeped in pseudo indian ideals. That isn’t to say that everything we did was fake. My first OA only camp, they had a dance competition. These were traditional indian dances. Yeah, I know, you’re thinking of a bunch of white boys in scout uniforms with face paint on.
Before they began the hoop dance they inspected the costumes. The best of those was maid out of a soft deer hide that the scout himself had brain tanned before he sewed, shaped, and then applied beadwork to.
He later told me that he’d spent close to a thousand hours working on his costume in between practicing the dancing. Considering he could dance with up to 24 hoops, he spent a lot of time working on that as well.
If you hadn’t noticed, he was the first boy I had a crush on.
I’ll admit now that my leatherworking was a little girly. No, not that leatherworking is girly, but I did bright colors and flowers and such. For three years I did that until I turned eighteen a couple of weeks ago. You can’t really be a part of OA, or even Boy Scouts when you’re supposed to be a man.
I took a deep breath of the leather smell and just smiled. I saw the guys from Beta-Kappa-Tau run in front of the window and finally relaxed. While most greeks seemed to be pretty cool, the Tau’s, as everyone at school seemed to call them, were a throwback to an age that never was.
Allain, the guy I’d had a crush on was pledging with the Tau’s. I’d known that there was never really a chance for us, since I was a boy and he was a boy, but that didn’t change anything. I still liked him, and unfortunately one of his Tau brothers found out about it. They decided that a good proof of how ‘viable’ as a pledge he was would be for him to beat me half to death.
I was really beginning to rethink my ‘bright’ idea of following of following him to the school of his choice.
Well, not that it mattered now. For now I was safe. I began to look around the show floor. There seemed to be boots of every possible style from heavy steel toed work boots to ladies thigh high calfskin dress boots.
My hand went almost of its own volition to an absolutely beautiful pair of black boots. Before I could touch them, a man entered from the back of the store and started upon seeing me.
“You’re not supposed to be here. I didn’t expect to see you until…” his voice trailed off as he looked at the calendar on the wall. “...that’s neither here nor there. You’re here now. If you’d come...how can I help you Jody?”
I grimaced. That was part of the problem I’d always had. My parents liked the name, and theoretically it was a good boy’s name, in practice I went by Jay.
“I’m just hiding from the Tau’s,” I said. I didn’t know why, but this guy reminded me of my grandfather and made me feel safe. They looked nothing alike, but my grandfather had been the one who protected me from my father’s good intentions.
“Well, we can’t have that, now can we?” He hooked his arm in mine and began to escort me around the room. “So, Jody,” he said and patted the back of my hand, “what do you want? You’re here early so this time your purchase is up to you.”
Every time we came around the room, those black boots called out to me. They were exquisite. The tool work all over them was in abstract geometric shapes that formed into pictures as the light hit it from different angles.
“I want to be taller,” I said absently as I watched the boots as we walked.
“How much taller,” the old man asked.
“I want to be at least five ten. I hate being so short.”
“Four inches? That’s a lot,” the man says thoughtfully.
“I know, but it’s the only thing I want right now,” I said with a sad smile.
“Well, this is a challenge and I haven’t had one of those since...well since before you were born. Wait here. I’ll look in the back room for a moment.”
I took the opportunity to run my hands over the boots that kept calling me. Unlike a lot of the work I’d done, these marks seemed to be a perfect part of the leather. There was none of the roughness that I associated with tool work this deep and this intricate. I wondered if he’d polished it smooth after he marked it.
I was still absently running my hands over the leather.
“Those are for a very special customer. Special order. She’s been looking for a pair just like it all her life.”
Hearing this made me sad. I knew that they were likely girl’s boots, but I could dream. He handed me a large, heavy, box. The first thing I noticed is that this wasn’t a cardboard box. It was a light wood, likely pine, and had a couple of light hinges on it.
I set the box down on the counter and opened the latch and then opened the box. Inside, cradled in black velvet were a pair of boots. There was a two inch sole under the toes of the boot and the heel was about four inches tall. All told, it would be like a pair of two inch heels on a platform.
They looked so small until I realized that it was just the angle of the shoe. Not that it was really that severe, just more severe than any other shoe I’d ever used.
I slipped out of my tennis shoes and into the boots. They fit better than any shoes or boots I had ever tried on. They felt as though they had been made just for me. I rolled the cuff of my too large jeans down. The hem brushed the floor leaving only the square toe of the boot showing and hiding the large square heel.
“Why the pants?”
“I always liked the way that they looked rolled up. Mom was always sure that I was going to spring up four inches overnight, so she bought me pants with a longer inseam. I never did, though, get taller I mean. I just got used to buying jeans with a longer leg.”
“Well, I’d say you just grew four inches overnight now.”
We smiled at each other.
“How much do I owe you for these?” It was strange. For some reason I felt so much more confident about myself. I was still only up to the chin of this man, but at least I was looking at his chin and not his sternum.
“We’ll settle up next time. Think of these as a trial pair.”
“Thank you, Mr…”
‘Harrelson. Henry Harrelson.”
“Thank you Mr. Harrelson,” I said and took his hand lightly. He smiled at me and I just felt a glow erupt in me. I liked the way he looked at me. Not that I was crushing on this old guy, but I liked how he saw me as a person and not this short guy that everyone literally looked down on.
I ducked my head and turned to leave. I was halfway to the door when a thought struck me. “How do you know I’ll be back?”
“We’re not done, you and I. I still have another pair of boots for you when you’re ready.”
I just laughed at that and waved as I went through the door. He was a strange old man, but he was a good one.
I walked confidently through the door and fluffed out my shoulder length hair as I did. Sure, I might run into the Tau’s again, but that would be later. For now, I had a new pair of boots and a bounce in my step.
I was walking into my dorm, not really paying attention to anything around me. Sure, I was only four inches taller, but I had a different perspective on the world. I made a step toward the stairs and someone grabbed my arm. “Miss?”
I turned to look at the RA, “What’s up, Felix?”
“Oh, Jody, sorry, I totally thought...never mind,” Felix was blushing and looking anywhere but at me.
“What is it,” I said, putting a hand on his arm.
“You kinda look like a girl. I never noticed it before, but I was totally checking out your butt.”
It was my turn to blush, “Let’s just not mention this to anyone else,” I said and turned to leave. Felix nodded emphatically and went back to his seat near his room.
I shook my head and smiled. I climbed the stairs up to the fourth floor, where freshman were living this year, and headed down to my room. I heard some wolf whistles behind me and turned to look. Every time I did I caught sight of one of my fellow students going white and slinking back into his room.
What was with them...the boots that was the only thing that was different. For some reason people saw me as a girl when I wore them. The heel was only two inches...but was that enough. Did it change my posture that much?
Sadly I slipped off my new boots and put them in the closet. I only realized then that I’d left my shoes at the boot shop. These were the only pair of footwear I currently owned. I lay back on my bed and screamed at the ceiling in frustration.
My door burst open and a girl maybe a year or two older than me rushed in, “Are you okay?”
“I left my shoes at the store and walked out in these,” I said gesturing toward my boots.
A boy about my own age slipped into the room, “They’re cute,” he said with a shy smile.
“I was hoping for bad ass, actually. Mostly I got them because I hate being so short.”
“Those skyscrapers have to be at least four inches tall,” the girl exclaimed, “how short are you.”
“Five-six.” I said sullenly.
“That’s not all that short. I’m Amy by the way.”
“Jody,” I said in response, offering my hand. She took it lightly and we barely shook them.
“Tim,” said the boy. He held onto my hand longer than was strictly necessary.
“Tim,” the girl said, “she’s probably here visiting her boyfriend. Excuse my brother, he’s a walking hormone.”
“I don’t have a boyfriend...I mean I’m not here...this is my room.”
“Your…” they both look at me like I’m some sort of freak. Shock suffused their features and I could almost watch as everything finally connected for them.
“You’re a boy,” Amy said at the same time that Tim said, “there’s no way you’re a boy.”
The looked at each other and laughed weakly.
“Yes, I’m a boy.”
“But those boots,” Amy said.
“What about the boots?” I said, growing confused.
“Those are girl’s boots,” she said.
I had a sinking feeling and the blood drained from my face. Then I flushed bright red as I realized what they were saying. If it walks like a duck...and I’m sure that I was quacking loud and clear while I wore those boots.
“I have no shoes,” I said in despair.
“What size do you wear?” Tim said. He reached out a hand a couple of times, as if he were trying to comfort me, or something. The strangest thing was that I wouldn’t have minded it about now.
“Eight.”
“Women’s?” Amy said looking at my feet.
“No, men’s. I know, I have tiny feet.”
Amy grabbed the boot and turned it over. “This says it’s a size nine.”
“Well, it fits me perfectly.”
“Must mean that you wear a women’s size nine. That’s about average, I think. At least I wear a nine and I’m only about an inch taller than you.”
“Great, so all I needed to do to find a variety of adult shoes in my size was to buy women’s shoes? Awesome,” I said sarcastically.
“No offense, but aren’t you already buying women’s jeans?” Tim said. He was blushing, and I realized that he’d been checking me out. That same glow from earlier at Mr. Harrelson’s shop erupted in me. He’d been looking at me...and by his blush he’d liked what he’d seen.
I looked down at my toes just peaking out from under my pooled jeans and I had to admit, I didn’t really look like a guy. It’s seen so many barefoot girls in highschool who looked exactly the same when they took off their shoes because the skyscraper...oh.
I sat down on my bed with my toes pointed so they would reach the floor and put my elbows on my knees so I could hide my face in my hands. Somehow, intentionally or unintentionally, and I was beginning to believe that there was a lot of things I did subconsciously that was not entirely masculine, I had purchased a pair of skyscraper boots and loved the feeling of wearing them.
Tim began to fidget and then rushed out of the room saying something about needing to leave. I watched him leave. He had a nice butt I thought and smiled to myself.
“Did you just check my brother out?”
“What? No, I didn’t,” I began to blush again and tried to hide my face in my hands.
“There’s nothing to be ashamed of, Jody. He has a cute butt.”
“But I’m a guy…” I began.
“You may be male, all evidence to the contrary, but you were never a guy.”
“I was in boy scouts. I joined the Order of the Arrow.”
“The huh what?”
“It’s a boy’s leadership organization in the boy scouts. See, I did this.”
I pulled out my book bag to show her the beadwork on it. the strap was in a dark leather with a daisy design tooled into the leather. The bag itself had thousands of beads stitched onto it. It was one of my more abstract pieces, but I could see the images I put there.
I looked up after examining it for a while with a little smile on my face. Amy was trying not to laugh. “That is a beautiful...purse.”
“What, no it’s not...” I looked at it critically for a moment or two and realized she was right. This bag I’d been carrying with me everywhere for a year and a half was a purse. I might carry a dollar or two with me, and my ID of course, when I left it behind, but all of my essentials were in my bag...I had a purse.
“How long have you been transgendered?”
“I’m not transgendered,” I tried to say but the words just wouldn’t come out of my mouth. I opened my mouth to speak and say something else in denial. Sure, I knew the term, who really didn’t. Some might still have preconceptions about what it means, but the media is doing it’s best so that people are at least familiar with what it means. The problem was that in my own mind it had never applied to me.
“I just thought I was gay,” I said in a quiet little voice.
“And there’s a problem with that?” Amy said with mock severity.
“No, I was just...turned off by…”
She looked at me curiously.
“I know I’m attracted to guys, but the idea of what...of a guy sticking his...ewe.”
“Join the club.”
“Huh?”
“A lot of girls I know don’t like the thought of someone invading the back yard. Not all, mind you, and with the right guy I’ve heard that even just lying there next to him fully clothed can be magical, but some, me included can’t stand the thought of it.”
“But I’m not…”
Amy sighed and rolled her eyes. “Jody, you are a girl,” she said with emphasis on each word, “The sooner you come to grips with it, the better everyone is going to be. Get your boots on.”
In a daze I slipped on my boots. I had a half smile on the whole time because I had never had a pair of footwear ever fit me like these boots did. When I was done and had pulled my pants into place she handed me my purse and walked to my door.
“Where are we going?” I said, my heart pounding in my chest.
“Out on the campus.”
“But the Tau’s…” I began.
“What about the Tau’s?”
“They are sort of trying to beat me up.”
“Why those bigoted...it’s time I set them straight...again.”
Amy was a force of nature. She walked out of that room and expected me to follow her. I did. We walked quickly across the campus, but not quick enough that I didn’t have time to examine how I walked.
Before, I’d been so engrossed with how different my perspective was that I’d missed how the boots changed me. There was a sway to my walk, a shifting of the hips, that came naturally while wearing those boots.
I became aware of the fact that my jeans were tight. No, not in a way of me becoming aroused or anything. I just wore my jeans a little tight. I was never one to go in for baggy pants, and my jeans were like a constant hug.
It suddenly dawned on me what Tim and Felix must have been looking at and my knees gave out on me and I stumbled.
“Are you okay,” Amy asked me, looking concerned.
“I just realized that my jeans are too tight.”
“They’re…”
“Guys can check out my ass,” I said in a whisper.
Amy just laughed and offered me a hand to help me up. “It’s better than them talking to your chest. At least when they check out your behind it’s behind your back and you can be ‘blissfully ignorant’.”
I laughed when she used the air quotes. When I thought back to the times I’d realized that Tim was checking me out, I’d liked it. I wanted to be taller so people could look me in the eye. I could see how them talking down to a chest I didn’t even have yet could…
I realized that I’d thought yet when I thought about having something more than the flat expanse nature had blessed me with.
Amy leaned over to me and whispered, “that guy with the cute butt is totally checking you out.”
I turned my head and caught the guy in question smiling in my direction and I just laughed and hid my face in my hair. “Wow, girl, you are a natural long distance flirt.” Amy got out before another voice interjected itself into my domain of hair and darkness.
“Hi, I’m Jason.”
“Hello, Jason,” Amy said, “I’m Amy and the faux-shy one here is Jody.”
“Jody...pretty name for a pretty girl.”
That was enough to bring me out of my sanctuary. “Does that line ever work?” I said looking directly at him.
“You’ll have to let me know. That’s the first time I ever used it.”
My breathing caught in my chest when he smiled.
“We have to go, Jason.” Amy said taking my arm and propelling me into motion.
“Nice meeting you,” he said as we walked away.
“But...smile,” I said marginally intelligibly trying half heartedly to go back to Jason.
“Girl, you can’t handle the smile.”
I giggled at that, and Amy joined in with me.
“Jody, seriously, you need to be careful.”
“Why…” it suddenly dawned on me that I’d been acting normal. No, that’s not exactly right. I’d been acting like a normal girl. Naturally, without artifice, I had slipped into the role that felt natural to me.
“Because, Jody, you're not everything you seem yet.”
I thought about her words the rest of the way across campus. It’s not as if we walked in silence. We talked about the guys and girls we were passing bye, and I flirted a little with some of them, the guys I mean, but I toned it down, intentionally, so that none of them came over like Jason did.
The fear began to creep up on me again as we neared greek row. Their house had Betta-Kappa-Tau in greek letters above the porch. Amy marched right up the steps and into the front room, grabbing me by the arm when I hesitated at the doorway and dragging me along.
“George, get your ass down here now!” Amy yelled as soon as we got into their living room.
“Amy!” he said happily until he caught sight of the look on her face. “Aims...whatever it is we didn’t do it.”
“Sorry, but this time you did. Sure, you like to come off as the big tough frat on campus, but Jody here is terrified of you guys.”
“Jody?” Allain said from the doorway just having come in with a group of pledges.
“You’re Jody,” George said, “Crap, um, sorry man, I didn’t mean...um, what did I say now, Aims.”
“Jody is a girl.”
“I thought you said,” George began.
“I’ve seen you naked,” Allain began. “Jody is male, I’m sure of it.”
“And she’s a girl,” Amy said forcefully looking pointedly at George.
“Oh,” George said, “Allain, the requirement is off the table. Sorry for scaring you, Jody. We just wanted to have Allain kiss you. We thought it would be hilarious, but now that we know...sorry, we didn’t mean to scare you.”
I looked at George in shock and then over at Allain and he nodded a little.
“Oh, is that all,” I said with a little smile. I sauntered over to Allain and looked up into his blue eyes. I whispered at him, “You better make it good, I’ve never been kissed before,” I said with a little smile.
He took me in his arms and the world went away. Good, bad, indifferent, I have no idea what that kiss was, all I know is that it was wonderful and it seemed to last forever.
When he finally let me go I stumbled a bit before I regained my composure. Everyone of those guys was staring at me with a slightly glazed look in his eyes. I finger waved at Allain and followed Amy out the door.
The cheering didn’t start until we got out of sight. I could hear them congratulating Allain about something, but before I could really figure out what it was Amy linked her arm with mine and said, “those boots should be registered as a deadly weapon.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Hon, you completely killed every guy in that room. I know the ‘guy’ I met in the room this evening would never have done that. Somehow those boots give you a confidence in your femininity without any conscious thought on your part.”
“I still don’t get…”
“You laid claim to that boy in there.”
“He kissed me.”
“Oh, is that how you see it. From where I stood it looked like a lot of cooperative tonsil hockey was going on.”
I blushed at that but I got a goofy grin on my face all the same.
“I know how powerful it can be letting the world know who you are for the first time. There are a lot of traps, though, so let me help you. Girls like us need to stick together.”
“Girls like…” I looked at her questioningly and she just smiled’
“Jody, how nice to see you again.”
“Hello, Mr. Harrelson.”
“So, done being taller?”
“Oh no, but I need a new pair of boots. for some reason these only lasted me for a couple of years.”
“Constant wear will do that. I have just the pair of boots in the back.”
I smiled at him as he walked through the door into the store room. He came back with a cardboard box and set it on the counter for me. I opened it and gasped. Inside were the same pair of boots that I’d loved when I’d first been in the shop a couple of years ago.
“But you said…”
“That these were a special order for a special girl? Indeed they are. They’re yours, Jody.”
I quickly slipped out of my old worn boots and slipped into those perfect boots. I hadn’t noticed before how the patterns on the boots matched the patterns on my purse in all but color.
“That will be thirty dollars, dear.”
“Thirty each?”
“No, I could never charge you for those old worn out boots. Just for the new ones.” I paid him and thanked him and walked out the door.
I linked arms with my boyfriend and he gave me a peck on the cheek. “So, what was this all about,” he asked me.
“Oh, just getting another pair of perfect boots,” I lifted my skirt up to my knees and stuck out my foot. “You like?”
“You know I love looking at your legs,” he said with a smile.
“Tim!” I heard a voice call from behind us and turned to see Amy rushing up, “Jody? Wow, you look spectacular.”
I laughed at that. She’d been there to help pick out the outfit after all. I knew from her that Tim had been ring shopping recently. We wanted me to look perfect today because he had a lot of things planned he wouldn’t tell me about and Amy and I thought...well, here’s hoping.
She looked at me and then glanced at my left hand. I gave a slight shake of the head and she frowned.
“Hey, Aims, they called our number,” George said from in front of a restaurant.
“Let’s walk you over. I have reservations so we can all go in at the same time.”
We parted inside and the waiter lead us to our table. I felt perfectly feminine sitting there, chatting with Tim. The boots only perfected it. My previous boots, the first pair of Harrelson’s that I’d worn had been in between. Sure, they let everyone, including me, see that I was a girl, but their style was so...neutral. Over the past two years there had been so many times that I switched into other, more feminine shoes. Things that just went when this or that outfit better. For daily wear, I always went back to the Harrelson’s of course, but there were those occasions. These boots, though…
I felt like I was dressed up just wearing these boots. I might not get the same amount of wear out of these as I did with the other Harrelson’s...well then again, I did love to dress up, and these new boots gave me the excuse.
The food was as good as the company, even with the small portion I allowed myself. I’d take the rest home and snack on it for a couple of days to remember this night all the better. Smell is great for memory, and taste is linked to smell...you know what I mean.
Tim dropped something on the floor, and I looked over at him in alarm and he got out of his chair to retrieve it. Before I could even react he’d opened up a small velvet box. I didn’t hear what he said, and it went on a while. The ring mesmerized me.
I looked into his face and saw the expectant look that lived there. I just nodded and he took me in his arms and kissed me.
Dear Mr. Jacob Peters,
The admissions committee has reviewed your application to MIT…
No, that's not the actual text that was in the letter, nor do I remember it. I think mom framed it and put it on the wall. Me, my stomach fell through the floor. I'd applied almost on a whim, and completely without any inkling that they would allow me in.
Not that I had poor grades, or because of lack of extracurricular activities. No, I had those in spades.
The real reason is that all of the people who I was up against for the limited slots for undergraduates had transcripts the equal of my own.
I didn't have the heart to tell mom that my pitiful college fund would not be enough to even really begin paying for MIT. Maybe with a loan, a job, and the seventy thousand in the fund, I would make it through two years…or possibly more. I hadn't checked the semester costs recently.
Ok, let's be a little more serious.
The costs are approximately $55,000 for nine months worth of schooling. Assuming going home over the summer semester, then that is my yearly cost.
Without any loan, then I could handle about a year and a half. With a loan, I could probably get through the five years of an engineering degree.
But then I'd be on the hook for $200,000.
"Honey, you've always wanted to go to this school. I'm so proud of you."
Why does your mother have to make your life a living hell just by making such small statements?
"I'm so happy, Mom. This is the coolest."
What else was I supposed to say?
I'd just committed myself to a school that would cost me $275,000 over the next five years. This barely covered food.
Now, I'm not a foodie by any stretch of the imagination. More I'm one of those guys who can live on ramen and not complain about it. Mom and I had actually lived on rice and butter for six months during high school.
You do what you need to do to survive, and sometimes that means eating things that just aren't that interesting.
So, the first thing I would cut out of my budget would be food. The second would be entertainment. All I'd need to do would be to find a good role playing group, one who didn't mind my character proclivities, and I'd be set.
Not that there's anything wrong with my characters, just that I always play a girl. Hot, plain, tall, short, fat or thin. It doesn't matter to me, and I've played them all. I just always play a girl. Now, don't go reading anything into it. Julie, my previous DM, tried to get me to talk to her therapist. Something about me being transgendered or something.
From playing Girls in our role playing sessions?
Come on, there are lots of guys who do that. I mean, why would there be a joke about it otherwise. You know the one I'm talking about. The alternate meaning of MMORPG?
No?
Many Men Online Role Playing Girls?
Forget I said anything then.
Regardless, here I was, contemplating my future, and I realized for the first time that I would not be going to any future local sessions with my group.
Well, we all knew that was likely to change. Especially since one of our players was off to Harvard. Another would be going to Oxford, of all places. Well, the time of fun in basements had to come to an end sometime, but the seven of us had been playing together since I was twelve.
Six years.
And now? Now I would be off to a whole new adventure.
Packing up my things wasn't a big chore. I had few articles of clothing, and fewer other possessions that I would be taking with me. I would be packing light. Since I would be travelling by bus, not the most enjoyable method of travel, but the cheapest by far, I wanted to take hardly anything with me.
I don't need to tell you what it's like traveling by bus. Either you've done it, in which case you don't want a reminder, or you haven't, in which case nothing I say will make you understand. I'm sure there are people who like to travel by bus, but I'm not one of them.
I slept, I talked to a few people, and I looked out at the scenery.
Ok, so I do enjoy watching the world go by at the speed of a car. Before dad left we took a lot of vacations as a family. Colorado is a great place to start from. Course it seemed as if every trip we took lead us through Las Vegas.
And lots of winding mountain roads.
And tons of construction. It seems that when everyone else gets a vacation, the road crews just begin their work.
Regardless, I developed the ability to simply stare out a window and watch the miles, and hours, melt away. It is relaxing in a zen sort of way. But even so, sharing a smelly bus with people who want to do nothing but regale you with stories of the cats they left at home…
The trip was over and I found myself in Cambridge, Massachusetts with only two weeks until class started to kill. I was registered, had a dorm room to call my own. I moved myself in, with the couple of changes of clothing I owned, and went to purchase my books.
A thousand dollars poorer and I had all the books I needed for my first semester of classes.
I wandered around the school, watching the people who were going to the summer semester go from class to class, and a feeling of peace entered me. I was supposed to be here.
I just smiled and walked around.
Eventually, my wandering lead me to the student center, and I gravitated toward the bulletin board. I'd had some thought that a role playing group might be advertising here, but that wasn't the case. People looking for new roommates. People selling old furniture. People offering services from maid to computer repair. And off in one corner, a little older than the rest and given what seemed a place of honor there was a single, off white, 3x5 note card.
If you are reading this, then I can use someone like you. Not everyone thinks to look for the old and faded when there are so many other newer and flashier offers on hand. Hands is what I need, preferably young and strong, but any will do. If you are still reading this, then call me at the number below. Ask for Stan.
I was intrigued to say the least, so I walked over to the nearest payphone and called the number. I took the card with me.
"Hello?"
"I'm looking for Stan?"
"You found him. What can I do for you?"
"I'm in the MIT student center and…"
"You saw my card, huh?"
"Yes."
"Have to say that in the fifteen years that card has sat there, your one of the few that has called me. So, are you afraid of a little hard work…what was your name?"
"Jake."
"Isn't that a boy's name?"
I blushed. Even at eighteen, my voice was still high, and it embarrassed me all too often.
"My name is Jacob Peters, Stan. I am male."
"Sorry, you're a prodigy or something."
"No, just have a nice Irish tenor."
"Gotcha. So, Jake, why don't you meet me Saturday morning at Allied Storage. I'll need you to help me sort through some stuff. Get there before nine and I will explain a little more about what it is that I do."
"Ok, Stan. How will I recognize you?"
"I'll be the guy in the bowler."
"People still wear those?"
"Not that I know of, which is why I use one to identify myself."
I shook my head at the concept, and said my goodbyes. That would be on Saturday. Until then, there would be an entire week in which I had nothing to do.
I went back to my dorm to find the other bed taken up by my new roommate.
"Hey, you must be Jake, right?"
"I'm sorry, how did you know my name?"
"I requested a freshman be put with me. Name's Brad. Well, I'm a freshman too, I think. Started as soon as high school let me out. Summer you know. Figure I want to get done with this formality as soon as possible."
"You talk too fast, Brad."
"Sorry, just a bit nervous. Never had a room mate before, and you seem…well…sorry. Not my place."
"Seem what, Brad."
"Jake, you seem a little gay."
"What?"
"Maybe that's girly. I mean look…"
He gestured around the room. My side was neatly organized. My books were already on the shelf on my side of the room. My clothes were hanging up, or put away. My bed was made, using sheets and a comforter. The comforter had taken up most of my luggage space. Nothing screamed girl to me. The bedding was blue. A deep royal one. The clothing was button shirts and slacks. I had sneakers and dress shoes and a couple of pairs of sandals.
It's not like I put up curtains…of course now that I thought about it, I considered what curtains would look best in our room.
I shook myself and looked at Brad's side of the room. It was cluttered bordering on downright messy.
"Brad, I think the word you're looking for is organized."
"Then you're not..gay?"
"No, I'm not going to attack you in the middle of the night. Even if I were gay, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't be my type. You're too…geeky."
"Looks who's talking, nerd."
We laughed at this. I was wearing a short sleeved button shirt and a pair of beige knee length shorts. I think he was right.
"This is what I like to wear, okay. Deal with it."
"I like you, Jake. You're alright. So, some of the guys and I play touch football on Saturdays. Wanna come out and play with us?"
"I've always been more of a D&D guy myself, but I could play with you all."
"You really are a nerd."
"Yeah, but you're here too."
"Not every person here is a nerd or a geek or whatever, Jake. This is a diverse campus."
"Yeah, I figured."
"Well, good luck finding a role play group. And if you find one, let me know. I might consider joining."
I laughed at this. Ok, it was sort of a titter. I was always embarrassed at my real laugh, and usually tried to 'man' it up. I forgot this time, and it caused Brad to almost fall down laughing.
I couldn't help it, I started laughing as well, which set Brad off even more.
"I have to run off to class, Jake. See you later, 'kay?"
"Bye, Brad."
I lay down on my bed, and began to read my text books. I had nothing else to do, and it never hurts to be prepared.
"So, Jake, I thought your classes didn't start for a couple of weeks."
"Eek." I jumped.
Brad began laughing.
"Stop that, it's not funny."
"Dude, you really need to stop doing things like that. Let your hair grow a bit and everyone's going to think you're a girl."
"Not funny, Brad."
"It's freakinilarious, Jake."
"Huh?"
"Never mind. So, you ready to come down to dinner? Want to introduce you to the rest of the guys."
"But I thought that the cafeteria didn't open til…six…huh. Where did the day go?"
Brad laughed at me as I got up and followed him out the door.
The cafeteria served the quad of buildings around it, which meant a couple of hundred students. We slipped in, and a group of guys waved at brad. We made our way through the line, grabbed our food, and sat down next to the other four.
"Guys, my new roommate, Jake. Jake, this is Seth, Aaron, Michael who prefers Kelly for some reason, and Liam."
"Kelly?"
"Too many mikes in my high school. In my sophomore year I decided that everyone should call me Kelly, since there wasn't a single one of those in the school. My best friend decided that was a good idea and he picked Brent."
"How many Michaels were there?"
"Fifty seven."
"You're kidding…right?"
"Nope. Inner city school, and everyone wanted another Jordan, I think."
It was funny. I hadn't even noticed that he was…well…darker skinned than the other guys. He wasn't what I would call black, he looked more Latin to me, but now that he mentioned it…
I blushed and looked away. I'd been staring.
"Sorry, it is just…"
"Don't worry about it. Mom was born in Ireland, and so was my dad's mom. Seems the guys in my family keep finding our wives in Ireland. You're not Irish are you?"
My jaw dropped open, and before I could say anything Brad spoke up, "He's my roommate."
Kelly blushed and the rest of us laughed.
"Sorry, man. my fault. You just sound so…well…"
"I know. It sucks to be me. When everyone else was getting deeper voices, I just stayed the same."
"Did you consider you might have a medical condition? I knew this kid in school who everyone thought was a boy…"
"Yes, we did the tests. The doctors just think that my body might not be ready for puberty yet. No reason they can find. I have grown, though, so at least there's that. And hey, I only have to shave once a week."
"Dude, I so wish," Seth said.
We laughed at this. I made sure to get a little more of a chuckle than my normal titter.
The rest of the week was more of the same. I finished my first text book, Introduction to Psychology, on Friday. It was fascinating. Well, in a weird disturbing sort of way.
We continued to eat in the cafeteria as a group. All of us were freshmen, and none of us wanted to pledge. Brad initially thought that was why I'd come to school early, but no. I had no interest in a fraternity.
Saturday morning, I was too excited to sleep. I didn't know why I was so excited, but I was. Something about the unknown always thrilled me.
I got up, got dressed, and slipped out into the predawn for a brisk five mile walk to the storage facility.
Stan looked ridiculous. He had the darkest skin I had ever seen. It was almost iridescent. He had eyes that looked black in the light from the street lamp and hair that was as white as new driven snow. He had a stubbly beard and a ready smile.
"Stan?"
"I recognize that voice. Hi, Jake. you ready to go treasure hunting?"
"Treasure hunting?"
"Yeah. You see, people hire storage companies to hold their stuff. When they fail to pay for long enough, the storage company auctions off the storage units to pay for the loss. You get a couple of days to clear it all out, and whatever is in there, is yours to keep."
"Ok, but how is this treasure hunting?"
"People store the strangest things, and usually it is things that are valuable to them. Sometimes, more often than not, these things are valuable to other people as well."
"I'm with you so far."
"I have contacts with antiques dealers, second hand clothes shops, jewelers, and so on that I sell my goods to. Well, not the antiques dealers or the jewelers. They sell them in their shops and then give me a cut of the profits."
"So, this is a business."
"Pretty good one for me. If you learn the ropes, you might be able to do this for yourself."
"But, I'd be in competition with you."
"So? There are more storage units than I can afford, and as you've seen, I'm not a young man. I do this for the thrill of discovery. If you stick with me for at least three months then I'll personally put in a good word with my people."
He stuck out his hand to me, and I shook it.
"Ok, I can do that."
"Great. The auctions begin in a couple of minutes, so let's head in and see what we have."
I listened as Stan talked to the owner about how long the units had been paid up before the payments lapsed. Some had been here for years, and some only a couple of months.
Stan pushed the hardest on the ones that had been here for the longest. The one Stan picked up went for 3500 dollars.
The owner of the facility cut the lock, and Stan slapped one of his own in place. Then he handed me a lock, and seven thousand dollars.
"Now I want to see if you were paying attention."
We went on, and I didn't even bid on the first two. The third however, caught my eye for the name, more than the length of time that it had been here. DAR was prominent at the end of the name line, and I had a feeling about it. They'd kept up their payments for the first two months, and then nothing since.
"I'll be opening up the bids at fifty dollars for this one."
"Fifty."
"One hundred."
"One ten."
"One thousand."
There was a gasp from Stan, and the auctioneer guppied for a moment, but no one else said anything.
"Going to the girl for one thousand…sold."
He snipped the lock, and I stood there. Stan stood there next to me. They walked a bit away and so I held my breath and opened the door.
"Shit…"
Stan said nothing more for a moment as we simply stood there looking at the contents of the storage locker. It was row after row of colonial period dresses. Some were obvious reproductions, but many had the look of time hanging about them. They were mounted on museum racks and they just looked out at us from the locker.
They took my breath away.
I'd never seen anything as pretty as that. I wanted to go in there and touch them, but common sense kept me from doing it.
"I doubt we'll be able to get the entire thousand back, but that is a good eye, Jackie."
"Jake."
"Yeah, Jake. Sorry. I've never seen this much history in a single locker."
Stan pulled out his cell phone and began making calls. I stood there looking at the dresses.
Eventually, a stern looking woman came up to us and looked into the locker. "Thanks, Stan. You were right to call us. You know that my museum doesn't have the money to afford…"
"Becky, just take the damn dresses. I'll get my thousand back another way."
"A thousand? You only had to pay…here. Take the five I brought with me. I thought that something like this would have gone for a lot more."
"It was Jake here. We might have gotten it for less if I hadn't jumped the gun. No one else wanted to go above five hundred."
"Stan, the only reason the other's dropped off at a thousand is that I jumped so much further ahead of them. Both of the other people in the bidding had gone as high as two thousand on other lockers without winning. They were shocked that I broke protocol."
Stan laughed at me, and Becky smiled.
"This is a shrewd one, Stan. Hold onto him. So, we still on for dinner this evening?"
"Of course. Here's the key for the lock. We have another locker to look into."
We closed the door and put the lock in place.
"Another? Don't you usually only do one a week?"
"With Jake to help me, I figure I can do two for a while."
"Good luck you two."
"Thanks, Becky."
We walked over to the other locker, and opened it up. Inside, in a wooden frame, was the largest chandelier I'd ever seen.
"Damn, but if you aren't a good luck charm, Jake."
"Why? It's just a chandelier."
"You have a lot to learn, Jackie-boy."
He got on his phone, again, and talked for a few minutes with an Edgar.
"He thinks it's likely a pre-civil war piece that didn't get destroyed in the sacking of the south. He'll have to check in person, but if it is, then this is likely worth somewhere between five and six thousand to us when it sells."
"So, we made about seven thousand today?"
"Yes, we did."
I was shocked. Seven thousand…in one week.
"Well, actually. I made twenty-five hundred. You made four thousand."
"But, I mean, it was your money."
"Well, if you don't have the thousand, then I can always…"
"Can you come by my dorm? I've got the money there."
"Jake, what are you holding in your hand?"
I was still holding the five thousand that Becky had given me. I blushed and counted out a thousand of it for Stan.
"In the future, I'm not fronting you anything. Do this with your own money. And in the future, we split the proceeds evenly, ok? This one was to reward you for having a better instinct at this than I do. How did you know what was in that locker?"
"D A R."
He looked at me for a moment, blankly, and then he started laughing. "I'm getting too old for this, it seems. Either that or no one else made the connection. Daughters of the American Revolution. Good catch, Jackie-boy."
I let his nickname pass. I'd been called worse, and at least he recognized I was a guy.
When Edgar arrived with a couple of guys to look at the chandelier, he increased his estimate by a little bit. It was apparently leaded crystal and not just cut glass. I still don't really know the difference.
I said goodbye to Stan, agreeing to meet him at Adamantium Secure Storage next week, and headed home.
I had just lain on the bed when I felt myself being shaken. "Jake, you coming?"
"Huh?"
"Football?"
I got up and followed Brad and the guys out to the field where they played. We weren't the only ones there, but we were the biggest group. There was a girl out there with us, but I quickly learned to give her a wide berth. Sure, it was called touch football, but she almost tackled anyone with the ball. It seemed like she had something to prove to the rest of us.
Our team won by a couple of touchdowns, not that we were really keeping score.
We went into the cafeteria for dinner after we all took time out to shower.
"Hey, guys, why don't we rent a house together."
Sean looked hopefully around the table.
"Is that the best idea?"
"I'm up for it," I responded.
"It can get a little expensive, Jake, I know that you are a little tight for cash…"
"I'm actually good, Brad. Sure, it might be a onetime thing, but I might have a job that can pay for my school and some other things."
"Huh?"
"I made four thousand this morning."
"Jake, you know that prostitution is illegal," Kelly said.
"Jerk, no, I found some museum quality dresses in a storage locker. Got paid five thousand for them. After the thousand I paid for the locker…"
"You can make money doing that?"
"Apparently. My partner made three thousand."
"You're sure you're not just saying this so that we don't rat you out for whoring?"
"Kelly?"
"It's a legitimate concern, Brad."
"Guys, you can come with me at nine next Saturday if you really want to see."
"In the morning?" Sean asked.
"Yes in the morning."
"No thanks." There was laughter at this, but nods of agreement from the other guys.
"So, about the house…"
"Can we ask my girlfriend to join us," Kelly asked.
"You know the rules about co-ed dorms," Seth said.
"There are rules?" I asked.
Liam snorted, "Of a sort. Basically, any co-ed buildings have to have separate rooms for male and female students, and in general the numbers of men to women need to be even, or close to it."
"Wait, what?"
Aaron picked up the thread, "Yeah, stupid, but that is the rule. Supposedly the even number is to keep us all honest or something."
I shook my head at this, but smiled.
"Well, then, let's do it."
We spent the rest of the day online looking for a house. I knew that it would mean not eating in the cafeteria, but that would save me money in the long run. Ramen and rice are less even than what I was paying for my food here in the cafeteria.
I'd save all of the money I could and then when I was ready, I could focus on nothing but school, and then I'd be done and have no debt hanging over me.
It was a perfect plan.
Most of the next week, we looked into housing. We finally found a four bedroom house just off campus, and we were really happy with it. Kelly and Aaron would share a room. So would Liam and Seth. That let Brad and I solo.
Since I paid the security deposit, they figured that it was only fair. I think Brad was still uncomfortable around me for some reason.
Saturday morning I came to Adamantium prepared. I brought ten thousand with me. It would be enough, I hoped, for anything that came along.
I didn't make out this time as well as last. I paid four thousand for clothing and a couple of chairs. Stan paid three hundred for a tiffany lamp. Between the two of us we cleared a thousand each.
Not the four thousand I'd made last week, but it was a positive increase. That would be fifty-two thousand a year. I could live with that.
We finished moving into the new house after I came back from the storage facility. I played football with the other guys, and then went back to the storage facility. I had to sort the clothing out into usable and unusable. I folded all of it, dusted it, and ended up with a few boxes for Stan's second hand store. They paid me seven hundred for the lot.
The chairs were worth thirty eight hundred dollars.
The lamp was worth just under two thousand.
There were other things in Stan's locker, but nothing worth really anything.
I went home and lay on my bed and stared at the ceiling. I could do this. I could.
Maybe I'd find a suitable one in the treasures that I'd be going through. The last one I found was hanging in my closet. Remember at the beginning of this paragraph where I said suitable? It was a women's jacket. Leather. Burgundy, or whatever you call a red so deep as to be black in anything other than direct sunlight.
It almost fit me. I say almost as it was made for someone with breasts. It sort of, well, hung on the top part of my body. The shoulders and waist, however, fit me perfectly.
I really don't know what that says about me, other than I have a really slender frame.
It fit so well that I really couldn't bear to have it anywhere but in my closet. That and they'd only offered me ten dollars for it at the second hand shop. Apparently the color was too outré.
Even if it wasn't made for a man, though, I sort of wished that I had it walking across the campus that morning. It was colder than I'd expected, and the more I thought about that coat hanging in my closet, the more I realized I was a fool not to wear it to class.
After my two morning classes were over, I took the walk back to my house, and the day hadn't chosen to get any warmer.
You'd think I'd be used to cold weather, living on the plains of Colorado and all, but let me tell you, I wear coats any time it dips below sixty. I don't know why, but I always felt so…cold…in the winter.
I put on the coat, leaving it open in the front so that it wouldn't be so obvious that I didn't have the proper equipment to fill it and looked at myself in the mirror. I changed out for my second pair of sneakers, as the wite just didn't seem to fit with it, and then I changed my shirt. Somehow the two dark colors clashed. I picked a lighter shirt, a shade of green I have no real name for, and it seemed to work.
I left the house with a bounce in my step, warm for the first time that day.
I entered my math class, and sat near the front of the class. It went by quickly. I like math. I gathered my books and was making my way out of the room when I heard a voice behind me.
"I haven't seen you in the dorms."
"I have a house with some friends."
"A house full of freshman girls. Aren't you scared?"
I went bright red. "I think, look I mean, sorry. I'm a guy."
I pushed past her, wanting to die. I should have expected that the coat would enhance my already feminine appearance.
"Look, girl, there's nothing to be ashamed of. Lots of people are still a little tomboy in college. Even if you feel more like a boy than the girl that nature made you there are options."
I stopped and just stared at her. She was pretty in a vague sort of way. I'm sure that Seth would have liked her, anyway, for the types of girls that he seemed to stare at when he got the opportunity.
"Unless I lied to the school about my gender, I doubt I'd be living in a house full of other boys."
"You lied to the school…"
I wasn't about to drop my shorts, so I lifted my shirt and showed her my chest. Flat and barely manly, but male none the less.
"I'm a boy."
"Oh…wow. sorry. It's just that your voice…and that jacket…"
"It was free. Beggars and choosers and all that."
"Wow. I just made a fool of myself."
"No, I get it a lot. I should be less defensive. It's not like I'm trying to look all manly. Maybe I should shave my head."
"No, then you'd just look like Sinead O'Connor."
"Who?"
"Female rock star from the 90's…never mind. It wouldn't make you look more like a guy is all I'm saying. Maybe if you grew a mustache or something."
"Who are you?"
"Oh, sorry, I'm Sadie."
"Jake," I said and shook her hand in greeting. "Look, Sadie, I would definitely grow facial hair if I could, but I've seriously considered just pulling the one or two hairs that do grow, instead of shaving."
"Really? That little?"
"My arms should give you a clue."
I pushed up the sleeve of my coat and showed her the peach fuzz that took the place of my arm hair. Fine and blonde and almost invisible.
"No, I think you shouldn't tweeze."
"Huh?"
"If hair like that were covering your face, you'd look even more feminine."
I tittered at her and then put my hand over my mouth.
"Did you just giggle?"
"I didn't…yeah, I guess I did."
"You are such a girl."
"Hey."
"Look, either change your mannerisms, dress, and voice, or give in."
"You sound like my old DM, Julie."
"DM?"
"Yeah, Dungeon Master. Called a Game…"
"I know, it's just you had a female DM?"
"Yeah…" I looked at her questioningly.
"You looking for a new group?"
"Yes. I can't seem to find any on campus, though."
"Most of them are run in the frat houses. Yes there are still normal people who go here, but there are a lot of the geeks as well. Look, I am in an all girl group. The only rule is that you have to play a female character, so as long as…"
"How often do you game?"
"Slow down there, sister. I need to introduce you to Carla first."
The prospect of getting into a game, and not being looked down on for playing a female, was really exciting to me. I had to calm my breathing to be able to survive it at all.
"Well, I'm done with my classes for the day," I said to her.
"And so am I. If you don't mind stopping by my room with me, first."
"In a girl's dorm?"
"Look, if I've been talking to you, and seen your chest, and I still think you are a girl, then I doubt any of the others will twig to you. Anyway, there aren't any real rules against it that I'm aware of."
That really didn't make me feel any better about the whole situation, but I was willing to go with it if it would get me into a gaming session anytime in the foreseeable future.
We entered the Sanctum Sanctorum of all womanhood at the campus and I have to say that I was disappointed on some level. In my mind, to a certain degree, I'd built it up as some mystical sort of place, and in the end it was just a place.
How often in our lives is that the case.
I smiled and waved at the girls who gave us greetings. I didn't say much, afraid that somehow my voice, high as it is, would betray me. Maybe choosing that moment to break and shatter the façade.
Sadie had already stripped and changed into a lighter dress before I even realized that she was doing so. I'd just been talking to her, and she to me and she was changed. A little shocked, I sat on her roommates bed.
"Jake?"
"Um, you just changed in front of me."
She blushed, and I still sat there on the bed, staring at the floor.
"See what I mean? I know you're a guy, and it didn't even occur to me…"
"No, that's not it. I didn't even notice. Aren't I supposed to notice? Everything was so normal about it. You changed, we were talking, it was…nothing."
"Well, maybe you like…"
"Not that I've noticed that either. I live in a house full of guys after all."
"Then you're probably just oblivious is all."
I stuck my tongue out at her and she laughed at me. I giggled back. Being around her like this, I didn't mind giggling as much. Sure, it wasn't a manly mannerism as far as those things go, but I didn't really care. It's not like I wanted her to see me as manly. I really wasn't interested in her that way, or like I'd said, in anyone.
Well, I had a lot of schooling to get through, and a lack of libido would help that, right?
Of course it would, or so I kept telling myself.
We left her room and walked out of the building and across the quad. It was a different quad with a different cafeteria than the one I'd gone to, which could help explain why we'd never met before school started.
It could also be that she had just arrived shortly before school had actually started.
We entered the other building, and made are way up to the eighth floor. Unlike the other dorm, this one smelled like women lived here. Not to say that Sadie's dorm smelled like a locker room, just that this one smelled…well…like perfume.
"I like your jacket, you'll have to let me borrow it sometime."
I turned to look at the person behind me on the stairs, and realized my sight line had been a little low. She was tall. I mean really tall. Standing two steps below me, her eyes were level with mine.
"Hey, Jasmine, this is Jake," Sadie didn't look too happy to see the other woman.
"Jake? Is that somehow short for Jacqueline?"
"No, it's short for Jacob."
"You're parents were even more cruel than mine. You have my condolences."
"Don't you have somewhere to be?" Sadie said at my elbow.
"No, Sad-ie, I don't." Jasmine didn't pronounce the name like normal, you know, Saydie. She emphasized the sad, and then put a slight pause in there. I put in the hyphen, but I figured I needed to explain a little more.
"Drop it, Ok, Yaz? You almost got all of us killed last week, and I still haven't forgiven you for that. I mean, come on, throwing a fireball spell at a loup-garou who was standing in the middle of a gas station?"
"I was trying to distract him from your tasty little ass."
My mouth dropped open.
"No, she has a donkey that follows her around everywhere. Don't ask."
"Wha…"
"The game, Jake."
"Oh…you guys really get into it, huh."
"Yeah, we try to come 'in costume' as it were. you know, dressed like our characters would. Since it is a modern setting, it is better than wearing cloaks and things," Jasmine said.
"I don't know. Cloaks could be cool."
"You've obviously never worn the 'and things' before. I hate corsets and bodices."
I blushed as I thought about some of the things my characters had worn over the years. I know it's impractical, but my warrior queen had to wear a chainmail bikini on Julie's orders. I'd played it for all it was worth and hated every minute of it. That was only thinking about what my character had worn.
If I'd had to actually wear that…I shook my head to dispel the image.
"I see you've had the same sorts of GMs as we've had in the past."
"Julie was great and all, but she thought she was punishing me by making one of my characters wear a chainmail bikini."
"Ouch. Those are uncomfortable."
Sadie and I looked at Jasmine. I think my eyes might have been bugging out of my head.
"They pinch in all the wrong places."
I blushed bright red, and turned away from her.
"Jake, sorry, I didn't mean to embarrass you."
"Don't worry about it Jasmine."
"Well, see you at the game, Sadie?"
"You can bet on it. We still have a loup-garou to take down."
Jasmine pushed by us on the stairs and then Sadie and I continued on our mountain climbing expedition.
"So, that doesn't sound like D&D."
"Nope, it's not. That's not a problem is it?"
"No, it's not a problem."
A new system. This could be interesting.
We finished climbing the unending stairs and exited onto the eighth floor.
We knocked on Carla's door, and waited. Then waited. And waited some more. I think I heard a crash, and then a giggle or two. There was a man's voice, and some more crashing sounds. The door opened and Liam tried to push out past me.
"Liam?"
"Jake? What are you doing here?"
"Hi, Liam. Jake's here to talk to Carla about getting into the game."
"Hello, Sadie, didn't see you there. When are you going to stop by our place? I don't think Jake here would mind seeing you again."
"It's not like…" I began.
"Wait, Jake lives…" Sadie started at the same time.
Liam, and the elusive Carla both began to laugh.
"So, how did you guys get the school to allow a girl to stay in your house."
"Girl? Jake's a guy, Carla, promise."
"Wait…"
"Yeah, Carla, Jacob is a boy."
"Could have fooled me, and I usually have an eye for those things."
"Sure you're not just saying that, Carla," Liam replied.
"Hush, you, or our athletics sessions will have to cease."
"You wouldn't do that to yourself, would you really?"
"Of course not. I love you too much for that. No, I just like to threaten is all."
"I've got to run," Liam said with a laugh, "you ladies behave yourselves now, won't you?"
I punched him in the arm as he made his way out of the room. Carla and Sadie laughed at me and it wasn't long before I joined in.
"Are you sure you're not a girl, Jake?"
"I'm sure. Need me to strip to prove it?"
Carla got a gleam in her eye, but Sadie interrupted her before Carla could respond.
"He's male, Carla. Down girl."
"Sorry, you know I only have eyes for Liam."
"This week, sure. You move too fast, girl."
"So, Jake, what can I do for you."
"Jake would like to join in our game."
"What, really?" Carla stared at Sadie for a moment, "you know you'd be playing a girl, and have to come dressed, well, in costume?"
"I didn't know the in costume part when Sadie initially broached the idea, but it doesn't seem like a problem. I mean, what I'm wearing now has everyone confused."
Carla giggled at that and smiled.
"You have a point there, Jake. You know, Jake really doesn't seem like it fits you."
"Blame my mom. It's my name."
"You should have a more gender ambiguous name. Really. It would be more funny. You know, like if your name was Jodie, or Kelly, or Sam even."
"Sam is gender ambiguous?"
"You didn't watch 'Who's the Boss' reruns did you? Stargate SG-1 maybe?"
"I'll take your word for it."
"How can you be here and never watch Stargate?" Sadie asked me.
"I prefer fantasy, usually, to science fiction."
"Well, all of the girls in the group are playing characters with the same name as they have. Well, close to it. I like the feel it gives the game."
"You just like the blurring of sureality with reality after you've had a couple of beers."
"Guilty. It's just that Jake really won't do."
"Can't I just pick another name?"
"you could, but then what meaning would the name really have to you."
"Then call me Jackie. Stan already does that, but usually adds a boy to the end of it."
"Stan?"
"My boss."
"you have a job? Already?"
"I'm in antiques. Well, sort of. More I'm kind of in reclamation."
"You're a garbage man?"
"No, but it feels that way sometimes. We place bids at blind auctions for items left behind by people in storage lockers."
"You can make money doing that?" Sadie asked.
"A total of five thousand in the last two weekends."
"This won't interfere with playing Saturday night will it?"
"No, I'm usually done by eleven. Or at least I have been the last two weeks."
"Ok, then, Jackie, welcome to the game. Any preference on what type of character you play?"
"I don't really…"
"He isn't familiar with the world, Carla. I've told him nothing."
"Yeah, all I caught was that there was magic, and a werewolf and a donkey."
Carla laughed at this, and I smiled.
"Ok, let's introduce you a bit to the Dresdenverse."
I'm sure that most of you don't really care about the particulars of what we went over, and the rest of you can go pick up a copy of either the Dresden Files source book or one of the novels.
Short version is that we would be playing with magic, vampires, were wolves, and ghosts in a modern setting. I was hooked.
I couldn't wait 'til Saturday for my first session with the girls, and hoped that it would be as fun as it seemed.
I made my way home after a couple of hours with Carla and Sadie and found Liam lounging on the couch.
"Hey, Jake. Dude. You know that's the most exclusive RP group on campus, right?"
"Really? They seem fine with me joining."
"Yeah, well, they would."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You know what it means. You're kinda girly. They only let girls join."
"Don't tell me they turned you down?"
"Ok, yeah. They did. I couldn't handle playing a girl, let alone the fact I would have to come dressed as one."
"You're a wimp, you know that, Liam."
"Look who's talking," Seth said from the doorway.
I giggled and then covered my mouth and blushed.
They laughed at me, and I simply smiled. They were good guys over all.
"So, how is Liam a wimp now?"
"Jake has been allowed to play with the Game Grrlz."
"What!? You're joking, right?"
"Has everyone heard of this group except for me?"
"Jake, the Game Grrlz are, well, they're all girls. All of them. How did you…"
"By being himself, apparently."
"Yeah, I met Sadie in my math class."
"Dayum. You might be the undoing of a three year institution here."
"What are you talking about?"
"Carla has been running the group for the past three years, ever since she first came here. There hasn't been a man allowed in the group to date. Well, until you."
"Why not?"
"Because of all the fraternity gaming groups…well the two frat gaming groups if you want to be specific. They are male only. It takes poling the entire female population to get the three current player that are in the group."
"We had three girls in my group at home in rural Colorado. Our DM was female."
"See, you have no understanding. There just aren't that many girl gamers, dude." Liam said.
I figured he had to be wrong, but I was in no position to really argue.
"Look, guys, I have to play a girl, and dress as a girl to get into the game. How is that changing anything?"
"He's got a point."
"Of course he does."
I snorted at them, and that set them laughing for some reason.
I went into my room and hung my jacket up on the inside of the door. It didn't make me feel any different to have it off. I couldn't help but smile at it hanging there for some reason. I was happy that I'd worn it, even with all the confusion it had caused.
The rest of the week when perfectly smoothly. I talked to Sadie a couple of more times when my class with her rolled around again, and then it was Saturday morning and I was out at today's storage lot.
One of the units struck me as a little interesting. There was no name on the lease and after the initial payment, there had been no payment after that. It could be nothing, but it costs less to pay to have your trash hauled away, than to put it in a locker like this. The storage company was out five hundred dollars for the unit, as it was one of their more expensive ones, and I doubted that anyone else would be likely to bid for it.
I was wrong on that.
Everyone else seemed to be as intrigued as I did.
"Jackie-boy, let one of them have it."
"No, Stan. I've got a good feeling on this, Seven thousand."
"Eight,"
"Nine."
"Fifteen thousand," I said trying to shock people out of continuing.
"Twenty!"
Shit, I wanted to win this now. My hear was pounding. My palms were sweating. There was a thrill to the unknown.
"Twenty-one."
"Twenty-two."
I'd never seen a bit go this high before. I let it run on its own for a bit.
I'd thought to bring fifty thousand with me today. I wanted to bid for at least two lots, and have money just in case.
"Going for thirty-seven thousand…"
"Forty."
Right at the last minute, I'd made my plea. It was unheard of for a lot with this little payment history to go for such a price. I hoped that I was right.
"Sold for Forty thousand dollars."
Stan was shaking his head sadly at me, but I just smiled up at the guy.
"I feel good about this one, Stan. Really good."
"More than forty thousand good?"
Everything started to fade out. I'd just spent half of the money that I'd saved for school on a single lot.
Stan helped me to the ground after putting his lock on the door.
"Shit, I was too late."
"Edgar?"
"Yeah, I wanted to bid on this. I knew the former owner. He's been promising me a piece of this collection for years. Apparently he died intestate. No will."
"What are you saying?"
"Open it up and I'll tell you what I'm saying."
We opened it up, and it was different than any of the other lockers I'd yet seen. It was a massive fifty by fifty area. Inside, on dark wood shelves with specialized lighting, there was row after row of red glassware. Each piece had a provenance sheet behind it.
"So it's red glass."
Stan snorted at me, and Edgar just smiled.
"No, Jackie, this is Ruby Gold or Cranberry glass. Depends on where it was made, really, but the cause is the same. That is made with gold. And the really old pieces in here, we'll they're almost priceless."
"What are we talking?"
"Well, to the right investor, we're looking at between a hundred and two hundred thousand dollars."
"For glass?"
"No, for sets. Original sets. A lot of these sets will go for one to five thousand at auction. A little less in my shop. Consider that we have full complements? Dishes, glasses, bowls…some of those would got for a lot more."
"But a hundred thousand?"
"Jackie-boy," Stan said, "There are more than a hundred sets, not pieces, sets, in here."
After the cost of the unit Stan and I would be splitting at least sixty thousand dollars. I'd almost doubled what I'd put into the locker in the first place.
"The kid's better than you, Stan."
"The kid's lucky."
"Come on, Stan. You know it was more than luck."
"No, it wasn't. You better be careful, Jackie. I want no part in you destroying your life with reckless gambles."
I watched Stan walk away, leaving me there with Edgar. The victory of a moment before seemed hollow. I liked Stan, even if I'd only known him for a couple of weeks.
"So, looks like I'm just dealing with you now."
"Yeah. What do I do?"
"Well, usually, with Stan, I offered him sixty percent of the sale price of the goods."
"Edgar. You know that this is worth more than Stan ever brought you."
"And you are a new player to the game."
"Tell you what, Edgar, you charge me a flat fee for everything over fifty thousand that I bring you. Say twenty five thousand. I'm risking my own money on these auctions, and you are putting nothing up. Below fifty, we go with a fifty percent split. Usually I'll be putting up a lot less of my money for those."
"Wait, you want to offer me a better deal on everything I sell less than fifty thousand dollars?"
"It's incentive, Edgar. I know you want to get the best price you can on most goods, and if you cheat me on the higher priced ones, I leave."
"Sounds fair to me. So, I get twenty-five thousand off the proceeds of selling all of these items, or we go with lots of smaller units…"
"You sell them in the largest sets they fit into, and we go from there."
"Ok, but I want to tell you that I will not charge a fee on anything I buy personally."
"What do you mean?"
"I wanted this collection for myself, Jackie."
"Ok…"
"I want to offer you a hundred and twenty for the lot."
"I would have taken a hundred. Sold, Edgar."
"Pleasure doing business with you, young man."
Between my scores for the last two weeks, and today, I'd made a profit of eighty five thousand dollars. That was almost a third of the way to my goal. Then I could focus on school to the exclusion of everything else.
I went home and showered, and then put away my money. I really needed to find a better place to keep it. Maybe I'd get a bank account.
Then it was football in the park with my roommates. One girl and a lot of guys. I even made a touchdown, but we ended up losing this time.
I went back home, took another shower, and then I had to decide what I would be wearing tonight. I knew the jacket would be part of it, but for the rest?
I had nothing fancy, and all of my clothing was distinctly male.
And it was beginning to hang off me. I'd lost close to five pounds in the last three weeks and I was down to 112. Skin and bones comes to mind. I just hoped I wouldn't lose much more weight, since I didn't think I had much more I could safely loose.
Not that I'd consider doing such a stupid thing on my own, but the girls had convinced me to go down a dark alley, on my own, at night.
The full moon shone everywhere but in the artificial canyon in which I walked. I could see the silver light shining from the building on my right, at least from the very top of it. The stars were obscured by the light pollution from the rest of the city.
I hugged my chest and was glad for my Jacket as tonight was colder than I'd expected it to be. My breath came out in plumes of frost, and the snot froze in my nostrils and I breathed in.
Ok, so that's a detail that you didn't really need to know. Suffice it to say that it was cold. Really cold.
My jacket blended into the darkness around me even better than I'd assumed it would.
I heard a giggle from up ahead and assumed that it was either Sadie or Yaz. One of the two. I hadn't caught the other girl's name before we ventured out into the cold.
A shadow, somehow deeper than those surrounding it detached itself and started moving toward me. There was a gutteral growl issuing from its throat.
"A werewolf? Really?" I called out to the darkness. Not that I really expected an answer. We were hunting Loup-Garou after all.
I drew my mother's silver sword from its sheath and brandished it at the beast. They'd expected me to simply stand here and act like bait, but I didn't see myself doing that. I had a proud tradition to uphold, and that meant standing my ground and…
A voice from another world spoke to me in that moment, Aren't you thinking right now that you can Survive with your Mother's Help?
"Ok, I think I understand a little better what I meant. It was more a case of, Mother doesn't Understand Me Cause I'm Mortal."
The loup-garou stood there and cocked it's head at me.
"Sorry, Shaggy, Talking to the GM really quick. Hold a moment."
He slumped to the ground and humphed at me.
Did you just call the loup-garou, Shaggy?
"I figured it works for me. I grew up using my quick wits to keep me out of trouble. You know, A whole Can of Snark sort of thing."
I like that. Anyway, back to your Mother.
"This isn't a therapy thing is it?"
Jackie…
"Got it. Thou shalt not snark the GM. Mother is an immortal member of the Seelie court. While she understands fae children, I doubt she ever really understood mortal children. Like you said, this was all done as a sort of fling with my father."
Go on.
"She does her best, but I simply feel misunderstood. When she first retrieved me as a teenager it was a lot worse than it is now. I tolerate her now, but I couldn't stand being anywhere around her as a teen."
So, you Walked the Nevernever as a teen?
"That aspect of my young adult life shaped me, I guess you could say."
Ok, I like it. So, the sword. Item of Power, or just a silver sword?
I thought about it for a moment, and then shrugged, "Why not. I think I could use an item of power right about now."
Not that type of power. It is actually linked to what your mother is. I'll tell you more about it later, but the simple answer is that it allows you control over your mother's home in the Nevernever, and you can open a gateway to the Nevernever anywhere, anytime, and take other people with you.
Great, I had the subtle knife. I wish people would be more creative about these things.
I brandished my sword, preparing to take the villain's charge.
Have you practiced using the sword as a Weapon?
"Um…not as much as I would have hoped right about now."
So you're mediocre at it, average, good?
"Oh, I wish I were good. No, just about average. Like I said, I didn't…"
Before I could finish, the loup-garou leapt to his feet and was charging toward me.
"Luck don't Fail Me Now!"
Is that another declaration?
"I'll take anything I can get."
I put my sword in front of me, hoping that I wouldn't die. At the last moment I twitched my sword to the side and it pierced the monster just above the heart.
I looked down at the beast in shock. I'd wanted to wound it, not kill it. I pulled out my sword, and it twitched. It wasn't dead yet.
"Damn, girl, you don't do things by half measures, do you."
"Isn't there something you can do, Yaz?"
"Wish I could. I'm a Wizard, not a faith healer."
"Ha ha ha, Deforest Kelley."
"Who?"
"Doctor McCoy?"
"You lost me."
"You guys have all watched Stargate, but you never watched the quintessential sci-fi show of the twentieth century?"
Yaz looked blankly at me, but Sadie began laughing.
Yaz glared at her.
"Star Trek, Yaz."
The fourth member of our group came loping around the corner and shifted back into her human form. She was naked since she hadn't thought to bring a change of clothing, again. I think she just liked being out in public nude.
"You killed him." Katie yelled at me.
"Keep her out of my way, for a moment, Yaz. I think that my mother's magic might just help me more than yours at this moment."
"You mother's…"
"Summer Court. Life, Rampant Growth, Life."
I'll allow it. Superior lore?
"Um, don't I need medical knowledge to heal him, or can I do it some magical way."
you're right. So, Medical Doctor, twice, what…
"Superior. And Lore superior as well."
Got it. Going to give you Healer as part of your lore as well.
I inscribed a circle around the beast using the point of my sword. I could smell fresh cut grass and summer days as I pushed will into the circle closing it with myself inside. I put my hands around the wound and pushed my senses inside. I had cut through the pericardial membrane and nicked the heart. He was bleeding internally. I closed up the larger wounds and generally closed the opening, cleansing bacteria as I went.
I was done, and the wound was closed.
I sagged down, tired beyond belief, but he would live. Sometimes it pays to remember that not everyone who attacks you is really a monster. Inside, most of us are still human.
Sadie began laughing as I finished my internal monologue, and Katie just smiled. I kept my eyes on hers when I looked in her direction. She actually stripped when she transformed her character into wolf form. Yeah, she took the whole in costume thing seriously.
She began to get dressed, and Yaz glared at me.
"A little munchkin are we?"
"What?"
"You were so the center of attention today, Jackie. Perfect in every way."
"Jasmine, that's not fair to Jake. He is focused in his character. This will help you all in the future, and adds some interesting facets to the character. She won't be able to do much beyond blindly waving her sword, and healing you the next time that you screw up and throw a fireball into a gas station…"
Jasmine interrupted Carla, "It wasn't going to kill him."
"But it almost killed both you and Sadie."
"Whatever, I'm out of here."
"Wait for me, Yaz," Katie said. She smiled at me again, and blew me an air kiss.
"Don't worry about it, Jake," Sadie said.
"Don't worry about the fact that Katie did a strip tease three times this evening?"
Carla and Sadie laughed, and I giggled.
"She almost seemed put out that you wouldn't react."
"I'm just not…sexually interested in her. Well, in any of you. Well, in anyone."
"We know, Jake. You keep saying it, though, and it chips away at my self esteem."
I walked over and gave her a hug.
"Sadie, you're a beautiful woman, and some guy out there will notice, eventually."
She kissed me on the cheek. "Thanks for that, Jake."
She walked out of the room, following in the wake of Jasmine and Katie.
"Jake, Sadie thinks she's a lesbian."
"Huh?"
"She has convinced herself that she is attracted to women. I don't buy it personally, but I'm not going to call her on it."
"Wait…"
"She figures that you're her only chance at a 'normal' relationship."
"Why are you telling me this?"
"To let you know what's going on there. Personally, I've seen how she reacts when two women kiss. Disgust is more her emotion. That and she doesn't even react at all when Katie strips. She was watching you, and not Katie."
"I'll go after her," I rushed out the door, and grabbed Sadie's arm.
"Look, Sadie, I didn't mean to insult you."
"No, it's not an insult. I understand that your heart was in the right place."
I put my arm around her and we walked across the campus. It was nice, but that's about all. We got to my house.
"Look, Sadie, I know this campus is supposed to be safe, but…why don't you stay here tonight. There's a nice sofa I can sleep on and you can have my room."
"No, I'll take the sofa. I know the guys here and trust most of them."
I giggled at her and we went inside. It was two in the morning, and everyone else was asleep. I got some extra sheets and blankets for her, and made up the couch for her.
"Night, Sadie."
"Night, Jackie."
I stuck my tongue out at her and went into my room.
The sound of voices woke me a few hours later. I quietly slipped out into the lounge.
Seth and Sadie were sitting next to each other on the couch. She put her head on his shoulder and sighed.
I walked up behind them and in a normal voice said, "Good morning."
They jumped and Sadie tried to move away, but Seth put his arm around her.
"Sadie, relax. I have nothing to hide from anyone."
She giggled nervously and sat back down next to him. I walked around to an arm chair and sat down.
"So how long have the two of you…"
"I've been chasing her since high school."
"Wait, you two went to high school together. The odds…"
"Yeah, we were in the same clubs."
"He kissed me awake this morning."
"Seth!" I said shocked.
"I couldn't help it. I've wanted to kiss her forever, and it always seemed like the wrong moment."
"Lucky she didn't punch you."
"Oh, she punched me, and then kissed me back."
"You two are crazy, you know that, right?"
The laughed and I joined them a moment latter.
Slowly the rest of the house woke up, and we just hung out. Carla came by a little later.
"You ready to go, Liam?" she asked.
"Hey, Carla." Sadie said. She was still wrapped up in one of Seth's arms and simply beaming at the world.
"Finally. you know how often I've tried to set the two of you up together?"
Sadie blushed and Seth laughed.
"Yeah, apparently I had to be a little more forward to win fair lady's affections."
She blushed even hotter. The rest of us laughed.
Seth got the job of walking her home. They left at the same time as Carla and Liam.
"Hey, Jake. You up for some head to head?"
"What are you talking about, Brad?"
"Kelly picked up a PS3 and Sackboy."
"Sackboy? Oh you mean little big planet."
"Yeah."
"You know that game is more cooperative than head to head, right?"
"Yeah, but I thought that it could be fun."
We played for a couple of hours before Kelly and Aaron joined us. It was insane playing on a single screen with the four of us jumping and swinging all over the place. You had to have a sort of zen attitude on death, because you did it a lot.
Of course the expressions on the little sack people was priceless when they died. They looked out at you as if you'd betrayed everything they stood for.
We whiled away the rest of the day on that, and then Monday rolled around. Back to class, and living through the next day.
The first day of October was warmer than a lot of September had been, so I got to leave my jacket at home. I figured that this would be a good day to open an account.
I headed into town, with no idea of where I would be going. I wandered around, thinking it would be simple to just find a bank. Ok, so the entire concept was a little naíve. I'd never had a bank account before.
Eventually I stopped and asked for directions, and then found my way into a local bank.
"How may I help you, Miss?" the woman at the desk asked. The nameplate on said desk told me that she was Wendy Wallace, Accounts Manager.
"Actually, it's mister."
"So sorry. you just seemed too…coordinated. I don't usually see that in the men who come in here."
"Don't worry about it. A lot of people think I'm female for some reason. So, I'd like to open up an account here. I figure that keeping my money in my room isn't at all safe."
"How much are we talking here?"
"A hundred and thirty five thousand dollars."
She choked.
"Really?"
I smiled, "Yes, really. It's my college fund, as well as the money I've made through work."
"Very nice. So, are you thinking a savings account, checking account…"
"I need to access between ten and thirty thousand dollars each week for work, but other than that, I just need somewhere to store my money."
"Cash?"
"Probably the best in cash. I could possibly write a check? Never done it before though."
"Ok, we'll go with a checking account and put in forty thousand. The rest we'll put in a savings account for you."
"And if I need to do things with my money, I can just come in here?"
"Yes."
I didn't know how secure I felt about my money being in a bank, but I felt better than I did with it sitting in my room.
On Saturday it was back to work. I was confident in my abilities, or maybe my luck. Nothing on the list caught my eye so I randomly bid on just about everything.
"Going for three thousand…sold to the girl in the front."
It was chilly and I was wearing my Jacket, so I couldn't really complain this time.
I paid with my first check, numbered 100 for some reason. The locker was filled with items of sentimental value and not intrinsic.
There was a coat in there in my size, and I brought it home with me. It cost me another five hundred dollars to get the furniture hauled away. It was the cheep pressboard stuff. The clothing there only got me about a hundred dollars. All in all I was out thirty four hundred dollars for the day.
I was sitting there in the empty locker, the white down coat across my knees wondering what had happened.
"Hey, Jackie-boy. Lost a wad, I hear."
"thirty-four hundred, Stan. I knew there was nothing here. Nothing really struck me as a good bid. I was playing around."
"This is what I was trying to tell you, kid."
"Apparently this is not the road to riches I thought it would be at the beginning."
"If you're good, lucky, and patient, it will take care of your needs, Jackie."
"And don't bid unless something catches my eye?"
"Mostly I was going to say don't bid for the fun of it, but that works too."
"The old man helped me to my feet, and I brushed myself off."
"Not sure if that coat fits you, Jackie-boy
"It fits…"
"I meant that it's a very masculine coat. You may be a boy, but you aren't very masculine."
"It's white."
"It's off white. Still, the cut doesn't fit you."
"How can you tell?"
"Put it on."
I did, and I could tell what he meant. The shoulders were all wrong. The sleeves were a little long. The length and everything else seemed to almost work. It would probably fit better if I wore the jacket inside it.
"Well, you take it then."
"No, Jackie. Keep it as a reminder. Sometimes it pays to be patient."
I looked around one last time to make sure that I hadn't left anything behind and then I made my way home.
Next week I'd have another opportunity to try to do this thing better.
I made my way home, changed, and waited for the rest of the guys to show up for the game. I didn't really pay attention to the score this week and I had a lot more fun.
Each one, in some way, didn't fit me quite perfectly. The one was broader in the shoulders than I was. The other was bigger in the bust than I was.
Yes, I'm talking about my down coat and my leather jacket. Sure, the jacket fit my persona for the game better, but the coat…well the coat was masculine and I might be trying to tell everyone that I really was a guy.
Might be.
I was a little confused on that.
More and more I was asking myself who I was really. And more and more I was wondering if it really mattered on anything more than a personal descriptive basis.
There was a knock on the door as I sat there dithering.
"Hey, we're heading out. Will you be ok heading to the game on your own?"
"Hi, Brad. I should be fine."
"It's late, you know."
"Brad, I am not powerless, you know. I mean, regardless of what everyone else thinks, I am a guy. I really am."
"Sorry I brought it up."
I was pissed at him. I grabbed my jacket and left. How dare he think of me as helpless? I wasn't some weak girl in need of his, or anyone else's help to get from one side of the street to the other. I've been crossing streets for years without his help and this wouldn't be the last time I did so.
I was fuming. My hair was beginning to piss me off. It was covering my ears, something I'd never let it do in the past, but then again it cost money to get haircuts, and I didn't really want to spend that money right now.
I wrapped my arms around my chest to try to keep some of the heat in. It collapsed the chest and removed the air pocket where the cold air could invade my little sanctuary.
The moon was a sliver past full and it shone its silvery light on the deserted campus. I had traversed most of it when a couple of shadows detached themselves from the building I was passing.
"Looks like someone is lost. Are you lost little girl."
"Are you a moron?"
"What?"
"I am not a girl."
"Sure look like one, what do you think, buddy?"
"She looks all girl to me. Let's try her on for size."
I didn't wait for them to finish their statements. I ran. Right past them. They were so shocked to see me running toward them that they actually jumped out of the way. Thank god for amateur criminals. Professionals would likely have grabbed me as I went by.
I heard them shout something at me and then there was the pounding of feet in the darkness behind me. I only hoped that I was fast enough to keep ahead of them until I reached the dorm.
Time seemed to stand still. My lungs burned from the cold, and the thud, thud, thud of my feet on the pavement jarred my knees. I could feel hot tears on my cheeks and wondered why I was crying. Nothing really made sense to me, nothing mattered, except for getting to that lit doorway.
Fifty feet. Twenty Feet. Ten feet. I allowed myself a smile as my hand closed around the handle, and then rough hands grabbed me from behind.
"Help me! Somebody! Please!"
"Shut up, bitch," one of the two said and I felt a blow to my head. My ears rang and darkness threatened to engulf me until the cold air on my lower body cleared the haze.
I began thrashing around then. I didn't want…whatever this was to continue. I had to get free.
"What's going on in there?"
"Nothing, officer, just a little prank."
"Help! They're trying to rape me!"
"Step away from the girl."
I was dropped onto the cold grass, and sobbing I pulled up my pants. I huddled myself into a ball as small as I possibly could and just sat there. This was impossible. This couldn't have happened to me. I was invincible.
I was male.
I moaned softly to myself, mourning the tatters of my dignity. I flinched away from the officer when he touched me on my shoulder.
"Miss, we need to get you checked out by the doctor."
"They never…they didn't…"
"Still, miss. Can you come with me?"
"Jake?!"
Sadie rushed up to me and I collapsed in her arms.
"Shh, sweetie. Shh. It's ok. You're safe now."
She conducted a conversation over my head with the officer and then I was being lead into the back of an ambulance. She held my hand the entire way.
"The doctor needs to check you out for damage, Jake."
I nodded and someone took off my pants and underwear for me. There was an intake of breath.
"He's a boy?"
"Yeah," Sadie said, "Seems that no one really believes him, though."
"Hmm. How old is he?"
"You're eighteen, aren't you Jake?"
"Yeah." I said noncommittally.
"What's wrong, doctor?"
"I'd prefer to talk to him privately if you don't mind."
Sadie began to rise and I just held onto her. I didn't want to be alone right now.
"Don't leave me."
"Ok, Jake. I'll stay here."
"Jake, I'd like to run a couple of tests, is that alright?"
"They've already run tons of test, doctor. They even ran an MRI and Sonogram, well in the other order."
"Well, I would be running other tests. I don't think you are intersexed, or whatever they want us to call it these days. I think there is something wrong with your endocrine system, specifically with your testes."
"There's something wrong with my balls?"
"Well, that's the crass way to put it."
"Ok, is there something I need to sign?"
"No, but it will hurt."
I held onto Sadie as the doctor inserted a needle into my scrotum. It didn't hurt as much as I expected it to. That's not to say that it didn't hurt.
"Let me take this into the lab sand then I'll be back to finish my exam."
I waited there, holding onto Sadie, just crying. It wasn't fair, but then life rarely was.
"Hey, why are you letting this affect you, Jake. You're the big strong guy, aren't you?"
"How would you react to almost getting raped?"
"Well…ok. I didn't think about it that way. That must have been worse for you, though, because you think of yourself as a guy."
"No, it's worse for me because I'm stupid. Brad offered to take me across campus and I threw it in his face. I knew that there were rumors of stuff like this happening, but for whatever reason I thought, 'this doesn't affect me. I'm a guy.' Pretty stupid, huh?"
"I think it's very human," the doctor said as she came back in.
"In the recent months, I've had a number of girls in here thinking this wouldn't happen to them for whatever reason."
"But no other guys."
"No, I've had no other guys."
"So, what was with the needle?"
"I was taking tissue samples. I'm having the lab look them other in the microscope. I doubt that it is ovum material, but I'm equally sure it's not testicular material either."
"You think it could be…" Sadie began.
"No, I don't. His testes might be overly small, but I doubt that. It would require other physiological differences, and he just isn't developing in that way."
The doctor finished her exam, and Sadie and I sat there waiting for the results after I got dressed.
They moved us out of the exam room after about ten minutes, and we ended up waiting in the eponymous room while they finished all of the tests.
"Are you feeling better, Jake?"
My trembling had eased and I was simply leaning against her, not grasping her like she was my one salvation.
I nodded into her shoulder.
"Jacob Peters?"
We followed the nurse back to a small office where the doctor was sitting waiting for us.
"Would you still like her to be here? This is private information I will be sharing."
Sadie got up to leave, and for a moment I thought about asking her to stay, but it was only a moment.
"I'll be in the waiting room."
"Thank you."
"Mr. Peters. I'm not sure if you got my name earlier. I'm Dr. Conrad."
"It is so weird thinking of a female doctor with a male sounding name."
"Tell me about it. I have seriously considered changing my name. The only thing that keeps me with it is the continual hope that someone will marry me and change it for me."
I giggled at this.
"I am still waiting on the results of your karyotype test, but you don't have male reproductive organs."
"What…?"
"Your testes are fibrous, or at least the portions I tested are. There doesn't seem to be any banding…"
"Wait. What does all of this mean?"
"It means that at least physically, you are missing some of the important bits to be male. I'll want you to see an endocrinologist to check your hormone levels, but it is likely that you are producing very little, if at all, of any of the sex hormones."
"You mentioned something about a carry-type test?"
"Karyotype. It is a check of your chromosomes. It will tell us if you are genetically male or female."
I passed out.
"Jake, honey. Wake up."
"Sadie?"
"Welcome back, Jackie."
I gave her a sour smile, and the doctor looked at us questioningly.
"A nickname the girls in my gaming group gave me."
"Ah. So, I would like you back here to talk to the endocrinologist on Tuesday if that's alright?"
"It should be. What time?"
"Sometime after two should be fine. His schedule is clear on Tuesday after two. He likes to go golfing then, but he'll make an exception for me."
I giggled at this, and Sadie joined in.
"I didn't think that doctors really spent all their time going golfing," I said.
"Just Jim…I mean Dr. Childs."
She blushed, but I let it pass. It wasn't my place to tease this woman that I didn't know.
"Good night, Dr. Conrad, unless there's something else you need Jake for?"
"No, here, Jake. This card has the doctor's name, as well as the time for your appointment."
"Thank you, Doctor."
Dr. Beverly Conrad's card had her name and phone number on the front. She'd written my appointment date and time with Dr. James Childs on the back, with his office phone number as well.
I walked out of the room and collected Sadie.
"So?"
"Well, apparently she doesn't know if I'm male or female either." I'd meant it as a joke, but I was a little bitter about it.
"Really?"
Sadie didn't get the joke either.
"Yeah, apparently my testicles are fibrous, which apparently means they aren't really testicles."
"Wow."
"Yeah, that's pretty much my own reaction."
"What does it mean for you? I mean…"
"What I think it means first off is I never have to worry about getting a girl pregnant."
Sadie blushed and I giggled.
"Well, with that giggle, I'm not sure that was ever something you needed to worry about in the first place."
I punched her in the arm and she laughed.
"So, we going to the game?"
"Well, um…"
"Sadie, I need to unwind more now than ever. And if I can take some aggression out on some poor hapless monsters in a make believe game…"
"Well, ok, but I told Carla we would likely not be showing up. She understands."
"I really want to go. Please?"
There were those tears in my eyes again. I angrily wiped them away. I wasn't that person.
"Ok, let's go."
"Um, how are we going to get home?"
"Ladies. I would be honored to give you a ride."
An officer stepped over from where he'd been sitting next to the door. He was actual police, as opposed to the campus cop who'd helped me earlier.
"I'm a guy."
"Well…sorry…the offer still stands."
Sadie pushed me, "Jake and I would love a ride back to MIT."
"Jake Peters? You were the one from earlier…?"
"The guy who was almost raped tonight? Yep, that's me. Everyone look at the freak," I'd begun to raise my voice as I went on, and the officer glowered at me.
"That was uncalled for, son. I didn't mean anything by it. I know you've had a rough night of it, and I don't want to make it an worse for you, ok? I was actually here to take your statement. Someone from the front desk told me you'd gone home, and then there was a gunshot victim…regardless. This is my job, and I thought I could at least get something out of it by giving a couple of pretty college students a ride home."
Sadie blushed, but I glowered.
"You don't look like a guy, which I really think contributed to tonight, don't you, Jake?"
"I guess."
"So, if I could get your statement I'll give you la..both a ride home."
I shook my head at him. There was a possibility, it seemed, that he might be right about me being a girl. It was still a foreign concept, but it was something I might be able to get used to.
I gave him my statement, and then we climbed into the cramped back seat of the police car. Unlike on TV, where it seems to just be like a normal sedan backseat, there was almost no room. I was glad I wasn't any taller than I was, as my knees were smashed into the back of the seat in front of me. Well, it would be more accurate to say that they were smashed into the metal shield that separated the seat in front of me from the passenger compartment.
Sadie spent the entire trip chatting the officer up.
We got out and walked into the building and made our way up to Carla's room.
I knocked on the door.
"Jackie! We were so worried!"
I collapsed into Jasmine's arms and just cried. Her statement opened up something inside me, and I spend the next couple of hours, not crafting spells or moving my avatar through a supernatural city, but being comforted by a group of friends.
We told stories about our lives, and I told them who I really was.
Well, Carla and Sadie already knew.
"Jackie, there is no way you're a boy."
"What are you talking about, Yaz. I am male."
"Yes, you're male, well at least physically, but you're no boy."
"What?"
"You are too soft."
"Yeah, I think that's a hormone issue."
"No, I mean mentally. You are a marshmallow."
"Yaz," Sadie exclaimed.
"Well, it's true."
"What do you mean, Yaz," I asked.
"I mean that you are, well, feminine in your mannerisms, and behaviors."
"Oh come on. I walked across campus alone to prove…"
"How independent you are? That is not gender specific. There are girls and guys that act stupid."
I blushed and the others laughed at me. I smiled weakly at them.
"Well, how does me being a marshmallow make me a girl, then, if behaviors aren't gender specific."
Jasmine opened her mouth to respond, and then shut it again.
"Actually, why not put him in drag? I mean look at Alex on the Glee Project. The first time he was in drag, everything made sense. Or should I say she…I mean all of his mannerisms that were so weird when he was presenting as a guy suddenly all made sense."
We all looked at Carla blankly.
"Wait, none of you watched it?"
There was general laughter at this.
"I think I understand what she means, and we don't need to put Jackie in drag to see it," Katie said
I looked at her, the question in my eyes.
"Without any makeup, and only wearing the jacket, Sadie mistook you for a female the first time she met you. Jasmine did the same. People assume you are a female, Jackie. It fits their image of you. From what you've been telling us, you're going to need to take hormones regardless of whether you're a genetic male or not. If that's the case, why not take female ones?"
I cocked my head at her, trying to figure out the joke.
"That's my line, Jackie. I'm the shifter, remember."
I stuck my tongue out at her, and the other's giggled at me. I smiled and joined in.
"Well, I'm not much one for sleepovers, so if we aren't playing, I'm going to bed," Jasmine said.
"I'm heading out too," Katie said.
A cold pit formed in my stomach and I began to sweat.
"Sadie, how about the two of us walk Jackie home, and then you and I can walk back together. It won't strand you at her house tonight."
The fear that had begun to grip me dissipated. It was earlier than it had been last week, but it was still the middle of the night. There really isn't much difference between one and three in the morning on a Sunday.
I had a lot to think about as I walked. I tried to keep up my side of the conversation, but it was obvious to Carla and Sadie that my mind was somewhere else. The lights were all on when we got to my house.
"Jake, thank goodness you're ok. We weren't able to get in touch with you, and the fact that there was another rape on campus."
"Why did you immediately think of me?"
Brad blushed bright red, and Seth came to his rescue, "because apparently you two had a lover's quarrel just before the attack happened.
"I wasn't raped, guys. It was only an attempted rape."
"Are you ok?"
"Who was it?"
"I'm walking you to your game from now on!"
Brad's outburst, the last one, was finished in relative silence. I smiled at him as the other's laughed.
"Brad, I'm and adult…"
"Yeah, like tonight? Take care of yourself? How did that work out?"
"I was going to say I can arrange for my own escort."
I turned on my heel and stormed into my room. Who did he think he was? I was old enough to take care of myself. I didn't need a father figure in my life.
I was mad and scared and I think I screamed a couple of times in frustration. I got undressed and got in bed.
It took hours for me to sleep. I just wanted someone to hold me and tell me that everything would be alright, even thought I was sure in that moment that it never would be.
I stayed in my room until Monday morning. Brad brought me my meals, and I started feeling bad for him. I was being too harsh on him, I think.
I went to class and started to feel a bit more normal. I jumped at everything, but at least I was out there in the midst of the other students.
I finished up my classes on Tuesday and caught a cab over to the hospital. I wasn't feeling up to an hour walk at the moment.
I got out and asked about the doctor at the information desk. I made my way to his office and knocked quietly on the door. I really wasn't feeling up to this today.
"Enter!"
"Dr. Childs," I asked as I opened the door.
"You must be Mr. Peters. You're actually in luck. I've had no labs in the past couple of days, so I think I can get yours expedited. Also, I can check with Dr. Conrad about your karyotype. It should be done today or tomorrow."
"This is so…sudden."
He smiled a pleasant smile at me.
"Well, nothing to worry about there. Dr. Conrad likes to get things going quickly and decisively."
"So, what do we do?"
"I take some blood and then we hang out for a couple of hours. Personally, I'd like you to talk to a therapist in the mean time, but that is completely up to you."
"A therapist?"
"You may have a difficult choice to make. You are physically male, but you might be genetically female. A therapist might make deciding which way you want to go…"
"There are choices? I thought male was male, and female was female."
"Not necessarily. It is a lot more complicated than that, realy."
"Fine, I'll talk to a therapist."
"Don't sound so excited."
This actually caused me to giggle.
"Do you prefer a man or a woman?"
"I prefer a competent one."
"They're both good."
"Whichever one can distract me for the next two hours."
"Fine, you can talk to Harriet."
He lead me down to the psychiatric wing while committing small talk.
"You don't think I'm crazy do you?"
"What? Oh, no. This is just where all of the head cases work."
I smiled at his attempt at a joke.
"Harriet?"
"Huh? Oh, hi Jim."
"You have time to talk to Jake? I spoke yesterday with you about him."
"Sure. Just tell him to come by whenever."
"Um…"
"Jake, this is Harriet."
She blushed, "I'm so sorry. I thought you were…"
"A girl. I get that a lot."
Dr. Childs left and I was alone with Harriet.
"So, tell me a bit about yourself."
"I am going to MIT. I play role-playing games. I love my mother."
Harriet laughed at this last bit.
"I'm not a psychoanalyst, Jake. I'm not going to analyze whether or not you established the proper sexual queues in your infancy."
"Wha…?"
"Sorry, psychologist joke. So, physically male?"
"Yep."
"So, what gender are you?"
"Wait, didn't you just say…"
"That is your sex, Jake. Who you physically are. I was asking who you are mentally. In these games of yours. Do you tend to play girls or guys?"
I blushed and couldn't answer.
"That wasn't a trick question, Jake. There are men who play female roles. It is not because they are female. There are women who play male roles for the same reason. They don't identify with their characters. They like to watch them, in cases of video games, or they like the attention of the non-player characters. They might even enjoy the sexuality of it."
I blushed even hotter.
"Is that…"
"No, it's just that I'm not used to people talking about sex so casually."
"Ah. Sheltered youth?"
"Something like that."
"That's normal for some people as well. So, I take it from your response that you play female characters?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
I stopped and thought about it for a minute or two. "It's always been easier than playing a guy."
"How so?"
"Well…it…fits? No that's not exactly right. I wore really masculine clothing in high school. I tried out for the football team and the baseball team. Didn't make it, but I at least made it past the first cut. I was always trying so hard to fit their idea of who I was. When I played my games, it was a case of relaxing. I could try out the waters. See how I felt about it. I acted like myself and my character happened to be female. Wait, you don't think…"
"Let's not get ahead of yourself here. I'm trying not to make any specific determinations yet."
"Why does everyone think I'm female?"
"Why do you say that?"
"Sure, I have a girl's leather jacket, but even before that they either thought I was gay or just a girl. Since I got the jacket, everyone assumes I'm female."
"Why did you get a girl's jacket?"
"From my job. I buy storage facilities at auction. There was a jacket in one so I decided to keep it for myself instead of selling it to the second hand shop. I needed a coat anyway."
"Well, it's quite pretty on you."
I blushed and said, "Thanks."
She got a thoughtful look on her face.
"You don't mind being called pretty?"
"No. I know what you mean. I look good. Because I look feminine, you say pretty as opposed to handsome."
"Actually, I called you pretty because you look pretty. Better than half the anorexic models I get in here after they collapse at a photo shoot."
I really blushed at that, but I was smiling at the same time.
"That pleases you?"
"You're just trying to trick me now," I said with a scowl.
"No, Jake. I'm not. I'm testing the waters. Saying what I feel and seeing how you react."
I mulled this over. "So, do you think I act like a girl? My friends do."
"Well, the real issue is do you feel like you're a girl? If you feel like a boy, then we can help you. If you feel like a girl, we can help you too. it all depends on what you want."
"I don't know. I just want to be myself, I think."
"Well, that is all any of us can ask for."
We just started talking, then. Not about anything specific, but more about nothing at all. Before I knew it Dr. Childs was knocking on the door.
"We're about done here, Jim."
"Thanks, Harriet."
"What's the news?"
"Well, the obvious part is that you have almost no androgens or estrogens in your system. No male or female hormones. It was the karyotype that took the time. They finally got that to me, and you are male, at least genetically."
"Well, I guess that answers that," I said frowning.
"What's wrong, Jake," Harriet asked.
"I'm male. Guess that means I need testosterone shots or something."
"You want that?"
I thought about it for a moment. There was a flutter of hope in my chest, which I quickly thrust down. "I guess…"
"Jim, would there be any problem with us giving it a week?"
"No. He's made it this far without any serious complications. I think we can go another week without too much difficulty."
"Ok, Jake. Think about it this week. I'll see you again this time next Tuesday. We need to give you one or the other, and at this point, since there are no other concerns, I'll leave that choice up to you."
"A choice?"
"Male or female hormones, Jake."
I was in a daze as I walked out of the hospital and caught another cab. Did they just give me the choice I think they did?
I think it's called epiphany.
That one word, in my opinion is under used in the English language. It's like serendipity, only a lot more personal. When all of the scattered conversations and individual glimpses into the divine come together into a glorious whole, that is epiphany.
And no, Tuesday wasn't that day for me.
The rest of my week was a blur. I was doing well in school, but then again I expected to. I wasn't stupid by any stretch of the imagination, and I only scheduled work and play on the weekend for a reason. The rest of the week bowed down at the pedagogical throne.
Friday I had something new to worry about. I was down to 105 pounds. I looked at myself in the mirror that evening after classes, naked of course, and tried to see what everyone else saw. I just saw skin and bones. Ok, I wasn't quite that bad, but I had a very waifish appearance.
I'd only been here for a few weeks and already I was down to a sliver over one hundred pounds.
I put it out of my head as I got ready for bed that evening, but it was something that bothered me. I really needed a big score tomorrow so that I could feel confident in getting myself some real food. Apparently what I was currently eating just wasn't enough for me.
I was back at Adamantium Secure Storage the next day.
I rented a truck that day. Something about this morning felt different to me. I was worried about my lack of bulk. The fact that I was about to begin taking hormones of one sort or another flitted through my mind. Visions of who I was about to become plagued me.
I stopped by the manager's office to take a look at the units up for bid, and one caught my eye. It had been rented here for the longest period of any unit, active or not. Fifteen years. Who keeps a storage locker for fifteen years?
"Is that a typo?"
"Nope. It's not. Fifteen years. It was initially rented out by a young man in college. 'Bout a year after that his sister, I think, picked up the lease. She's had it here since then. She occasionally drops off more stuff, but never comes to pick anything up."
What could be in that locker? Fifteen years worth of dropping things off. College age kids wouldn't have had much use for a storage locker, but they'd be in their mid-thirties now. They might have something.
I saw Stan wandering around the lot, and waved to him. The crowd of other bidders was a bit heavier than usual. I noticed a woman who seemed completely out of place here. She didn't look like the rest of the vultures. She seemed unsure and a little determined. She was middling pretty and wore a business suit.
We wandered around the facility until the manager came out to begin auctioning. He started with the jewel.
"So that everyone is on equal footing, I'd like to mention that this unit was actually insured. I'm not going to tell you the amount, since that would be cheating," he said this last with a smile, "but it is insured. Who will start me off at five hundred."
"Five hundred," the woman stated with a smile.
She was starting early, and I had a feeling about her. She was new or she was the former owner of the stuff. That could get ugly when I won, and I planned on winning.
"One thousand," I said clearly.
"1001," the woman replied. She had a smile still on her face as if this was the biggest joke ever.
"Fifteen," Stan said.
"1501," replied the woman.
"Five thousand." There was a gasp from the woman and Stan looked at me with an appraising look in his eye.
"5001," she said. The confidence had left her, but she was still determined.
"Nine," Stan replied.
She took a deep, calming breath, and said, "ninety-one hundred."
She was only now starting to get what real bidding was all about, but it was too late for her. Stan was losing confidence, and she was beyond what she could afford. Time to end this.
"Ten thousand dollars."
Stan smiled over at me, willing to let me have it. The woman paled, let out a sigh, and started to cry a bit. She walked quickly away from the unit. My victory was a little pyrrhic. Sure, I'd won the contents of the locker, but I'd done so directly from the owner of the unit.
It hadn't cost me my life, but it felt as though I truly no longer wanted to win.
I put on my lock and wandered around with the rest of the bidders. Stan picked up a unit for a couple hundred dollars, but that was Stan for you. He rarely liked to go above a thousand when he could help it.
All of the auctions were done, and I pulled the truck into the lot. Now was the moment of truth. I opened up the locker and found boxes. They were stacked all the way to the ceiling.
Good thing I brought the truck.
I began to move the boxes into the truck. I checked a couple of them and they all seemed to be filled with clothing. With this many boxes of clothing, I'd have to donate a little each week to the second hand store, and possibly look for another one or two stores to do business with.
I had moved somewhere around twenty boxes when I finally broke through the wall and could see what was in the rest of the unit. I began to smile. I wasn't and expert by any stretch of the imagination, but the sheer volume of furniture in that unit made my heart race.
I'd seen other units with antique furniture in them, but never anything like this. Someone had taken great care to store this. It was all raised off the ground on pallets and there were tarps to prevent leaks. The unit wasn't hermetically sealed, of course, but it was as close as you could get with a public storage facility.
I called Edgar, "I have a load of furniture here I'd like you to take a look at. I rented my own truck this week, so if you'd like to bring some guys to move it today…"
"No, Jackie, I think I'll move it tomorrow or Monday. Let me get down there to have a look at it."
"Ok, see ya soon."
I continued moving boxes into the truck so that there clear access to the back of the locker. Toward the back I ran into a group of boxes marked fragile, so I set them aside and continued moving clothes into the truck. It didn't fill the truck, but there were a lot of boxes up there.
Edgar took one look into the locker and paled.
"Jackie-boy. You hit the motherlode."
"What are you talking about?"
"There are desks with matching chairs. There is a table in there, with chairs. Period matched. Someone spent a lot of money on this furniture, or they've had it in their family for a very long time. Rough estimate? Five hundred."
"Dollars? Well, that's ok, I guess." The floor had dropped out from under me. It happened.
"No, thousand."
My jaw dropped and I stared at him.
"You're kidding."
"Nope, never. After my cut…you'll be looking at a little under three hundred thousand dollars."
That couldn't be possible.
I walked over to the boxes and opened them. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Fine china. It didn't look antique, but it looked impressive none the less.
"Wow, this day keeps getting better and better for you."
"What is it?"
Edgar was wearing gloves, like usual, and carefully picked up the plate on top. He turned it over and I saw a few words printed there. Noritake. Nippon. Hand Painted.
"What is it," I asked again.
The front had a beautiful floral pattern on it.
"This, Jackie, seems to be a complete set of Noritake china," he began looking through the other boxes, "several complete sets actually."
"I never thought I'd own fine china."
"Unless these are reproductions, which is possible, I wouldn't suggest eating off them. You're probably looking at a couple thousand dollars worth of china here."
"So, I doubt you're going to but this off me," I said gesturing to the rest of the locker.
"Nope, but I will sell it for you. There are a couple of other outlets that I'd like to try as well. There is a lot of history in here. Might not get as much if we offer it to a museum…"
"I'll let you decide."
I was confident in my options. I had everything I needed even if this got me another two hundred thousand.
It was everything that I needed to get all the way through school without needing to bid on another locker.
I carefully moved the china onto the truck and drove it home. The guys were still asleep so I moved the boxes on my own into my room. Well, and the living room, and under the stairs.
There was little room for the boxes in our small house. I began to unpack the boxes, going through them one by one. Sorting the salable, usable, and garbage from among them.
Strangely enough it all seemed to be in my size. I held up some of the clothing to me, seeing how it would look.
I was smiling and having a good time when I opened a box and saw a pair of breasts looking up at me. I reached out and touched them, afraid of what else might be in the box.
There was a sheet of paper behind the breasts and looking at it I breathed a sigh of relief. They were something called breast forms. Use and care instructions were on the sheet of paper. there were a couple of other breast forms, both B cups like the first one, as well as women's clothing. It almost looked like the women's clothing was there as packing material.
I closed the box and continued sorting through the clothing. It was more men's clothing and I was beginning to think that the breast forms were a fluke, but then I ran into a box full of skirts. On a whim I held one up against me, and it seemed as though it might fit.
The thoughts I'd had through the week sort of culminated into a 'why not?' sort of a thought.
I read the instructions a couple of times for the breast forms and then went for it. I picked out a matching bra and panty set from the box and slipped them on. I'd expected the panties to at least feel a little weird, but they didn't. a bit tight in the front, maybe, but overall they felt comfortable. They were black and lacey. The bra had a front closure, for which I was thankful. I slipped it on and closed it. I adjusted the straps so that they sat properly on my shoulders next.
Then I slipped in the breast forms.
They had a sort of self adhesive that held them in place, or at least kept them from sliding around. I could see the edges, but I wasn't too worried about it.
It felt strange to have that weight on my chest, and threw off my center of gravity a little bit.
I looked at myself in the mirror, and was shocked at what I saw. I was so…feminine.
I grabbed one of the skirts and pulled it on. It seemed to give me a waist. I noticed a few hairs here and there on my legs so I decided to shave them off. I went to the downstairs bathroom and took care of that, and checked my face. There was nothing there to speak of, so I felt confident in my attire.
I headed back out and quickly found a cream blouse to fit the navy blue of the pencil skirt I was now wearing.
I looked at myself in the mirror and brushed my hair into what I thought was a little more feminine style.
Then I set to work with more energy than I'd had before. I bypassed all of the boxes with guy's clothing and focused on the boxes with girl's clothing.
I was so engrossed that I didn't even notice the door opening.
"Hey, have you seen Jake anywhere?"
I looked up startled and saw Brad standing in the doorway.
"I don't think we've met. My name is Brad."
"I know who you are, Brad."
"Do we have classes together? Wait, that voice…"
"Yes, Brad, you should recognize…"
"Jake!?"
I smiled. The look on his face was so…precious.
"But you…skirt…breasts…"
I was forcefully reminded of what I was wearing. I blushed and turned away from him.
"Stop, Jake. What's going on here?"
"I got some girl's clothing today."
"And you just thought you'd try it on and it gave you breasts…"
"No. Those are breast forms. Like these."
I showed him one of the other bags.
"That is so…weird."
He was getting a glazed look in his eye, and he shifted uncomfortably. Then he looked over at me and blushed.
"Look, if you don't want to join us today, that's fine Jake. I know there's only the one other girl who plays, and frankly, she's a little butch."
"Brad, I'm still a guy."
"Really? You told us about what they told you at the hospital."
"But."
"Jake, look. Let me prove it to you."
He walked over to me, and my heart began to pound. I thought I knew what he wanted to do, and I was rooted to the floor. Part of me wanted to move away from him, but part of me wanted…him.
He put his arms around me and drew me in close to him. I placed the gentlest of kisses on my lips and I melted.
He helped me sit down on the bed.
"Now, Jackie, tell me that you're a guy."
"Huh? What? Um…if I do will you kiss me again?"
He got a goofy grin on his face and laughed.
"You know, you were beginning to make me question my sexuality."
"Huh?" I know. Complete articulation here.
"Ever since you got that jacket, I find myself drawn more and more to you. It is like a switch was thrown and my mind started saying, man, that Jackie is kinda cute."
I blushed. I mean really blushed.
I tried to hide my face in the hair I did not have.
Brad put a finger under my chin and lifted my face to his.
"Hey, Brad. We need to get going. Who's the hottie."
"Seth," I exclaimed. I felt different about Brad calling me cute and Seth calling me hot.
"Wait…Jake? Dayum. You really are a girl."
I giggled at this and Brad and Seth began laughing.
"So, I take it this means you're not joining us for the game?"
"Nope, she has some unpacking to do it seems."
"She? I was kidding."
"No, I don't think it's a joke."
"Seth, at least for this weekend, I think I'll dress this way. I have that decision to make on Tuesday, and I figured that it would be a good idea to see how the other half lives."
"Well, here's hoping you stay that way. You really add some eye candy to the house."
"Out, Seth, out," Brad said as he shoved Seth out of my room.
I tried on a number of other outfits. Some of it was too small for me, so I packed it back up. Some a bit too big in the bust and hips. That I set aside, thinking I might eventually grow into it. A lot of it fit me like a glove.
I packed up my limited array of guy things and made room for the girl things.
An inkling of an idea came to me and I realized that another student, fifteen years ago, had gone through the same sort of transformation I just had.
It made me smile, actually.
When I was done, my closet was filled with dresses, skirts, and blouses. I had jeans and tee shirts, and all of the underwear I thought I would ever need.
There were even shoes in there.
I tried walking a bit in the heels and realized this was a skill that it would take me a bit to learn. I ended up wearing the navy skirt and cream top I first tried on. I slipped on a pair of navy flats. I didn't know what the style was called, but they kind of looked a bit like a slipper, only out of leather.
I slipped on my jacket, and realized that my modest breast size filled it out perfectly.
I closed up the jacket and felt…sexy. That's all I can describe it as. I would have loved to wear a heel with the ensemble, but I really didn't feel confident enough to try it yet.
"I take it you're ready to go?"
"Yes, Brad, I'm ready to go."
Something was different, though, as we walked across the campus. He was quieter than usual, and I had a hard time getting him to open up. I leaned up against him, and he put his arm around me as we walked. I was beginning to get comfortable when he pushed me away.
"Come on, Jake. This is a little weird, ok? I know I kissed you earlier, but I'm not gay."
I didn't know what to think about his statement. I didn't feel like a guy in this clothing. Not that I'm sure I ever felt like a guy, but I felt even less of one now. I was just trying…
"Ok, Brad. I'm sorry."
My eyes burned, and I did my best to hold everything in. It wasn't fair. Here, I had finally realized something, or thought I had, and my best friend was rejecting me.
Ok, so Sadie was likely my best friend here, but in my heart Brad took a close second. He had introduced me to his group of friends and they had accepted me as far as being Brad's friend. I had hung out with them, when Brad invited me along…
Remember what I said at the beginning about epiphany.
I realized that I'd basically been Brad's girlfriend since the beginning of school.
I stopped there in the middle of the sidewalk, shocked so badly that I couldn't take another step. Yes, my feelings for Brad had been moving in that direction, and it was only the fact that I wore this outfit that allowed Brad to admit that he'd been thinking along the same lines.
"Brad, I'm sorry that I embarrassed you. I'll get Seth or one of the other guys to walk me next week. Good bye."
"Jake, come on. Jake."
I walked faster and faster to get ahead of him. How could I have been so stupid.
"Jackie!"
I began to run. I was very glad for the flats at that moment. I got to Carla's building and only momentarily slowed down for the door. I climbed the mountain to her room and knocked on the door…the moment before I collapsed there in front of it.
I was crying, sobbing really. I didn't even know that I was feeling that way toward Brad, and now it was gone. I felt arms help me up and into the room and the murmur of comforting voices.
There was a pounding at the door and I could hear Brad's voice outside it.
"Jackie, I'm sorry."
"Go away, Brad. Don't you think you've done enough, whatever it is you did," Sadie asked him through the door.
"Sadie, you've got to let me in. I need to explain…"
I shook my head and Sadie frowned.
"Jackie doesn't want to talk to you right now, Brad. Go home."
"But…ok." Something sounded a bit broken in him. It made me want to get up and go to him. To try to comfort him.
"Be strong, girl. You don't want to come off as desperate."
I looked at Carla shocked. Then I remembered what I was wearing.
"So, Jackie, you going girl I take it?"
I smiled a bit at the strange statement from Katie.
"Spill, Jackie, what's going on?"
Sadie was a little cross and a lot confused, or so it seemed I decided to keep it short.
"Brad kissed me, earlier, to prove he thought of me as a girl or something, and then while we were walking over here he told me he wasn't gay and pushed me away."
"Look, guys are jerks, ok. It happens," Katie said. "I know this was your first real relationship, Jackie, but we all have to go through it some time."
"But, I didn't, I mean I'm not…" I blushed.
"You're not crushing on him," Jasmine asked.
"Ok, yes, I have a crush on him."
"Guys, has anyone else noticed what Jackie is wearing?"
"Stand, model, now," Carla said.
I got up and did a little pirouette.
"Wow, that's…" Sadie began.
"You, Jackie. I love the mixture of burgundy and navy. It's really sexy," Katie said.
"Oh, hush. You're going to make her think she was seducing Brad or something," Jasmine said.
"Wasn't I?"
"No, Jackie, you weren't, although I'd kill to be able to wear that skirt," Carla said.
"Look, can we get to the game this week," I asked.
There was general laughter at this, but there were nods all around.
I was home, for the moment, trying to figure out what I was going to wear.
Ok, seriously? I know that you are new to the clothes thing, Jackie, but can you be serious? Carla said in her GM voice.
"Fine," I said to thin air, with a smile on my face, "but I was just considering that I have no idea how to get an ectoplasm stain out of nylon or this cotton poly blend skirt."
There was a general chorus of assent from the peanut gallery.
Fine. I can accept that, but you wore that here, so you get to wear it on the town.
"Ok, ok already."
Cell phones seemed to short out around me, and land lines weren't that better. Sometimes I wished that people would invent the mystical equivalent of those conveniences.
I went out into the chilly air, walking toward where we'd agreed to meet for the evening. We were becoming a regular coven it seemed.
"Hey, a coven is witches."
"You're point, Yaz?"
"I happen to be a wizard."
We laughed at this, and settled in for what was turning out to be a pleasant evening.
It was just turning four when Sadie, Carla and I arrived at my house. I slipped into my room and locked my door for the first time since I'd moved in. I stripped and followed the directions for storing the breast forms and then slipped into a pair of silk pajamas. They were pink, but I figured I could live with that. They felt nice, and sort of helped reinforce the whole femininity thing.
The next morning I went out and got my breakfast without changing.
"Who's the babe," I heard from behind me.
"Hey, Kelly."
"Jake?"
"You can call me Jackie if it's easier."
"Kind of figured there was something special about you. Love the pajamas by the way. They suit you."
"Thanks," I said with a smile and a blush.
"Yeah, my sister went through something like this. Of course she realized it when she was ten. Threw my parents for a loop."
"Wait, what?"
"My sister is transgendered. You know, like you are?"
"There is a word for what I'm going through?"
"Yep, whole community."
I was floored. It had never occurred to me before that there were more people…like me…out there. Of course, given infinite diversity, I guess that wasn't too hard to really comprehend.
"This is all so…new."
"Tell me about it. It took me a bit to actually accept that my older brother was now my older sister, but hey, it was who she was. She really blossomed into the role."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence," I said.
"You're welcome. If anyone gives you a hard time, let me know."
"I'm still not 100% sure that this is what I want…"
"Really? You have always struck me as…well…female. I know you always told us you were a guy, and you tried to play football with us, but…"
"You sucked, Jackie, that's the bottom line."
I looked up at Liam who was standing behind me, leaning over.
"Hey, Liam. I think you're girlfriend might have a problem with how close you're standing to me."
"Nah, I know he only has eyes for me…at least he better," Carla said.
Liam gave her a kiss in response. It reminded me of what I didn't have, and probably wouldn't have any time in the near future. Kelly's comments aside, I doubled anyone could care about someone…like me.
I tried to keep in the conversation, but I got quieter. I shut up completely when Brad came in. He took one look at me and turned around and left.
That was it. I went to my room and locked myself in again. I heard an argument between Brad and Kelly, but I stuck my head under my pillow so I couldn't hear it. I cried.
It wasn't fair, but then life never is.
I would become the man I'd always claimed that I was.
The more I thought about it the sicker I got. My stomach twisted in on itself. I just couldn't destroy my self-image to that degree.
As I came to this realization, there was a knock on my door.
"Hi, are you Jake?"
"Jackie, mostly, but yes."
"Hi, um, I know this is unusual, and well, I wanted some of my stuff back."
"Wait, what?"
"Yesterday…"
It was the woman who'd bid against me yesterday.
"Look, I've already taken the furniture to an antiques dealer."
"No, I can live without the furniture. It reminded me too much of my parents. I loved them, but they couldn't accept me for who I was."
I remembered my thoughts from yesterday.
"You're like me, aren't you. I mean you were born…male?"
She blushed and looked around.
"The guys here know, at least about me. I came to school as a guy to begin with. I'm seriously thinking of changing that."
"Only do it if you feel it. Don't change if you feel pressured into it."
"Why do you say that?"
"My…friend…recently committed suicide. She felt that to better understand me, she needed to become like me. She knew I was a lesbian and well…she changed for me. A few months ago…"
I stood up and put my arms around the older woman. She was considerably taller than me, but she succeeded in crying on my shoulder anyway.
"Just to let you know, I think I'm heterosexual."
She laughed at this. I could hear some of the original depth of her voice as she laughed. I guess some things are harder for some people than it will ever be for me.
"Just to let you know, I prefer more mature women."
I giggled.
"You are so natural."
"It helps to have a developmental condition. Apparently I never had any testicles."
"I'm so jealous right now."
"If you don't want the furniture…"
"I want my trousseau."
"Huh? Wait…"
"My parents only had one child. So did my mother's parents. My Great-grandparents only had one girl. My mother was given all six sets of the china my great-grandparents had purchased for their female children.
"My mother broke one set when I told her who I was. It is my trousseau, even though my mother would never want me to take it as such."
"You bid over nine thousand dollars for the china."
"Yes, even though I couldn't afford it. I can pay you five thousand for it."
"No, I'm sorry. I can't take five thousand for that."
"Oh. Well…"
"No, you misunderstand. I can't take your money. I'm giving you the china back. You don't want any of the clothing…do you?"
She laughed at this, but it was more controlled this time.
"I see you're already making use of that."
I blushed. I was still in the pink PJs.
"Look, I can tell that you don't have many girl things, well, except for the clothing. Let's go shopping."
"Um, I don't think."
"I need someone to help me carry these boxes anyway."
She left so that I could change into something more suitable. I was already noticing that I'd have to get a new jacket as the one I had really limited my clothing choices. Since I'd be working I went with a pair of blue jeans and a black tee.
"You're really new to this, aren't you?"
"What?"
"Those jeans are really tight…"
I looked down and could see what she was referring to. I'd never been really well endowed by any stretch of the imagination, but I was visibly male in those jeans.
"Um, I'll get changed then."
"No, you just need to move…that…somewhere less visible." She was blushing.
"Where do you…oh. You mean not in front."
I went back into my room and tried a couple of things. Some were really uncomfortable, and some less so. Eventually I found something that I thought would work. It wasn't really uncomfortable, and as soon as I got the jeans back in place it began to get a little more comfortable.
I looked at myself in the mirror and smiled. I looked perfect in those jeans, and they really hugged my butt.
"Much better, Jackie. Oh, I'm Sam by the way."
"If you could pick your name, why go with Sam?"
"I did pick my name. I was originally Peter. I like Samantha better."
We moved the boxes out to her mini-van. I was very careful while moving them. She was a bit less careful. I doubt either of us broke any of the items in the boxes. We drove to her house which was near the Harvard campus and unloaded the boxes.
"Who's this? A new friend, Sam?"
"Just a friend, Amy. Jackie, this is Amy, my landlord."
The woman was grey haired and shriveled up, but there was a twinkle in her eyes that decried a vitality her obvious age did not support.
"Hi, Amy."
"Welcome Jackie. I hope she's wrong about the friend thing. She needs to move on."
"Sorry, Amy, I'm hetero."
We all got a good laugh at this, and then we climbed back into the van.
"I want to do something about your hair first."
"Is there really enough to style?"
"We'll have to see."
I expected to drive to a salon of some sort, but Sam pulled up in front of a house a couple of blocks away from her home.
"Sam! Your next appointment isn't for another week."
"Hi, Landon. You have room to be able to squeeze in this cutie?"
"Hmmm. Well, This seems to be an emergency," the man said, "so yes, I can squeeze her in."
Stereotypically, male hair dressers are depicted in movies and TV as flamboyant, whether or not they are gay.
Landon wasn't…flamboyant I mean. I didn't know whether or not he was gay.
"So…"
"Jackie."
"So, Jackie. What can I do for you. You seem to have had a really masculine haircut last time."
"I did. I was trying…"
"Jackie was male at the time she got the haircut."
"You don't say. Well, we'll just have to fix that."
"Sam!"
"Jackie! Landon is a good guy, and very discreet."
"I'm right here, ladies." It seemed he put just the slightest emphasis on the word for my benefit, so I smiled up at him.
"Now, Jackie, your hair is a bit short for much of anything that I could do. I am mostly limited to either a pageboy or a pixie cut. I could get away with a slightly longer pixie cut…"
"What is a pixie cut?"
He pulled out a book and flipped to the right page. The face smiling up at me had similar features to the one I looked at in the mirror every day. The hair, though…
"That's kind of sexy…"
"Is that really a bad thing, Jackie? I mean you're trying to show your femininity to the rest of the world, and what better way to do that than being, well, sexy."
"But…"
"If you're not comfortable with it, I can try something else."
My stomach felt like it was filled with ice, but nothing ventured…
"Do it, now, before I change my mind."
"Sit right here, milady, and we'll get you taken care of."
I sat down and he started in on my hair. The nervousness that I felt as he started only increased. I was starting to fidget a little, at which point he asked me to relax. He finished before I really got fidgety again.
"Ok, take a look."
I looked at myself in the mirror, and I was shocked. I barely recognized myself. Just a simple haircut, and I really looked…well I looked gorgeous at least as far as I measured these things.
"Landon, you missed something."
He turned me to face him, and then smiled.
"Let me shape your eyebrows really quickly, Jackie. They are fine as they are, but they could fit your style a little better."
A couple of tears escaped as he removed what felt like half of the hairs from my face. When I was allowed to see myself in the mirror again, I was completely changed. The girl in the mirror smiled at me, and I felt my heart leap in my chest, because I knew that the girl in the mirror was me.
A couple more tears fell, but these were tears of joy.
"Thank you so much, Sam."
"You're welcome, Jackie."
"So, you ladies out for a night on the town?"
"We have another stop first, but I have to make a phone call before we do."
Sam walked into the other room leaving me alone with Landon.
"So, Jackie. I know this is new to you, and normally I don't ask out clients, but, would you mind going to dinner with me sometime?"
I looked at him, shocked.
"I'm really not expecting more than dinner, Jackie. Not that I won't admit to wanting more, but I know…What I'm trying to say is I'm straight. I'm sort of, well, normal as far as sex goes. No kink or anything. Maybe in a couple of years…" He looked at me appraisingly.
"Sorry, I'm making a fool of myself and acting really pervy."
I giggled at him.
"No apology needed, Landon. I'm a virgin in every sense of the word. In fact I'm not looking for a sexual relationship at the moment. So, if you're fine with just dinner, then I'm fine with just dinner."
"Wait, did you just say…"
"I said, yes I'll go to dinner with you."
He actually crowed.
"What's all the ruckus in here?"
"Jackie and I are going on a date sometime."
Sam smiled at me, and I blushed.
I gave him my number, and then thought of something. "Look, Landon, I currently live with a bunch of guys. Don't be put off if one of them answers, ok?"
"Ok. I'll call you sometime later in the week. Next Friday good for you?"
I smiled, and blushed, and nodded.
When we were back in the car, Sam laughed.
"Damn, girl, you really move fast."
"I've never been one to let indecision stop me from anything I wanted."
"You know, in the three years I've been going to Landon, I never even knew he was straight."
"Well, I guess it took the right kind of girl to open him up."
She looked at me appraisingly, but didn't say anything.
For how poorly the morning started, it was shaping up to be a really nice day. We drove for a little while before we stopped in front of what looked like a warehouse.
"Where are we?"
"Hell-o-e'en inc."
"Which is…"
"A costume makeup company. However, one of the best makeup artists I know works here. She taught me how to apply makeup fifteen years ago."
"Wait…makeup?" The blood drained from my face, and I must have gotten a deer in the headlights look.
"Jackie, it's not a big deal. Girls spend time when they're teenagers learning how to get makeup just right, and which colors work, or don't with their complexion. Someone like Tara can shortcut the entire process."
"But, I don't need makeup."
"No, you really don't need it. But isn't there someone who you want to eat their heart out? I mean there was a reason you were in your room, in your PJs, all day long for a reason."
I blushed crimson and she laughed at me.
"That's not funny."
"No, probably not, but I hit the nail on the head."
"Yeah, you did. There's this boy…"
"Isn't there always…well in my case it would be more 'there's this girl.'"
I giggled.
"Look. You won't need much. Just enough."
"Fine."
Tara was a treat. We spent close to four hours there. I learned what colors worked, and what didn't. She even gave me a few samples that seemed to fit me really well. When she was done, I had a really pretty evening makeup applied to my face.
The makeup didn't change my look completely, like the hair had. More, it seemed to emphasize the feminine shape already there.
"Well, you look ready for a night on the town."
"I'm not really dressed for that."
"That's fine. We'll make a stop off at your house, first."
We drove to my house and I rushed inside to get changed. I slipped as quickly as I could out of the tight jeans and then dropped the t-shirt on the floor. I looked through my closet for something that caught my eye and settled on a short black dress.
Well, short is relative. It was only a couple of inches above my knee. The front covered my bra completely, but the back was bare and showed of my lingerie.
I worried for a moment what I was going to do, and then I noticed that the dress had a couple of pockets hand sewn into the front. I smiled at Sam's ingenuity and slipped the breast forms into the dress and then put it on. It wasn't quite as natural feeling as the bra had been, but it worked, and the tightness of the dress in front prevented it from moving with the weight of the breasts.
"Jackie?"
"I don't have time for this, Brad."
He was standing in the doorway, staring at me. I'd been so engrossed in getting the front of the dress to sit right that I hadn't noticed when he came in.
"Look, I'm sorry, ok?"
"For what? Kissing me here in my room? Or rejecting me when people could see?"
""Both, or either, or I mean rejecting you."
"I think you made yourself abundantly…"
He shut me up with a kiss. My knees gave out. He held me up and continued to kiss me. I opened my mouth slightly to try and get a breath, or something, and he took that as an invitation.
All I could think about was that kiss. He was breathing hard when he finally released me and I just sat there, a slight smile on my lips, not really focusing on anything. He left before I could really respond.
"Are you about ready to go, Jackie?"
"Hmmm?"
"Jackie?"
I shook myself and stood up.
"I need a pair of shoes."
"Try these."
She handed me a two inch heel and I pulled back.
"I can't wear those."
"You have to learn sometime. Especially with how short you are. And you may want to touch up your makeup."
My lipstick was a little smeared, so I cleaned it off and re-applied it. Sam chuckled behind me.
"Stop it!"
"So, the makeup worked?"
"If by worked you mean did he kiss me so thoroughly that I almost orgasmed, then yes it worked."
"He didn't…"
"No, but my tonsils got a thorough cleaning."
"If you are a virgin, how do you know what an orgasm feels like."
"I was looking for a specific feel to how he kissed me."
"Well, you did look a little dazed when I came in."
"That's because he's a good kisser."
"Well, we need to get going."
She gave me a brief instruction on how to walk in heels, and I made it to the car without too much difficulty. At least I didn't trip over my own two feet.
We got to the restaurant, which if I was anywhere close in the map I was using in my head, was somewhere near Harvard.
"This looks like a student hangout."
"Teachers hang out here too."
"Wait, you're…"
"A professor? Yes. No, I'm not in womyn's studies. History, actually."
"History? Aren't history professors supposed to be stodgy older men in tweed?"
"With leather patches on the elbows?"
I nodded with an impish smile. I'm sure it went well with my haircut.
"No, they aren't. There isn't any sort of 'supposed' to be. My father actually used to complain about television shows that had pretty female scientists because he said it wasn't realistic. A pretty woman didn't need to rely on her brains so there is no way she would become a scientist."
"You're kidding."
"Nope. I'm not. People are people. Pretty or ugly. They all have reasons for doing something that have nothing to do with how they look."
"Like the fact that I'll continue getting my engineering degree even though I'm now gorgeous?"
"And oh so humble to boot."
"You'd better believe it. No hubris here."
"Hello, professor Spade," the girl behind the podium said.
I couldn't help it. I giggled. "Samantha Spade? You're kidding, right?"
"Nope."
"Your first name is Samantha," the girl asked.
"You didn't know?"
"The syllabus just says S. Spade."
"Wait, you work here and go to Harvard?"
"Jackie, not everyone who goes to Harvard is rich."
"Table for two, professor?"
"Yes, please."
"It'll be a half hour wait."
"We'll be in the bar."
We walked into the bar area and sat down at the corner. I got a few appreciative glances from the guys, and some of the girls. There were also some glares from some of the girls.
I was surveying the people coming in, when I saw Matt.
"Oh, crap."
"What is it, Jackie."
"Matt is from the same home town I am."
"There's no reason to believe he would expect to see you here."
"He knows I'm going to MIT. He's coming this way."
I tried to sink into my barstool, but Sam stopped me.
"Act natural and you'll attract less attention."
"Hello, Ladies."
"Hi," I said weakly.
"Hello," Sam said.
"Can I offer you a drink?"
"Are you old enough to drink," I asked.
Matt went bright red, and then looked more closely at me.
"Do I know you?"
"Yes."
"Wow, now I'm embarrassed. I would never have forgotten a face like yours."
"And yet you did. Imagine that."
"Are you kidding? I mean, you don't really know me, right?"
"I know you, Matt."
"Yeah, you could have asked my name from someone else."
"Really? Sparkle-britches?"
His mouth dropped open and then he blushed bright red.
"Shh. Not so loud, that nickname makes me sound gay."
"Amanda would disagree with that assessment, and she gave you the nickname."
"Do you think this is wise," Sam asked me.
I shut my mouth at this statement.
"I really do know you, don't I? Why can't I place your face?"
I shrugged, "I have lost some weight since you last saw me."
"This is going to bother me all night. Well, nice seeing you…" He was waiting for me to drop my name. I kept tight hold of it.
"Nice seeing you, Matt."
"You are wicked, Jackie," Sam said when he was safely out of earshot.
"I know. I'm not really sure how he'd take the new me, but he is a good friend, or at least was. If he figures it out he'll either have a good laugh or kill me. Probably laugh….I hope"
Sam shook her head at me. We eventually heard our names called and we made our way into the restaurant.
The food was good, and the conversation came easily. We talked a lot about the life that Sam had led to get where she was. She gave me a ride home afterward.
"So, come and visit me anytime."
"Awfully long way to walk."
"There is an excellent public transit system. Use that."
"There is?"
"Don't tell me you've been walking or using taxis to get everywhere."
My blush was answer enough.
"Well, get a bus schedule and use that in the future."
"Ok, mom."
She stuck her tongue out at me and I just giggled.
I cleaned off my makeup in the bathroom with a washcloth and water. I felt somehow less when I took it off, but I still liked what I saw.
Monday, I came to class in a pleated olive skirt and a button top. It might be a little out of style, but I liked the look. There was something missing from my image in the mirror, though, and it took me a while to realize what it was.
I had no jewelry.
I laughed at myself and walked out the door. I was wearing a three inch heel today to get more practice walking. That and they fit with the outfit.
Three inch heels are a little different than two inch heels, especially if your feet are as small as mine. I figured out the trick of it before I got all the way across campus, though, for which I was truly thankful.
I had to take my shoes off in class, though, as my feet were killing me.
"Hey, Sadie," I called to her as she walked in.
"Jackie? Love the hair. Wait, is that makeup?"
"Yeah. A friend helped me out this weekend."
"I like it. What does Brad think?"
"Well, I haven't seen him since yesterday before the restaurant. He kissed me again."
"Oh."
"No, I mean really kissed me. In the manner of the French."
"Oh!"
We talked until class began, and then got down to the subject at hand.
Tuesday was more of the same, although I wore more sensible shoes, especially since I would be riding the bus to the hospital afterward.
I made it to the hospital with only one major mistake and went up to Dr. Childs office.
"Hello?"
"Hi, I'm expecting someone else, so if you could make it quick?"
"So, you scheduled someone other than me for today?"
"Jake?"
"I'm going by Jackie actually."
"Wow, well, I take it you've come to a decision, then?"
"Yeah, I think I have."
"Well, let's get you a shot, then, and I can take you to see the psychologist again."
"Doesn't she want to see me first?"
"Nope. She figured you could make your own decision, but if it was to become female, she wants to see you again."
"Why? Doesn't she think I want this?"
"She wants to monitor your mental health. I'm only here to monitor your physical health during the process."
I smiled at that, "Let's do this."
It didn't even hurt. Well, it didn't hurt much.
Harriet had come back at me in multiple different ways on the same theme. Was I just pretending to be a girl? Somehow I thought that I'd get a shot, get checked off as well adjusted, and I'd be on my way home. People already accepted me as a girl, and it would just continue that way. I'd grow breasts and then…ok I had no idea how things progressed from there, but then again I'd never looked up anything on the subject. It simply hadn't occurred to me that this was…me.
Ok, so Julie tried to tell me that I was different and get me to see her therapist.
As a side note, I have no idea why Julie was seeing a therapist.
"As far as I'm aware I don't have any mannerisms that I'm really putting on for anyone. I just act like myself and dress like a girl. People think I'm a girl and I can live with that. I'd like to match what I apparently seem to be."
Harriet looked thoughtful for a minute, "so, you're telling me that you have not changed your behavior at all? Most guys don't sit with their legs together like that."
"It's a very tight skirt. I couldn't spread my legs if I tried right now. Heck, it's really fun to walk."
"But sitting with your knees off to the side like that? It's a very feminine pose."
"It's comfortable."
"You're voice?"
"Yeah, you know that it's me."
I could tell she was getting frustrated, so I decided to try to cut her a little slack.
"Harriet, people have thought I was a girl for years now. They have called me 'miss' and 'lady' and other less complimentary things. Up until a couple of weeks ago, I just corrected them and went about my life. Then something happened. I started pretending to be a girl. Or more specifically I stopped pretending, in my head, to be a boy.
"It was strange. Suddenly I was connecting with people like I hadn't in the past. There wasn't this self imposed wall between us anymore. Other girls seemed to be more comfortable around me and guys started, well, noticing me," I blushed considering some of the notice that Brad had been paying me.
"A specific boy?"
"Yeah."
"Is he the reason…"
"No, nothing like that. I'm a girl, Harriet. Maybe not physically, but emotionally and mentally. I am a girl."
She smiled at me and made a calming gesture, "I didn't mean to let you think that I was going to stop you. I wouldn't have let you take the estrogen shot earlier if I had any doubts. Well, I might have, since one shot isn't going to make much difference, but not more than that. Jackie, I see you sitting here and I don't see a boy. I'm trying but there isn't anything about your behavior that suggests you are anything other than what you seem."
The rest of my session was more conventional, if you can call talking about being a different gender between your ears than between your legs as conventional. We talked a little about Brad and Sadie and all of my other friends. It was a pleasant conversation.
She even gave me some pretty graphic details about the surgeries I could expect after my real life test. You know, living like a female. She didn't think it was funny when I joked that I'd been living as a girl my entire life without realizing it. Yeah, she didn't ok my fast track to surgery.
Harriet and I set another appointment for Tuesday of next week, after which I rode the bus home. It was a pleasant trip and I was getting used to public transit.
The phone was ringing when I arrived home.
"Jackie speaking," I said as I answered. I still hadn't gotten around to purchasing a cell phone, so the home phone was my only link to anyone else. Most everyone I knew called me here.
"Jake?"
The voice was instantly familiar, and I felt my face begin to heat up. "Julie, hi."
"I had an interesting talk with Matt recently. It took me this long to track you down. Your mom still thinks you live in the dorm and answer to Jake."
"Yeah, about that…"
"So why Jackie? There are so many other names that are a lot prettier."
"Wait, what?"
"I would have chosen Tammy for you personally."
"You're kidding, right? Tammy? Why not Liara while you're at it."
"There is nothing wrong with the name Liara."
"Other than the fact that all of your important female NPCs are named Liara."
She chuckled for a moment before continuing.
"So, Jackie…"
"Because someone in my Math course thought that Jake was short for Jacqueline."
"You're kidding."
"Nope. What did you tell Matt?"
"I told him that the only person I knew that was out here was you. He said there's no way that you would ever look that hot."
I blushed to the roots of my hair, and I was glad that I was talking to Julie over the phone where only vocal queues would give me away.
"Wait, it was you, wasn't it? You were out at a Harvard bar with an older woman. And dressed like a girl to boot."
"I am a girl, Julie, or so you always told me."
"Wait, you're…who are you and what did you do with the real Jake."
"It's me, Julie. Apparently I have a developmental problem of some sort. They told me I'd have to go on hormones or I'd suffer worse problems, and then, because I was dressed like a girl at the time offered me a choice."
"Wait, you were dressed like a girl?"
I blushed again but said, "Yes."
I then proceeded to relate the entire history of what I'd been going through since I arrived at school. Talking about this made me realize that I hadn't seen Brad since Saturday. I told Julie about Brad at that point, and how confusing he was.
He must have heard me because he chose that moment to show up. "I'm not avoiding you, Jake."
"I'm Jackie, Brad."
"Are you? Really? I mean, other than that killer haircut you still look like my former roommate."
I didn't know why I suddenly felt like crying. It felt as though his words were a knife in my gut. I said goodbye to Julie and went to my room. What was the point if every time I turned around the man that I…no, I couldn't be thinking that. I didn't know Brad well enough. Sure, he was hot, and a wonderful kisser, a truly amazing kisser really, but that wasn't enough. He was showing me his true colors every time he cut me down or…
The door opening cut my thoughts off and I looked up. Brad stood there in the doorway. Half of me wanted to yell at him to get out, but the other half wanted to be held and never let go. That part got what it wanted. He sat down behind me and put his arms around me from behind. I put my hands on his arm and turned my cheek to his chest.
"I'm sorry, Jackie. This is so weird to me. I know I'm not gay, but you haunt every waking moment and it's almost as hard to be with you as it is to be without."
"I'm not a lesbian, Brad. I'm heterosexual, just like you are."
"Wait…what?"
"I'm a girl, Brad. No, not physically, but that hardly matters. I'm not really interested in having sex with you."
He started to pull away, but I held on. I wasn't very strong, I knew that, so the only reason he didn't get free was he wasn't trying very hard.
"I've seen you naked, Jackie."
"I know, and I plan on changing all of that. I'm at least starting to."
"I don't understand."
"I'm taking hormones. For the first time in my life I'll actually be going through puberty."
"Won't that make you…"
"Female hormones, Brad."
"Oh…"
Then I had to hold on because he went a little slack. I'm not sure up to that point he'd ever considered that as an option.
"Look, I'll tell you straight out. I like you, ok, Brad? A lot. I don't know when friendship turned into wanting more with me, but it did. This is your parachute, ok? I want to let you know everything so you can jump if you want to. I don't want you ever resenting me."
"I couldn't…"
"Harriet, my therapist, thought it would be a good idea if I did this. She said that she has seen too many women like me hurt by their partners."
"I wouldn't…"
"Wouldn't you, Brad? You hurt me deeply within the past couple of weeks. Not physically, but emotionally."
"I'm sorry. I never meant to."
"I know you didn't. or we would be having a very different conversation."
His arms were around me again and I just luxuriated in the feel of him. His strength radiated into me, and I just wanted to sit there forever in his embrace. But like all mortal things, this too would have to come to an end.
"I'll never be able to bear your children, Brad."
"What? I thought you said."
"Right now, sure. Eventually I want you to marry me, silly."
"Is that even possible? I mean the whole gay marriage thing…"
"Brad, what did I tell you? I'm a woman. Remember that."
"Sorry, this is all so new to me."
"You think it's any easier for me?"
He squeezed me and gave me a peck on the cheek, and I lost a little time again just being held by this man. This flawed, imperfect man who owned my heart so completely.
"It will be at least a year before I will match physically with what I seem to be. I'd prefer to wait for anything beyond kissing until then."
"What happens in a year?"
"I can get surgery to correct the mistake in my sex."
He pushed me away, and I thought I'd just revolted him completely, but he turned me around to look into my face.
"You mean they're going to cut off…"
"Not that they ever did me much use before now."
"You're a virgin?"
"Yes, Brad. I'm a virgin."
He blushed and smiled at me. Then, after a moment or two, he began to laugh.
"It's not funny, Brad."
"Yes it is. I'm a virgin as well."
"But…"
"Never found the right girl. When you started featuring in my dreams I really thought that I might be…well, never mind. You know what I was thinking. But it's this female in front of me that really makes me want…"
He lowered me to the bed, and I felt his weight as he began to kiss me. I wanted to give into him completely right there, but the moment I got a chance to breathe, I pushed him back and said, Brad, no. Not right now."
"But, Jackie…"
"I'm not ready yet, ok?"
He grumbled something and started adjusting himself.
"What?"
"I said you really are a girl."
I giggled at him and he began to laugh. I kissed him and he kissed me back. When I felt him begin to get a little pushy I backed up again.
We were both breathing a little hard that time.
"Brad, I think I need some air."
"I know what you mean. Look, I need to think a bit, okay?" With that he got up and left the room. I glanced at his pants as he was leaving and they were tighter than when he came in originally. It hurt to see him go, and I wished for a moment that I could have taken back my words. I wanted him there to just hold me again, but it was too late for that.
I really wanted someone to talk to at that moment. Someone estrogen enriched who would understand what I was going through. Sadie or Julie came to mind, but that would mean calling someone on the phone and being out in the main living area where anyone could overhear my conversation.
I went to sleep confused, and woke up the next morning the same. The day went pretty well until I got home. There was a notice from the housing department at the school saying that I'd have to move out as it had come to their attention that I wasn't male.
I thought about fighting it for the rest of the day, and most of Friday. They wanted me moved out by no later than Tuesday.
I went into the office after class on Friday to see what could be done.
The girl behind the counter when I got to the head of the line was pretty, and seemed intelligent and bored. I explained what was going on only to be interrupted as soon as the information came up on her screen. "Oh, we're sorry about this letter. It seems that someone complained that there was a girl living in the house. We checked, though, and it seems that the person who they thought was a girl was actually a guy."
"No, I'm a girl, just not physically."
"Wait, but.."
"Hi, I'm Jackie Peters."
"Jacob…"
"I prefer Jackie."
"We have here that you're male."
"Working on rectifying that."
"Oh. Um."
"I realize this makes you uncomfortable. I was just wondering what we could do to fix this?"
"Well, um, I would normally suggest the dorms, but, well…"
"So, I'm female enough to be kicked out, but not to have a place in the dorms?"
I admit I was raising my voice a bit. The girls manager came over to see what the fuss was.
"Can I help you?"
"Yes, I was told I couldn't have a place in the dorms. You are telling me I'll be put on academic probation if I don't move out of where I am now."
I handed the letter to him.
"Put her in the dorms, then."
"But, sir."
"There are two choices, Beth. We leave her where she is, or let her move into the dorms. Which do you think will be less disruptive?"
I was given a room key and I left smiling.
I hired a van for the afternoon and parked it in front of the house. The guys helped me, except for Brad who was conspicuously absent, and they even drove with me to the new place. Since the beginning of school they'd just finished a new quad of dorms, and I was moving in there. The number of people moving in and out with packages suggested I wasn't the only one moving in this weekend.
I got waves from people I'd seen in passing or in my classes and waved back. I smiled at the people around me, feeling like I actually fit here for the first time. Sure, I'd been coming to class for weeks now, but finally I actually felt like a part of it all.
It wasn't until I got into the room and was putting away my stuff that I actually began to worry. I began seeing a repeat of the questions that I got with Brad, about how I really didn't fit my roommates world view.
The door opened and a force of nature swept in.
"Hi, I'm Wendy," the girl said over her shoulder. She dropped a box off on her bed and swept out again. I was just barely registering that there had been someone in the room when she was back and dropping off another box.
"You need help with that?"
"No, I've got it," and like that she was off again. In and out and in for about ten minutes and then, just as quickly, the boxes disappeared into her closet and shelves. When she was done, she walked over to examine my side of the room.
"Love your clothes. I'll have to borrow some of them sometime."
I just looked at her in shock. I'd never seen someone as alive as Wendy was. She was vibrant.
She asked me something and I just looked foolishly at her.
"You aren't a lesbian, are you?"
I just began laughing. I couldn't help it.
"My last roommate asked me if I were gay."
"But…"
"Don't worry. I like guys."
"So you are…you're confusing."
"Let me start at the beginning then…" It probably wasn't a good idea to tell people so easily about myself, but since I would be living in the same room as Wendy I figured it would be a good idea to let her know. That was she could request a new roommate before thing's became too settled. She took it amazingly well.
"Wendy?"
"Just give me a moment. It's not every day that one of the better looking girls you've ever seen tells you that she's really a guy in disguise."
"I'm not…wait, you think I'm attractive?"
"Don't get any ideas, there, missy. I like dick just as much as you do."
I blushed bright red at her statement, but didn't try to tell her I was a virgin. I think there had been enough revelation for one day.
"So, you're male, but a woman, taking female hormones and planning on surgery in a year. that about the size of it?"
"When you say it like that you make me sound weird."
"Well, you are a bit weird."
"Oh, did I mention I purchase storage lockers that are in default and sell off the antiques as a job?"
She just began laughing at me, and I giggled along with her.
"Jackie, you're alright. A little girlie for my tastes, but a good person."
"Wait, you think I'm girlie?"
"Have you seen your choice in clothing? And that jacket? And wow, but you have three times as much makeup as I do."
"that's probably because it takes three applications for me to get it right. I'd only been doing this for about a week after all."
"Girl, your makeup is flawless."
"But…it's hardly noticeable. Barely there."
"To a guy, maybe. Let me tell you a little secret. A girl knows. It's the little things that give it away, like lips that just look too good, or your eyes really standing out. People are bland, for the most part. Makeup is there to add a little spice to our appearance, and Jackie, you are muy calliente."
"Is that even proper Spanish?"
"Who cares? I liked it."
I stuck my tongue out at her and then we broke down in giggles again. When I got changed for the evening, she watched as I got changed. I didn't feel any problems with it and so just got into my favorite silk pajamas. She was wearing a tee shirt and shorts.
"See what I mean? You are so girlie."
"Shut up. I like these. You just haven't ever tried something like them."
I went through my drawers and found a pale blue pair I'd never worn and threw them at her. She laughed at me and then changed into them. Her expression slowly began to change. "Wow, they're."
"So soft? I know, right? Why do you think I wear them?"
"You know you're never getting these back, right?'
"They're yours, Wendy. They really don't fit me anyway since they're way too big."
"I noticed. You make twigs jealous."
"Apparently I've not been eating enough."
"Well, since food is part of your rent in these new halls, let's get you something to eat."
"You just want to fatten me up."
"That too."
We smiled as we went down to the cafeteria. No group of friends to be introduced to this time, but I think I enjoyed it better. We got food, or I should say I grabbed a Cesar salad that looked good, and then Wendy began piling my plate high.
As I sat there trying to eat the pile of food that Wendy had piled onto my plate I looked around at the other students. Wendy and I weren't the only ones dressed for bed, and truth be told we were some of the more modest ones in that category. The salad I ate first, as that is what I'd wanted. I got about half a cheese sandwich in but I couldn't even finish that.
We sat there wondering what to do with the rest of the food when a couple of guys came over.
"These seats taken, Ladies?"
I shook my head and blushed. Wendy was a bit more vocal.
"You can sit here provided that you eat the rest of this food."
"Trying to feed an army?"
"No, my roommate. Trying to fatten her up so I don't feel so gargantuan next to her."
"Well, we can't let good food go to waste, can we Tim."
"Course not, Jon. Course not."
Tim turned a pair of the bluest eyes I'd ever seen on me and I lost what he asked completely.
"Her name's Jackie. And I'm Wendy by the way."
"Pleased to meet you both," Tim said, turning away from me. I liked my lips and watched as they made the food on my tray disappear. Wendy and I seemed to bond further over that moment. We eventually said good night to the guys and made our way back to our room, talking about our new acquaintances along the way, giggling about our observations.
I felt comfortable with Wendy like I never had with the guys, and I could tell she felt the same. I guess the school had something about people of the same gender living together over mixed gender living.
Except for Brad.
I really felt like I was going to spend most of the rest of my life saying that. I wasn't really attracted to anyone except for Brad. School would be easy for me, except for Brad. I'd be able to move on with my life, get my degree, and never really worry about the people I met here in school, except for Brad.
See where I'm going with this?
And that morning was no exception. I got dressed in a warm and conservative outfit and made my way out to the storage locker for the auction. There were some nods from people I'd seen before, and Stan complemented my appearance. Especially my new haircut. It had become such a part of me that I kind of forgot that I even had a new haircut sometimes.
It felt…right.
I pulled my jacket around me, hugging myself, to try to ward of the chill in the air. I expected it would warm up a bit as the day progressed, but for now there was a bit of frost on the ground that I was having a hard time ignoring.
There wasn't anything on the list of units up for sale that really struck me as being worth bidding on, at least at first glance. When we were walking around the lot, something in the list began to scream out at me. One of the units just felt so…off.
It might have been the smell coming from the unit or who knows what, but I felt it would be a good idea if I picked it up. It went to me for the lowest price that I'd ever paid. $100. The manager cut the lock, and I put my own there. I wasn't planning on looking inside until the auctions were done for the day.
Nothing else struck me, and I ended up with just the one unit.
It was just coming round to nine o'clock in the morning when I opened up the door and saw the most surprising thing in the world.
To explain how I even knew what it was, I have to explain a little about my Dad. He was a WWII enthusiast. He loved the history about the war. He loved movies about the war. He belonged to a couple of war game groups and he was playing three different games by mail. Avalon Hill played a major role in our household.
I think he's actually part of the reason that I got into Role Playing Games in the first place. He showed me that a game doesn't have to be Sorry or Risk to be enjoyable, and in fact, the more that the rules actually reflected reality, the more complex the game, the more room to really play there was.
And it wasn't just dramatizations or fictional accounts that he liked. He watched the documentaries almost more than he watched the fictionalized movies. Which isn't to say that we didn't own a copy of Patton.
So, when I opened the door and saw a WWII field artillery piece I was floored. My first thought was that my dad would have loved this. My second thought was: what in the world have I just purchased?
I closed the door, locked it again, and went to the front office and called the police. I was pretty sure that if there were problems with people owning assault rifles that there would be serious issues with someone owning a cannon.
The person at the 911 office at first had no idea what I was talking about, and then sort of freaked and thought I was threatening the storage facility with an artillery piece. So, next thing I know, SWAT is driving up with a bunch of squad cars and they're all freaking out.
An officer who looked vaguely familiar walked up to me.
"It looks like you got out of the hospital ok. We've still got the guys who tried to rape you in custody. Has anyone contacted you about appearing in court?"
"Wait, weren't you the campus cop?"
He laughed at this. "There is only the one type here, miss. So, do you know what's going on?"
"Yes, the previous owner of the storage unit I purchased was storing a cannon."
"What?"
I lead him over to the locker and opened the door. He spoke into the radio clipped to his shoulder, and there went my Saturday morning. I spent the next few hours being interview by officers and standing around waiting to be interviewed by officers.
Then the news crews came, and everything went from bad to worse. Well for me, anyway. Anyone who has been following this narrative closely, and by that I mean everyone out there, will know that up until this point I've not only neglected to tell my mother about my life change, but I haven't even called her at all.
"Miss, can you tell us about the cannon?"
I noticed that the reporter was for a local station, "Not much, I'm afraid. It was there when I opened the door."
"Isn't it your storage unit?"
"Yes, but before today it wasn't. I purchased the unit, sight unseen, this morning."
The next reporter to speak had a CNN logo on his camera. I hoped that this was only wishful thinking, but it reminded me that I really needed to contact my mom before anything else came up that would have her finding out my secret from someone else.
"You had no idea what was in the locker before you opened it? I find that hard to believe."
"Believe it or not, it's the truth. You can make a lot of money bidding on storage units, or lose your shirt. It's a bit like roulette, only it's legal."
And on, and on, and…well, you get the point. It was like none of them were listening to the other, and I ended up answering the same questions over and over. Finally, the police closed off the area, I gave my final statement and signed it, and I was free to leave.
The first thing I did was purchase a phone. No, not an iPhone. I picked up a Galaxy Tab 10.1. Sure, a little big for a phone, as it has a 10.1" screen, but come on. It is a tablet PC and a phone all wrapped up in one. Did I mention it has up to 14 hours of continual usage?
Sorry, I'm geeking out over it, but I think it's cool. I picked up a bluetooth headset as well. There's no way I'm holding a tablet up to my ear to use the phone features.
So, I got signed up for phone service, set it up to automatically withdraw from my bank account, and made my first call.
"Hello?" the voice asked from the other end of the connection.
"Hi, Julie."
"Jackie?"
"You remembered!"
"Course I did, you silly goof. You get everything resolved with the boyfriend?"
"Boy…Brad's just a friend!" I said, blushing entirely too much, and glad that she couldn't see me.
"And I'm the queen of Sheeba," she replied
"Yes, your majesty."
We both giggled a bit at this before Julie brought me back to task.
"So, like I said, everything resolved with Brad?" She wasn't going to let me juyst get away with this.
"I haven't seen him since we last talked. Well, you and I talked. Brad and I didn't do much talking..."
"Jackie. You little…"
"Kissing, Julie. Kissing. That's all we did."
"Then why…"
"I told him it would be at least a year before I was legally, and physically, female."
"Oh…oh! You mean…"
"Yes. Surgery."
"Wow. I still haven't…I mean..." Julie cut off suddenly. I thought about what she said for a moment and then it dawned on me.
"Wait, are you telling me…"
"No. I'm not saying anything," she said evasively, but I knew I had her
"You can't leave me like this, girlfriend. Spill."
"I'm transgendered," Julie said.
"See, was that too tough?"
"We moved to your town because my Dad figured it would be easier to live in a small town with my secret than in a city. Something about people in the boonies taking things more at face value," she said this all matter-of-factly, almost quietly.
"That and his company moved him to the plant out there."
"He requested the transfer," was her reply to the question I'd only partially asked.
"I never knew."
"Well, now you know. Next time I'm out to visit Matt we'll have to get together."
"Wait, you and Matt?" The thought blew my mind. Sure, Matt had been a member of our little role playing group for years, but I never though that he was interested in the bookish Julie.
The other end of the line was quiet for so long that I thought we might have been disconnected. I looked at the screen to verify there was still a connection. There was, and just as I was about to talk, Julie began again.
"You can't tell him, Ok, Jackie? He doesn't know about me."
"Why haven't you told him?"
"You know Matt."
"Actually, I do know Matt. I've known Matt since the two of us were in pre-school. He was the reason that there were no bullies in our high school, did you know that? He just…made sure that everyone was taken care of."
"What about Felix?" She asked. Felix had made many of the girls at our school uncomfortable for a bit at the beginning of our junior year. There were even rumors about his extracurricular activities, none of which were proven.
"Felix only took about two weeks before what Matt was saying finally got through to him."
"But…"
"You knew that Felix's dad beat him while his mom watched? Matt was there when the police took him to jail. Then, he made sure that Felix was safe in the home they moved him to."
"I never knew that."
"Course not. You were a girl. You weren't a part of the cleanup squad as he called us. Well, mostly it was the football players, but I sort of tagged along."
"Yeah, how did he keep the football players from being meatheads?" Julie asked.
"Convinced the coach to have all of them sign a morality contract. If they broke any part of it they got kicked from the team."
"Jackie, this is no fair. You know him better than I do. All I want to do now is call him and tell him how much…how much I love him."
"Tell him the other thing, as well."
"Not over the phone, Jackie."
"Then when?"
"I'm going to be out there for Halloween. We'll both tell him then."
I stopped talking and just thought about it. I wanted to protest, but that would be doing exactly what I'd just talked Julie out of. Something occurred to me.
"Why haven't you had your surgery?" I asked her.
"Well, um…I don't have the money and my insurance won't cover it."
"How much does it cost?"
"The doctor I talked to said it would be $25,000. I could go out of the country for less, but I really don't feel comfortable doing that."
I sat there for a moment thinking. I was planning on continuing to work through my schooling. A couple of hours once a week wasn't cutting into any of my study time. I enjoyed finding stuff in the storage lockers. I was hooked to the rush of it all. Money for the last big haul I'd had was still coming in as the antiques dealer sold the goods. I was set.
"Julie, would you be mad if I offered you a loan of $25,000? I want to give this to you, since I can't get it yet on my own."
I could hear her begin to cry on the other end of the line. "I can't take your schooling away from you."
"It isn't, Jules. It is beyond the cost for all five years of school. And I'm still working."
"You have…"
"A lot. Found a really good job," I said with a grin.
"I don't know what to say…"
"Then say yes, for me, ok? It is a purely selfish request."
"Then yes. I say yes. I'll get the surgery scheduled for after Halloween. I'll be able to tell Matt that not only am I who I am…but I am going to be getting surgery to correct my little birth defect."
I smiled through my tears. I was so jealous of her in that moment. Jealous of her happiness that was denied me for the time being. We spoke for another half an hour, and then she had to go. I was smiling when I got off the phone with her.
I'd gotten her details while we were on the phone with each other, and so I went looking for an app I'd heard about. A download and a couple of clicks later and I'd done my first wire transfer.
I felt so black hat. I snorted at the thought a moment later and dialed my home number.
"Hello, Mom."
"Honey?"
"I have a lot to talk about. Sorry I haven't called regularly."
And I began to share everything that had happened to me since I came to school. I went into more depth than I had at any point previously. I talked about my thoughts and feelings. And I talked about Brad. Especially about Brad. When I got done, my mom's response was nothing like I'd expected it to be."
"Don't worry if the first guy you set your sights on doesn't have the same feelings for you that you have for him. You are a beautiful young lady and some day you'll find someone who will see that."
"Mom!"
"What did you want me to say? That I forbid you from doing this? You are an adult, Jackie. That means you make your own decisions. I choose to be a part of your life, whatever that means to me. Am I perfectly alright with this? No. To tell you the truth, Jackie, it freaks me out a bit. It is so far outside my world. But I will support you, and treat you like the young lady you believe that you are." She paused for a few moments and then continued, "besides, young lady, I've got eighteen years of motherly advice to make up for with my new daughter."
"Your only daughter, you mean."
"Exactly. Now, something I'd never tell my daughter, but I'll tell you, is that you know how boys think, or at least should. They are independent, pig headed, and don't tend to take advice well. Give Brad time, honey. Don't push him. Let him process all of this. Oh, and make sure that you are ready before you have sex with him. I know how…exciting…first love can be. He's going to pressure you eventually. If he can't respect your wishes to wait, then he isn't worth respect."
"And there are always other boys where he came from?"
"Oh, I hope not. Honey, you will have your heart broken more than once in this life. He may be the one, but there are still times he will break your heart. Part of being a woman is realizing that we were put her to make relationships work. No, I'm not talking about staying in a bad relationship. I'm talking of all the little things that a woman does. We can make them want to stay forever or run for the hills."
"You make it sound like we have all the power."
"No, but we have an equal amount of it. The problem is that most guys are passive in their approach to a relationship. Sure, if they want something out of it, then they can be really attentive. Girls are active in their response to a relationship."
"That seems so…"
"Backwards? Of course it is. Our society makes the men take the active role because that is how women see each partners role in a relationship and it makes them feel loved. Same thing about women taking a passive role. The problem is when they relax after the initial courtship and expect the romance to continue."
"So…you are telling me it's my job to keep the romance alive in my relationships?"
"No, it's your job to gently remind your partner that you need him to woo you."
I smiled, hoping I'd be able to do so.
"Thanks, mom."
We spoke for a little while longer, and then said good bye with promises to talk soon.
I made my way home using the buses again. It was so relaxing to take transportation compared to walking to and from the storage facilities.
I saw someone sitting on my bed out of the corner of my eye, and assumed it was my roommate. "Wendy, you'll never believe what happened…"
I stopped up short. Wendy wasn't Wendy.
It was Brad.
"Hey, Jackie. Wendy let me sit here and wait for you."
"Brad?"
"You are a hard person to get in touch with."
I wanted to rush over to him, to throw my arms around him, but my mother's advice came back to me and I just stood there.
"I got a phone." I gave him my number, "I'm available any time that you'd like to call me."
He began to smile and he stood up. "Jackie?"
"Yes, Brad?"
"Are you available now?" he asked with a goofy grin. "Jackie, you are the most wonderful person I've ever known. Man, woman, it doesn't matter to me. I can see you as you were when I first met you, and sometimes I see you that way in my dreams. I can see you as you are now. You are the only person I have ever really loved.
"I know I'll make mistakes, and some day you may come to hate me, but I will do my best to make you happy."
I began to cry and he took me in his arms. He lowered me to the bed and just held me there. I don't know how long we lay there, his strong arms surrounding me. It was an eternity. It was a single moment. All I really knew in that moment what this place was where I was always meant to be.
That and my jeans were pinching me.
“Can I help..?” I began as I opened the door. The two men standing outside the door shocked me into silence. They were wearing suits that could have come from the same rack let alone the same store and the badges they presented looked official.
“I’m Agent Franklin, and this is Agent Blitz, from the ATF can we come in?”
I stepped out of the way of the door as I gestured for them to enter, “This is about the cannon I found?”
“Cannon?” Brad exclaimed.
“I’ll tell you about it later,” I said with a small smile, “I assume you are here to take possession of it?”
They looked at me as if I were insane.
The confusion I felt most likely suffused my features, “Aren’t you?”
“We’re just here to ask a few questions about it. Are you aware that it’s illegal to own an unregistered firearm of this type?”
“I never wanted it in the first place. How was I to know I needed to register it. How much is that going to cost?”
“That’s not the point,” Agent Blitz said, “you don’t have a Federal Firearms License, we checked.”
“So, I can’t own it, how about I just sell it to someone who has this license?”
“You have to have a license to sell it…”
“Look, boys,” Brad said standing right behind me, “Obviously you have something to say here, so spit it out.”
“Your girlfriend is breaking the law.”
“Really?” He said with a little sneer, “in what way?”
“She owns a cannon.”
“I see, and did you purchase a cannon, Jackie?” I turned to look up at him, but his eyes never once left the agents in front of us.
“I purchased a storage locker, sight unseen that had a cannon in it.”
“Did you try to conceal this fact at any point?”
“No, I called the police immediately. My statement is on record.”
“So, how is she breaking the law?”
“then we’ll just have to take it off your hands,” the first agent said.
“Actually, I can’t let you do that. You see, I’m currently storing your property for you. There is a usage fee you would have to pay first.”
“A what?” All three of them said at the same time.
“I spent money to acquire that storage locker, so for the time being it is mine. That being said, I do not own the cannon in the storage locker, which I acknowledge to belong to the ATF as you two gentlemen have so kindly informed me. So, as soon as we settle up the usage fee, I’ll be glad to release it to you.”
Agent Franklin got a sneer on his face and said, “How much is this usage fee, little girl.”
“$100.” I said calmly.
Agent Franklin reached for his wallet and began counting money.
“You can’t be serious,” Agent Blitz exclaimed.
“Per day,” I said, my voice going cold.
“There is no way we’re going to agree to this,” Agent Franklin said.
“I think you already agreed that her usage fee was fair when you pulled out your wallet, Agent Franklin,” Brad said.
They huffed something about jail time and left. My first call was to the storage facility. I made sure that the manager was okay with me renting out the space.
“With the publicity that the news brought me, I can let you keep the space for the next few weeks for just the hundred you already gave me,” he said. I smiled and hung up. My next call, to the ATF, would likely be a little more nerve wracking.
“I need to determine if you actually have a couple of agents working for you,” were the first words out of my mouth as soon as I was put through.
It took half an hour, most of it on hold, but eventually I discovered that indeed these were actually agents of the ATF. That was about the time that my legs gave out and Brad caught me. He carried me over to the bed and lay me down into it. “Are you alright?”
“I just called out the government.”
“Well, one small part of it,” he said with a grin.
“Are you done in here screwing tall and...oh, sorry, let me come back,” Wendy said. She’d taken a couple of steps into the room without looking and done a U-Turn and headed out all in the space it took her to make that short statement.
“Wait, there is no...anything going on here,” I said blushing.
“Then can I?” she said looking Brad up and down.
“Wendy!” I said, shocked.
“He is cute, Jackie, you go girl.”
I blushed again as Brad put his arms around me. The clock on my desk fairly screamed the time and I pushed my way out of Brad’s arms. After the episode last week where I got my three inch heels stuck in the Muddy ground and almost tripped right into the mouth of...never mind. I was going to wear something more sensible this week. I wanted to wear a T-Shirt.
“What is it,” he asked.
“Game.” I said, still trying to figure out the best gear to fight monsters in.
“Come on, Wendy, I don’t think either of us need to see this right now.”
“Game?”
“She’s with the Game Grrlz.”
“Wow, I had no idea that I was rooming with a goddess among women.” Wendy said with a smile. It could have been more of a smirk, but I don’t really know. Something else had my attention at the time.
“Yep, so while she gets dress…” he shut the door behind him. I mentally thanked him as I continued to go through my clothing to find the right top for the occasion. While I was at it I slipped into a pair of baggier jeans. I needed to be able to move.
I finished dressing and went out into the hallway to look for Brad. He was sitting with his back to the wall next to the door and smiled up at me when I came into view.
“Miss me?” I said with a smile.
He climbed quickly to his feet and put his arms around me. There was only a moment or two where I wondered what was happening and then he kissed me. It wasn’t the soul penetrating kiss that I wanted, but it was a nice chaste kiss on the lips and I couldn’t help but smile into it.
“You know, if you wouldn’t mind ditching your game…”
I swatted him on the arm and he laughed. We left the dorms and made the, much shorter, walk across campus to Carla’s dorm. There was a certain amount of disappointment in me when we arrived, but Brad gave me a quick peck on the lips and left me there. The kiss was enough to smother any feelings of loss I might have, I was an independant woman after all.
“I hope you don’t have plans for the 31st,” Carla said as soon as I entered the room.
“Hello to you too,” I said with a little smile. Carla was vivacious, but tonight it more seemed like something was bothering her. Sadie and Katie were there and each of them had a cat in the cream smile.
“The 31st...please have no plans.”
“I have no plans for the 31st. What’s the 31st?”
“Besides Halloween? Some dances, a few parties, you know, the normal things,” Katie said, still smiling.
With everything that had been going on in my life I’d completely forgotten about Halloween. My old group used to throw a serious Halloween party once a year. We all came in costume and it always seemed that half the school got invited somehow.
Judging from Carla’s glare at Katie, I doubted this was about a party.
“We were invited to The Game this year.”
“What’s The Game?” I said at the same time as I heard a squeal from Jasmine behind me.
“We got in?” she said and began this whole happy girl dance that somehow I got dragged into against my will.
Who am I kidding? Of course I was bouncing and hugging with them, I just had no idea what we were celebrating.
“So, again, what’s The Game?” I say, no less confused for the goofy grin on my face. Sometimes it is more fun to be a girl than others.
“The game, young Jackie, is only the event of the year for all of the gaming groups on campus. It’s not LARP per se, but it is something we will physically doing.”
“This is a campus sponsored event?”
“No, this is put on every year by the greeks. Mostly the sororities. The football players always have a team, of course, but so do all of the other sports teams.”
“Wait, MIT has sports teams?” I exclaimed. It must have been funny because everyone else laughed and after a moment or two I joined in.
“Yes, we have sports teams. Our mascot is the Engineer.”
“I should have guessed,” I said ruefully.
“Anyway, we get together, do obstacle courses, solve logic puzzles, run as fast as we can, and try to get the best time overall...all while in Halloween costumes.”
“You’re kidding, right?” I said.
“It’ll be fun, besides, we have an advantage most of the other teams lack?” Jasmine had a gleam in her eye.
“What’s that,” I asked innocently.
“Girl’s costumes cover basically nothing.”
“That’s an advantage?”
“It is when you really want to move.”
For some reason I thought they were forgetting something, especially since most of the really sexy outfits I’d tried so far as a girl might cover barely anything, but that didn’t mean that they allowed for a lot of movement, but I smiled and went along with it.
I wondered, briefly, how Brad would react to it. Maybe, if he was really good, I’d give him a preview of whatever costume I decided on…
Over the past month, we’d fought three loup-garou. Not one of them had been a local and that worried me.
“Are you about done in there with your primping,” Yaz called from the other side of her house. She lived in a nice colonial home somewhere between MIT and Harvard, somehow I’d never once arrived here conscious and when I left it was always with a purpose so the exact address never stuck in my mind.
“Not my fault that you suck at your saving throws,” Yaz taunted.
“Not my fault that I was monologuing,” I replied.
“You monologue out loud,” Sadi complained and the rest of us laughed.
“Can we go out and hunt, can we, can we can we,” Katie almost panted from the front door and I just had to laugh. Initial impressions aside I think that Katie is a closet nudist.
You talk more than I do.
“Sorry,” I said to the ceiling. It never does to piss of your goddess, even if she is benevolent...mostly.
The other girls threw the aquarium pebbles we were using as fate points at me. I gathered them up with a little smile and said “Thank you,” in as snarky a way possible. We all laughed and got down to the serious business of role playing.
Hours later, when we finally wound down and got ready to leave, I found Brad sitting on the floor outside my door.
“Brad?”
“Hey, Jackie. Ready to go?” he said a little sleepily.
“You stayed out here all night?” Carla said in shock and amazement.
“Well, I couldn’t have her walking home alone,” he said, but his yawn betrayed him. He was tired, and barely on his feet. I couldn’t help it. A grin erupted on my face and moved next to him and slipped one of his arms around my shoulders.
“Come on, du Lac. Let’s get you home and in bed,” I said to him, hoping it was just to him.
I felt more than saw him shaking his head. He made some sound of negation before he said, “I made a promise to you. None of that until you are made whole...you know...there.”
“Did he just say what I think he said?” Jasmine said.
“I think that Brad just told you he would wait for whenever you’re ready to have sex,” Sadie said in a little bit of awe.
“Mostly I think he’s just trying to prove he isn’t gay,” I said with a little self derisive chuckle.
Jasmine walked over to me and really quietly whispered in my ear, “It’s because he is in love with you, Girl. I’m so jealous of you right now.”
The glow that erupted within me just couldn’t be contained. Somewhere, I knew that was the real reason, but I wanted to think the worst of Brad’s reasoning. I wanted to protect myself from any possible hurt that he could cause me. This feeling when someone confirmed my innermost hopes gave lie to the reasoning that I’d built for myself like a house of cards.
We made our way across campus to his house. I began to worry about how I was going to get myself home when Brad spoke.
“Stay with me tonight,” his voice almost pleaded at me.
“Brad…”
“Come on, Jackie. You can sleep on the couch. I don’t want you walking across campus alone at this time of the morning.”
“Brad, it’s sweet of you to say, but I don’t think I can do that. It would be a little wierd sleeping there on the couch in what used to be my old place.”
“then sleep in your old room. We could get some sheets out and make up the bed. We haven’t found anyone, yet, who could take your place.”
“It’s good to know I’m not easily replaced.”
“That’s not what I meant,” he said with a smirk.
“Why did you sit outside the door all night?”
“Because I was stupid and I wanted to make it up to you.”
“By making me walk you’re sleepy ass home?” I laughed after saying it.
“Well, I admit that I didn’t really think it all the way through. I never thought you girls would play for nine hours.”
“Why do you think that Sadie stayed over those times? It wasn’t to see…”
There had been something important I’d been about to say, I was sure of it, but his lips interrupted my train of thought. We were standing there, his body heat keeping away the chill of the night. Unlike the last time we kissed at the house, he never pushed me into anything. He wasn’t trying to prove anything with this kiss. He was just thoroughly kissing me.
“Stay with me tonight?” he said quietly as he looked me in the eyes. All I could do was mutely nod at him and we continued on our way. We were another hundred yards closer to his home before I stopped.
“You can’t do that, Brad.”
“Do what?”
“Ask me serious questions after kissing me like that.”
“Wha..?”
“I’m serious, that was a really cheap trick. I’d have agreed to anything at that moment, and you knew it.”
“Well, ok, maybe I did, but I’m just complicating your life and I thought that if you stayed over at my place it would simplify things a little, at least for one night.”
“See, Brad, if you’d just said that in the first place instead of trying to manipulate me…”
Again I sort of list everything that I’d been about to say. He pulled back from me sooner this time that he had before and I just looked up into his eyes as he smiled down at me. “I’m sorry.”
“Now that was an apology,” I said with a smile, a bit dazed from his kiss, “but don’t think this gets you entirely off the hook, mister.”
“Never. I’ve made mistakes by you, Jackie. I have a lot to make up for that. I know I can never erase my previous bad behavior, but I hope that going forward I can at least replace it with good?”
“You hurt me, Brad. I love you...but there are parts of you that I hate.”
“You…”
I don’t think that Brad was alone in being tired that morning, so I just smiled at him. He kissed me again but didn’t tell me he loved me. I could live with that.
We began walking again but I was a lot more comfortable with him, and the silence felt like a warm blanket and not as oppressive as it had in the past.
“I’ll stay the night at your place, Brad, but don’t plan on this being a regular occurrence.”
“No, ma’am,” he said with a broad grin on his face. It was moments like this that helped me realize I hadn’t ever really been a boy. It’s strange how you can go through life as though nothing is wrong, just because you are who you are.
I think it takes some jarring moment of disconnect for us to truly understand who we are. Catching yourself in a moment of distraction in a mirror, talking to someone who takes the time to really listen and make intelligent responses, or even just really comparing yourself to the people around you are all ways in which this can happen.
We don’t take the time, I think, to really understand ourselves. We allow society to define who we should be, and when we don’t fit we consider it a problem with us not with society, even though society is usually the messed up one.
“You’re awfully quiet.”
“Just thinking about how societal roles define who we believe ourselves to be to our detriment.”
He laughed and hugged me and I smiled. We finally got home from our walk and he was true to his word, making my bed for me while I just watched him. More than anything he’d done for me today, I felt loved by this simple act of service he performed for me.
I lay down in the bed and he tucked me in and I just giggled at him.
“Night, Brad.”
“Night, Jackie.”
It is funny how anything, and in that I include dressing as a girl, can become routine. My appearance had faded into the background by Tuesday afternoon when I went into the hospital again. Dr. Childs took some blood, and chatted with me about my moods and general feeling of well-being then I went up to discuss my issues with my other Doctor.
We chatted and I went home. The rest of the week was the same, which is to say it was all so very normal. I spent time each day with Brad, did my homework, went to classes, and did my best to eat the food that Wendy kept piling on my food tray in a good natured manner.
Thursday was a change in my normal routine. I’d finished class for the afternoon and was working on my homework when my phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Jackie. This is Landon. Do you have plans tomorrow night?” I was trying to remember if Brad and I had anything planned, and wondered what he was asking for.
“Nothing I can think of. Why do you ask?”
“Well, I thought that it had been too long since I’d seen you last. Would you consider that date I promised you earlier?”
I felt torn. On the one hand neither Brad nor I had promised any exclusivity, but I think there was something implied in the fact that we were seeing each other so frequently. On the other hand, here was this really good looking older guy who was actively pursuing me. It made me feel beautiful in a way that even clothes and makeup never could.
It made me feel desired and desirable. Sure, Brad kissed me, but he never really pursued me.
“I’m sort of in a committed relationship right now.”
“Well, Jackie. You need to decide. You either are in a committed relationship, in which case I won’t offer again, or you’re not. Don’t get me wrong, I think you are a wonderful girl, what little I know about you. I’m not going to take you from someone else. I have too much respect for the both of us to even consider that.”
“Then for now, I am. Sorry,” I said. I really did feel sorry for him. He seemed to be a great guy, and was really hot, but I owed it to myself to find out about Brad first.
I looked at the clock and realized that he’d be out of class by now. He had a later class than I did on Thursdays. There was a bounce in my step as I walked across the campus. I’d chosen him, my Brad, and I was now going to see him. This wasn’t something that was happening to me, but it was something I was making a choice about.
I still had a key and so I let myself into the house and slipped into the back where Brad’s room was.
“Brad, I…” I began, but could get no further. I’d never seen that much skin before in my life. Sure, I’d seen myself naked, but this wasn’t just one person, and you never get the full impact seeing yourself in just a mirror. There was something a lot more visceral about this.
There was screaming and the girl whose face I hadn’t yet seen was trying unsuccessfully to cover herself with her hands while gathering her clothing at the same time.
“This isn’t what it looks like,” she said and for the first time I recognized who it was.
“Jasmine?”
“Brad’s just a boy, Jackie. He has needs and I thought that as a friend…” I put my hand up and she shut up.
“Boys have needs, do they Brad?”
“Jackie…”
“Oh no you don’t,” I said coldly to him. My first impulse, quickly squashed, had been to run from the room crying. “Get dressed, we need to talk.” I turned to look at Jasmine. “Jasmine, would you mind getting dressed in the bathroom.”
“But what if someone else…”
I just glared at her and she meekly left the room. I shut the door behind her and waited for Brad to get dressed. I’d dreamed about how he looked without his clothing. I’d thought there would be a special moment for us in the future, some moment when the two of us would be naked with each other for the first time.
He’d just had his moment with Jasmine instead.
“Jackie…”
“Oh, no. You don’t get to speak. You get to listen, and when I’m done I’m leaving.”
“Jackie…”
“Shut up, Brad. You know what hurts the most? IT’s the fact that you lied to me about being a virgin.”
“But I was…”
“The operative word here is ‘was’ Brad. One year. One short little year and you and I could have been together in whatever way you wanted. Instead, you decided to have meaningless sex with one of my friends because you could.”
He opened his mouth to speak again and I just glared. I think, for the first time, he realized how pissed I was at him.
“Don’t call me, Brad. Don’t stop by my dorm. Don’t you dare ever show up to take me to the game. We’re through, Brad.”
I turned to leave, and then a thought occurred to me, “I really liked you, Brad. I’m not going to miss being with you, I’m not going to miss the relationship we had, but I am going to miss the relationship that I thought we had. One where we were equals and had some hope for the future.
“Brad, I know you’re going to get over me. You strike me as that sort of guy. I’m never going to get over what we could have had.”
“I could change, I could fix this…”
“Ours was a relationship based on trust and truth. We can’t ever get that back, because somewhere inside I would always be worried that you’d cheat on me again.”
“You don’t know what it’s like, Jackie. It’s not like anyone else…” he closed his mouth with a snap and shut up.
“No one else would ever want me? Is that what you were about to say? Brad, I was asked out on a date this afternoon. I thought I already was in a relationship so I told him so. He accepted my response. Well, guess I was wrong about a lot of things. Good bye, Brad.”
I left the room and closed the door behind me. Jasmine leapt to her feet when I got to the living room.
“Jackie…”
“Jasmine, please tell Carla why I’ll not be at this week’s game.”
“Why…”
I just looked at her until she said, “Oh, right.”
It was only after I’d left and was halfway across campus that I realized that I had no desire to cry about Brad or his treatment of me. All the tears I had for that boy had been cried out. All the unhappiness he could cause me had already been inflicted. I’m sure that there would be sadness still to come, but I wouldn’t cry.
There wasn’t any need anymore.
I got out my tablet from my purse and dialed the number.
“Hi, Jackie.”
“How did you...oh caller ID. Right. Um, Landon? Is the offer of a date still open.”
“Not if this is some sort of revenge thing for an imagined slight.”
“He was screwing another woman when I walked into his room.”
“I’m not a rebound, Jackie.”
“What?”
“I’m not going to be your rebound guy. I’m not into cheap sex and meaningless relationships.”
“You think that...no, that’s not what this is about. Sorry, I’m still a bit angry about what I walked in on, mostly at myself more than anything, or anyone, else.”
“Want to talk about it?”
“Yes, no...I don’t know.”
“How about this? Let’s go out tomorrow, we’ll talk about our horrible exes, get reasonably smashed, and I’ll get you home with your virtue intact. We can be friends for right now.”
“I could use a few less ‘friends’.”
“Pardon?”
“He was in bed with one of my friends.”
“Oh, ouch. I’m really sorry to hear that. You’re not planning murder, are you?”
“Not in reality. My character might try to kill hers…”
“Character?”
“We’re in the same role playing group.”
“You can tell me all about it tomorrow.”
“It’s a date.”
“Jackie, we’re just meeting as friends.”
“Landon, I want to date you. I’m calm about this. You tell me I need time, fine, but whatever you call tomorrow, I’m calling it a date.”
He sighed on the other end of the line and I smiled, “ok, fine. It’s a date.”
We hung up and I went back to my room to find Wendy. There was some chocolate ice cream with my name on it in the cafeteria.
Going forward, I will be making use of the note that was left for me. I am always open to correction when I am wrong.
Thank you all for reading!
Also, artistic liberty was taken in the description of objects later in this chapter.
A lot of the girls purchased sleepwear similar to Wendy’s and mine. I’m not sure where the trend came from, but I have to personally believe it was Wendy. She is just one of those girls that fill up a room with her personality no matter how big or packed the room is.
“Hey, Wendy,” Jon said slipping in next to her.
“Hey Jon, Hey Tim,” she said with her megawatt smile.
They were both wearing the boy ‘uniform’ of flannel pants and tank tops. Tim had his normal smile for me, and I did my best to return one to him.
“Hey, guys,” I said.
“What’s up, Jackie. Sounds like you just lost your best friend or something.”
“I broke up with my boyfriend today,” I said matter-of-factly.
“Really!” Tim said, his entire face lighting up with the smile that suddenly appeared there.
“Down boy,” Wendy said.
“Sorry, I couldn’t help it. I mean, Jackie here is the most beautiful girl in the freshman class. Everyone knows it. You define fashion.”
“What are you talking about?” I said a little confused.
“Look around you, girl,” Wendy said, “People follow your lead.”
“No, that’s you, Wendy. You are so alive…”
“If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t even be wearing this,” she said pulling the top away from her chest by pinching the material with a couple of fingers from each hand.
“But other people…”
“You are a queen, and you hold court in here every day,” Wendy replied.
“I’m not popular,” I began to say when a girl walked by our table.
“Hey, Jackie.”
“Hey, Amy, how’s your mom doing?”
“Better. Thanks.”
“Great. I’m happy to hear it. See you later?”
“Sure,” she said giving me a little finger wave, “Bye, Wendy,” she said as she walked away. Tim, Jon and Wendy began to laugh.
“What?” I said in confusion.
“You don’t even know, do you,” Tim said in a little wonder.
“Know what?” None of this really seemed to make sense.
“Jackie, you care about people,” Wendy said to me with a smile.
“Everybody cares about the people around them.”
Tim snorted at this in derision, “Jackie, no offense, but people care about their family and friends. They worry about the people directly around them.”
“He’s right, Jackie,” Jon said with a smile, “most people just don’t have the time for everyone around them. They limit who they care about so that they can more efficiently spread their limited energies around.”
“But, the only limit we truly have it time,” I say, still confused.
Wendy gave me a hug, “and that’s why people love you, hon.”
“I just don’t understand,” I said. Tim and Jon were just smiling at me and Wendy shook her head slightly.
“That is just a good part of your charm,” Wendy said.
I just shook my head and smiled at the trio. They laughed and I excused myself. On my way out of the hall I greeted four or five other people I knew. After that I began laughing at myself. I hadn’t greeted everyone in that room that I knew. Taking a last look as I left the room, I realized that I knew probably half of the people there. Well, let me rephrase that. I knew half of their first names. The rest I knew a smattering of where they lived, last names, or their roommates names.
I knew them. It wasn’t Wendy who knew them.
Maybe she had a point. I took myself to bed and tucked myself in. That was likely the best I could expect for the next little, or long, while.
The Skype ringtone woke me at four in the morning.
“Hello?” I said blearily.
“Jackie, where are you?”
“Morning, Stan. I’m at home in bed.”
“Well, you should be at Arcadia Premier Storage,” he said.
“Arcadia doesn’t do auctions.”
That was an understatement. Arcadia was one of those mythical places for people like Stan and me. In August I never would have believed that I would have known anything about storage facilities.
Now…
Arcadia was one of those places that does things its own way. They charged their customers a ‘moving deposit’ when they signed up for service. This deposit was used to move the stored material to the address that they listed when they signed up for service.
“So, why wasn’t the stuff moved?”
“That is the million dollar question.”
“Which is why I asked.”
“No, I meant that literally. The locker was insured for a million dollars. There was some mess with the probate of somebody’s will. It’s actually the court that is requiring the auction.”
“Wait...you mean..?”
“Yes, the proceeds of the auction are to be split by the various named individuals in the will.”
“You mean the previous owner of the locker wanted it auctioned?”
“He did.”
“But, this could be a trick of some sort. Some elaborate hoax on the part of an eccentric.”
“You want to take that chance?”
I leaped out of bed and threw my clothing on even as I continued to talk to Stan. “How long do I have?”
“About an hour.”
“I’ll be there.”
I threw a brush through my hair as I walked out the door to meet the Taxi that I called as soon as I got off the line with Stan. While I sat in the back of the car, I did something that I never did. I logged into my bank and checked my balance.
It had to be wrong, so I called the bank. They confirmed what I was seeing. My next call was for Edgar.
“This can’t be right. Your quote…”
“Was an estimate. I had an appraisal of the value of the sets. Not only were these sets of furniture they were actual sets of furniture. The same craftsman actually made all of the furniture in that locker.”
“You mean..?”
“I mean, Jackie, that it wasn’t a few sets of furniture, but one set.”
“But, if it was sold as one set…”
“I only took my cut once. That is yours. I made a deal with you. I thought of taking a bigger cut, but then it wouldn’t have been fair to you. You negotiated that deal with me in good faith.”
“But, Edgar…”
“No whining, Jackie. Take your money and get back to me later with more of it.”
“Fine, I’m going to pay you back, though. I’m not sure how, but I will.”
“Later, Jackie,” he said with a laugh.
I walked into the storage center and followed the sound of voices. My breath sounded loud in my own ears. Stan waved to me, but his smile told me all I needed to know. He thought he had this all wrapped up. My poker face was good enough that I didn’t even smirk back at him.
“It’s now 5:20 AM on October 26th, two thousand twelve. We will open the bidding on space number 2121 at one thousand dollars. Who will bid one thousand dollars?”
I think we were all shocked at how low the price was. Could it be that we were all wrong? It had, after all, been insured for a million. I expected it to open at at least a hundred thousand.
The thought that I was thinking it as ‘only’ at the time made me laugh out loud, “We had a bid for one thousand from the woman in the red jacket.”
It got serious after that. The auctioneer was slow and deliberate, making offers that we matched or not.
“Fifty,” called out one of the old hands from the back of the area.
“Who will make it thirty-five?” said the Auctioneer.
I held up five fingers as I raised my hand.
“Forty?” he said and I nodded.
“Forty from the woman in red.”
And on it went, this back and forth. By ones and fives it raised up slowly. I had the bid at ninety when Stan raised two hands the fingers out.
“The gentleman in the bowler for one hundred thousand dollars. And from here we shall begin in increments of ten thousand. Objections?”
There were none, and we began again. It raised not much faster as now we were afraid to raise more than a finger. The auction was increasing each time for amounts greater than most auctions even went for.
When we reached two hundred thousand I could feel my heart begin to pound. Was this simply gambling and the rush that I was staying in for now, or was this something else. I hadn’t even taken time to consider whether I actually wanted this one.
Stan went to two ten and suddenly it hit me. The manner in which it was being auctioned. The short notice. There was something here. Something special.
Whether or not it was two hundred thousand special, I didn’t know.
Well, as long as I kept the fifty-five that I started with, then I would be fine. I could always start over again.
I raised a hand, with five fingers outstretched.
“Two sixty…”
I raised a single finger and pushed it up.
“Two hundred seventy thousand dollars to the woman in red.”
Three more of the men threw their hands up and walked out. Stan looked at me with one eyebrow raised and I shrugged at him. Then I grinned.
He raised a hand with five fingers raised.
“Three hundred twenty thousand.”
I raised both of my hands, fingers splayed, closed them, and then opened them again.
The auctioneer just looked at me. I smiled and nodded, again twice.
“This is a bit, unprecedented today. We have an offer for five hundred twenty thousand dollars.”
I smiled at him, the warm feeling I had begun to feel suffusing my entire body. Stan looked at me like I was insane. He looked up at the ceiling. I nodded. He looked up again. I nodded again.
He shook his head and walked out.
“Do I hear five-hundred thirty thousand dollars?”
If it went no higher, I still had enough left over for school and food left in my account. I still had some leeway if it went higher, but I had a feeling it wouldn’t.
One by one all of the other bidders left. When they did, Stan walked back to stand beside me.
“I wanted to be here for the reveal.”
“I probably owe half of whatever this is to you.”
“Nah, you are a shrewd bidder. This is yours. You deserve it.”
“Sold to the woman in red for five-hundred twenty thousand dollars. My card, miss. Please have cash or bond made available to me within the next twenty-four hours.”
I took the card and glanced at it before putting it into my bag.
“If I may do the honors,” the man said, and turned the key in the lock.
“You know what it is?”
“I don’t,” the man said. “I know little more than you do. I know the piece was insured using redacted documents. Apparently the man didn’t want anyone to know what it was, and so he picked auctions of similar pieces of jewelry to give an approximate value.”
“You think it’s jewelry?”
“Well, a piece including gemstones of some sort.”
“Stay with us. You can see what it is when we do.”
He smiled at me and stepped back from the lock after opening the door. I stepped in and my breath caught in my throat. There was a single object in the room.
That isn’t exactly true. There was a museum quality display case in the room. It was made out of polished cherry wood with three miniature spot lights focused to a single point on the black velvet cushion.
The sides were glass that even I could tell from here were at least an inch thick.
What caught the attention, however, was the object lying there, half opened. There was an enamel heart suspended in the middle of it. There seemed to be seams on the enamel heart, but what exactly they were for, I couldn’t tell.
The outside of it was studded in diamonds surrounding pearls and the panels were a red and white diamond pattern. It was the most beautiful egg shaped object I had ever seen...and it was mine.
“Do you know what that is?” The auctioneer said from beside me.
“An egg?”
He walked forward and examined the base of the object, then he took out his phone and began a quick search.
“No, this can’t be.” the auctioneer said, almost in agony.
“What?” Stan said.
“That is a Faberge egg.”
I looked a bit confused at him.
“Basically it’s a really expensive Easter egg,” Stan said as if that explained everything.
“It is a work of art is what it is, a piece of the heritage of Russia...and this one, if I don’t mistake my guess is one of the lost ones.”
“Lost,” I said even more confused.
“Off all of the eggs made under the Faberge auspices, eight of those made have been lost to history. Some may have been destroyed. This one...is likely the Mauve egg. there aren’t even any pictures of this one.”
“How would we know it is actually the Mauve egg?”
“May I?” he said gesturing toward the case.
I nodded, a little mystified. He walked over and opened the case. Using a handkerchief he took from his pocket he carefully opened up the heart into what looked like a three leaf clover. There were three hand painted pictures in the three leaves.
“Unless this is simply a cunning reproduction, and even then it could be worth millions, this is...priceless.”
Stan began to quietly chuckle. “Well, isn’t this a fine monkey’s paw.”
“No, it’s beautiful,” I said. Never would I have purchased something like this if I’d been able to see into this room beforehand. I had purchased it, however. Sure it would clean me out, but I owned this. This was something that was mine and mine alone, a truly unique piece of history and art.
“You two can’t tell anyone about this,” I said quietly.
The auctioneer looked at me appraisingly, “I just want to be able to look at it occasionally.”
“Just you?”
“Just me.”
“This is the best story I’ll never be able to tell. Imagine, finding this thing in a storage locker. And I thought the chandelier was a good one.”
“Stan…”
“No worries, Jackie. No one would believe me without proof, and why would I provide the proof.”
I breathed a sigh of relief, then something occurred to me.
“How am I going to move it?”
“Oh, that’s easy. This space is paid up for the next three years. You were buying the previous owners contract as much as you were buying the contents.”
We left that smallish room and I locked the steel door behind us. It seemed so flimsy a barrier to contain what it did.
I pulled out the business card and looked at the man’s name.
“Mr. Greer, could you come down to my bank with me? I’d feel more comfortable not carrying that much money around with me through the city.”
“And here I was hoping you would have to default. Then I would be able to sell it at a real auction. You realize what sort of commission I lost out on with this one? I get one percent of every sale. The last Faberge egg to go up at auction brought in almost fourteen and a half million dollars.”
I tried to wrap my head around the fact that I likely owned something worth even a fraction of that amount. The one percent that Mr. Greer was talking about was over a hundred thousand dollars.
We got the money out of my bank when it opened at nine. I was still reeling at the thought that even the huge sum I was handy over was paltry compared to that object.
The rest of the day went by in a daze. I got nothing out of any of my classes and a number of my teachers just gave up on calling on me to answer questions.
When it was done, I lay down on my bed and just stared up at the ceiling. That is until I felt Wendy shaking me and sounding worried.
“Jackie?”
“It’s alright, Wendy. I’m fine. I’m just a bit in shock.”
“In shock?”
“I spent over five hundred thousand dollars on a storage locker and got something I can’t sell.”
“You lost five hundred thousand dollars today?”
“No, I think I have an asset worth more than that now.”
“you think.”
“Say you got a famous painting, you know like a Van Gogh. You know it’s worth something, but you can’t bear to actually sell it.”
“You bought a Van Gogh?”
“Something like it, in a storage auction.”
“Wow, and you don’t want to tell me what it actually is?”
“I’m afraid that if I talk about it I’ll realize how crazy it sounds and I’ll lose it.”
“And if it’s really worth all that much, you probably don’t have the security necessary to keep it safe. It’s not like you are a museum,” she said.
Her statements sparked something in me, something that would change how I thought about this, but at that moment I caught sight of the time.
“Crap. I have a date in a little over an hour and I have absolutely nothing to wear.”
Wendy began laughing at me and then helped me to get ready. I was just putting the finishing touches on my makeup when there was a knock on my door.
Wendy opened it. “Wow, you get all the good looking guys. What’s your secret?” Landon laughed at this.
“Simple, I’m myself and I don’t even try.”
“Lucky,” she muttered with a smile.
“Wendy, could you stay here for a moment,” I said to stop her from leaving.
She looked questioningly at me.
“I have something to say and want some backup just in case.”
“Are you sure about this,” she said with a questioning look.
“Yes,” I replied.
“This sounds serious,” Landon said with a smile.
“It is my life. It is, and isn’t, serious.”
The smile went away and I began to talk. It was awkward and halting, but it was the truth. I told him who I was now, and who I had been born. I told him what little I knew of the medical truth of things, and my plans for the future.
I talked, all told, for about thirty minutes without him saying a word. When I got to the end, I stopped talking and Wendy came over and sat next to me.
He sat there quietly, and I let him.
“Why did you tell me this?”
“Because right now I am in a controlled environment. Right now nothing has happened other than you styling my hair and asking me on a date. You haven’t invested anything in me. You can cut ties without feeling like a fool.”
“Are you gay?”
“No, I like boys just like any other heterosexual girl.”
He colored slightly but then laughed.
“You know, looking at you there, I see a girl, well two girls if I’m honest.”
“Thank you,” Wendy said with a grin.
Landon laughed at that. “Well, Jackie, I promised to take you out on the town tonight, and I never go back on my promises.”
“You’re not upset?” I asked a little concerned.
“Upset? No. shocked and amazed? Yes, certainly. I’m not personally sure, now, if I’m ready for a relationship with you, but I’d like to find out. So that puts us in the same boat?”
“How’s that,” I asked.
“Well, neither of us is currently ready for a relationship.”
I laughed and stood up from my bed. I grabbed my purse and Landon put his hand at the small of my back to guide me from the room. I didn’t feel it was pushy, or possessive or anything like that. I just felt as though he wanted to make sure I was there, and that we were going in the same direction.
I smiled up at him and he gave me an enigmatic smile.
“What?” I said, a little concerned.
“You realize I’d likely never have known you weren’t born female if you hadn’t told me?”
“Possibly, but what if you’d found out later, like after we kissed or...had sex…” I colored when I said this last part.
“Then I’d have felt betrayed,” he said matter-of-factly.
“With good reason. I would have been lying to you about something fundamental. Like my being married or something like that.”
Landon snorted at that.
We got in his car and drove over to the same restaurant that Sam took me to those weeks ago. Don’t get me wrong, it was a nice place to eat, but I was hoping, a little, to try somewhere new. Maybe next time.
The conversation was pleasant and easy as we drove. There were no expectations on either my part or Landon’s. We were like two old friends catching up on a lifetime of moments.
It was the most relaxed I’d ever been on a date. I had dated as Jake, pretending to be a boy. Most of the dates ended poorly. Not for anything I did or didn’t do, or at least that’s what I tell myself, but more for who and what I was.
There were some dates that went well, one with a girl that later revealed to the whole student body that she was a lesbian, but it takes all sorts.
Mostly it was because I just never felt attracted to the girls I was dating. Sure, I thought that most of them were beautiful, but I never felt anything like what Brad awoke with me the times we’d kissed.
I’d been going through the motions of what was expected at me. Never once did I actually examine my own feelings. Now, however, my feelings were letting me know loud and clear who I was.
I was a girl and damn proud of it.
Landon parked the car and went round to my side to let me out. Not only did he open the door, but he offered me a hand up.
As soon as I was standing his hand went to the small of my back again and I glowed under his attention.
Here he was, still not sure whether he could have a relationship with me and yet he was treating me every inch as the woman I appeared, and presented myself, to be.
“Thank you,” I said quietly as we waited for our turn at the podium.
“for what?”
“For treating me like a woman.”
“As far as I’m concerned you are a woman,” he said warmly.
“But, you said earlier…”
“No, I’m not ready yet. I need to decide whether or not I can deal with what it would mean to be your boyfriend.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Logically, I know you’re a woman. A relationship isn’t only logic. There is a lot of emotion tied up in any relationship, and I want to make sure that mine is in the right place. I’d never want to unintentionally hurt you, let alone intentionally.”
I just smiled at him. He was such a sweet guy and he was trying so hard to understand something that I was trying to just believe I didn’t need to worry about.
We were seated and made more small talk. You know, just talking about anything that came to mind when I felt a hand on my shoulder.
“Julie said she doesn’t know you.”
“That’s not what she said and you know it, Matt,” I said smiling up at him.
“Landon, this is Matt from back home. Matt this is Landon, a friend of mine.”
“Does he know…” Landon began.
“Who I am? No, and it’s driving him nuts, I can tell.”
“Should I be worried,” Landon said.
“No. Matt had a tendency to stick up for those people who were bullied. He was one of my heroes and I can admit now to having a bit of a crush on him.”
“You had a crush on me? Why didn’t you say something?”
“Because you were Julie’s and besides, it never felt right to me. I just thought it was how you related to someone you looked up to. I never realized it was something more.”
“What girl doesn’t know what a crush is like?” he said with a truly confused look on his face.
“You really can’t guess?” I said. “Nothing about me is familiar in the least?”
“Should you really be taunting him like this, Jackie?” Landon said.
Matt’s eyes grew wide and he did a double take. He just kept looking me up and down, not in a creepy sort of way like some of the male students will, you know, like a piece of meat. No, he was looking at me like I were a work of art that he just couldn’t quite understand.
“Jack...ie? Wow...Julie said you were in town and I immediately put that out of my mind. You look good.”
“Thank you,” I said blushing.
“Well, I’ll let you get back to your date. Landon, nice to meet you. Take care of my girl here. She’s a special one.”
“Oh, don’t I know it.”
Matt walked away and I lifted a questioning eyebrow to Landon.
“What? You are. You are one of the most caring individuals I’ve met.”
“How can you know that. All you have is what I’ve told you. I could be a complete bitch.”
“Unlikely. It’s the way you talk about people. It matters to you whether they’re happy with their lives. You really don’t care how they feel about you as long as they’re happy.”
“How do you know?”
“You told me about yourself before we went on our date.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“Jackie, it means everything. You didn’t do it to protect yourself. It might have caused all sorts of problems for you. You could have gone out with me for a while and we could have just had a relationship. You could have waited to tell me until you knew it was getting serious.”
“No, I couldn’t. You’d have been in a relationship with a lie.”
“No, you couldn’t, and that is what’s special about you. No matter how much it might hurt you personally, you think about other people and how to help them.”
Dinner was good, and not just because of of the company, but because of the way he made me feel. I still didn’t think that he was right about me not being ready for another relationship, but for different reasons than yesterday. Today, well, it was more a matter of the fact that I just wasn’t the same girl.
Life had changed. No longer was I losing myself in the womanhood that had sprung itself fully formed on me when I came to college. More, I think, it was the fact that I was accepting who I was, and more than being someone’s...anything I was a woman first and foremost.
Finding that treasure, that lost object of art, had changed me. Landon’s acceptance had completed that transformation.
When he dropped me off that evening, he walked me to the door.
“Thank you, Jackie. That was a wonderful evening.”
“You made it so,” I said demurely.
“No, Jackie, it was you. You are special.”
He kissed me gently and walked away as I stood there, shocked, in front of my door. Eventually I sighed and went in to bed.
A place to put, and organize, pages that are replaced, so that the comments on those replaced pages can retain relevance, and remain as they were posed. Pages here are renamed to denote their source story.
This is an idea I have been playing with a little. Mostly here, I want to give an example of my poetic skills. I have the songs running through my head, but my question is if they detract from the story (bad) add to it (good), or are sort of neutral to the story as a whole. Vote in the comments or with good story Kudos. Please only mark a Kudo if you like the song being in the story :). As regards TGL, no story today as I am working through life stuff.
The main character is Keith, who has a Glam Goth persona (Desdemona) that he uses on stage.
The lights went out in the bar, leaving a single white spotlight on my face. I looked down at that mic, not in fear of the audience, but preparing myself for the emotion of the song. I dropped my right hand to my side, holding first 1 finger up, then two and finally three.
I brought my hand quickly to the strings and started the screaming fall from near the bottom of the neck all the way till I was running an open E double. Jake and I wove the bass line back and forth for a moment or two, as if fighting for the spotlight. I screamed my guitar, and he snarled his bass, but then he took up the incessant bass line. It was a low rumble like a thunderstorm over the horizon.
I started in on the mid range melody, and began to sing, my voice forming a sort of descant above the pounding surf of the music:
Out side of my mind lives the darkness
it takes me from myself and consumes me completely
Inside of my mind all reside in loneliness
and I live within myself pushing, running, turning you away
I ran a short bridge and a key change into a more Major key from the Minor key harmonies of the main verse and launched into the chorus with a screaming tenor line almost drowning out the bass and drums. I lived the words for the moment, giving my soul into them:
I feel all that you cut me
and I know that you don't own me
but you will not live without me
and it isn't that you want me
but I sing this all about the hell that is my life with you.
I dropped back down a bit to the original melody as I sang the second verse:
I don't know if what I feel is what you want
and I know that you're here to make all of it stop
I lose myself within the voice, of your sick taunt
And I sit and say that all I want is for you to go away.
I ran a second key change, this time dropping into a different minor key, plucking out the sepulchral tones that the chorus could produce. We slowed from the pounding rhythm we had used from the start, and I sang each word as if it gave me physical pain to let it go into the world.:
I feel all that you cut me
and I know that you don't own me
but you will not live without me
and it isn't that you want me
but I sing this all about the hell that is my life with you.
Almost before I finish the end of the chorus, the drums start beating a steady rhythm. A heartbeat. Filling the words I have to sing next with life. The original melody picks up again in it's original key The music ran the same length, but each line stopped early, letting the music run alone:
You killed me went I went away
My feeling for you flew away
My life with you is gone away
The last line of this verse was spoken instead of sung. I started quietly and low, slowly speeding up and getting louder The music ended before I did, so my band went silent leaving me to finish alone:
I damn you to the hell you live and know that all my life I live and you will not rule my love of life so get your self away!
Everything fell silent for a breathless moment, even the audience seemed to wait in anticipation. We dragged the silence on for a couple more seconds, then Bobby struck the rim of his tom three times to give us the tempo, and then we picked up on the third strike with the words and music for the first chorus:
I feel all that you cut me
and I know that you don't own me
but you will not live without me
and it isn't that you want me
but I sing this all about the hell that is my life with you.
The other two dropped off leaving me for a solo on my 12 string. I played as if the rest of the song had just been a setup for this one moment. I varied all of the versions of the melody and chorus, playing my soul into the music. I shifted into the second to last line of the chorus to single bringing my solo to a close and at the right moment, the other two came in for the final line of our song:
I sing and play the hell of you away!
It no longer mattered to me if we won this contest. We had played better than we ever had in the past, and winning now almost felt like it would be anti-climax to emotion we had brought to the song. The crowd erupted into noise, but it was so loud I couldn't tell if it was positive or negative. We left the stage as we had entered it: silently with our heads held high.
Sometimes an author just doesn't have enough time for a full story
The Gateway to Life:Or what does a girl need to do to get service around here.
I walked into Mary2's office and stopped. It wasn't anything like the office I was used to. Most of the same items were there. It just seemed that something was different. Her Vincent van Gogh Sunflower print was on the left wall, instead of straight ahead. On the back wall, in place of the van Gogh, was a picture I had never seen before. It seemed to be a set of stairs running upwards forever. Or was it going down? There were people going both ways. It was on top of a castle, or something. I really liked it.
"Examining my Escher again?"
I turned around, startled. Mary2 was standing just behind me. "You startled me."
"You haven't looked that intently at that print since the first time you came to see me."
I had no idea what to say. I opened my mouth a couple of times to speak, but nothing came out. In my own world, I considered Mary1 to be a friend. What would it be like for her to find out I was dead? And what if someone who looked exactly like me came to tell her.
"What did you do to your hair, Jamie? Trying the short look?"
"I've never had long hair." I said before thinking, and then wanted to take it back. How could I be so thoughtlessly cruel.
Mary2 seemed to crumple in on herself. 'Help her, Jams'
I felt Jams take control and go to hug Mary2. "I'm not completely gone."
Mary had a confused look on her face. "Jamie?"
"Yes, Mary. It's me. I'm hitching a ride in this Jamie for the time being." I smirked at that. Of course, with Jams in control of my mouth for the time being, only she could really see it.
I saw Mary2 genuinely smile. They sat and talked for a while, and seemed to have the same sort of relationship that Mary1 and I did. At least some things didn't change. I did notice another thing that bothered me. She wasn't wearing a wedding ring. 'What happened to Frank?'
'Who's Frank?'
'Mary's husband,' I thought. Of course Frank was her husband. There should be at least that much similarity between worlds.
'Mary's not married.'
I felt really sorry for this Mary, and was glad she had a moment of happiness with her Jamie. Even though I hadn't started liking him until recently, I could always tell that Mary1 had been deeply in love with her husband. I couldn't ever understand why, but I could see it there in how he treated her, and how she reacted to that treatment.
I knew that this Mary must feel a void in her life that nothing would ever fill.
I began to cry, and I just couldn't stop. Disembodied crying hurts inside a lot more than normal crying does. I knew that it wasn't only Mary2 that I was crying for, but myself, and Jamie, and everyone else that had been hurt, or killed, in the past little while. I didn't realize what was happening enough to know that Jams had given me back the body before I felt myself collapse on the couch.
Mary sat down beside me and put her hand on my shoulder, and when I didn't seem to be letting up, she got up. I felt so alone in that moment. What would I do? I just couldn't stop, and started to feel something uncontrollable welling up inside of me. I was terrified I would never be able to stop. I began to wail a bit, and then I felt my Mother's arms around me. No, it was Jams' mother. My mother never loved me. I tried to pull away, but her arms held me tighter.
"Jamie Patrice, I know you aren't my flesh, but I am standing here as your mother. I have you, and you are safe."
I don't know how long I sat there, crying myself dry, and still unable to stop. I felt every strike that my father had ever given me. I felt Jams' death again. I felt the loss that Mary2 would never know she had. Through it all I could hear my mother saying, "You're safe. You're mine. You're safe."
I had no more tears left to shed, and still I moaned my loss. Jamie should be alive. Not this weak, incapable person called Jim. Jamie had a life, and all I could do was almost let her murderer get away.
I felt Jams' arms go around me and I completely lost it. I began to babble out my hurts. I told them about every time my step-father struck me. I told them about Brian goading me into flipping the BMX. I told them about getting locked in the girls bathroom at the movies, and being stuffed in a trash can and rolled down the hill at school, and all of the other things that people had done to me. I told them about all the hurt I felt and the hurt I couldn't heal in others. I told them how much I loved Jamie, and that she should be the one that was alive.
I told them about trying to kill myself.
I have never had the courage to go through with it. I once bought a package of razors blades at the drug store. I even put one to the skin at my wrist. I couldn't push it hard enough to draw blood. I had tried with a kitchen knife once as well. I tried jumping off a bridge, and that was the closest I had gotten. Someone had pulled me from the edge, warning me that I could fall. I laughed at that. I think I sounded a bit crazy. I got out a bottle of my mom's sleeping pills once.
Mostly though, it was the ledge at the top of the school. The gym to be exact. Our Gym was four stories tall. I was small enough to slip through the gate at the bottom of the stairs. I used to go up there to get away from the bullies. One day I went over to the ledge at the edge of the roof. It was a little like a parapet. It was about a foot and a half wide, and flat on top. I would climb up there and watch people going back and forth between the gym and the rest of the school. No one ever looked up. I would sometimes imagine dropping right in front of this person or that one. You know, the people who seemed to torment me the most.
I would imagine them awakening screaming with the image of my death for the rest of their lives.
I was too afraid it would hurt, and so I would always climb down from the ledge, but it was always there, beckoning me to take that one final step.
Each day the time I spent on the ledge would grow longer. I had even started skipping my English class to be up there. I was taking creative writing this year.
We talked for about two hours after that. I think that Mary2 canceled some of her other appointments to give that time to me.
Author's Note: I had only planned to write for about half an hour, to get something up for your enjoyment, but I just couldn't stop there. First, I really love writing, and second, I couldn't just leave Jamie in the midst of her pain. My Dad says that the way that I write is proof that I'm insane. I'm not altogether sure he's wrong. I create my characters as individuals in my mind. I then breath life into them and loose them on an unsuspecting world. This has often in the past led to revelations about my characters I didn't know, and interactions I never planned.
Before tonight, I truly never knew that Jamie was suicidal, and it really hurt me to find out. I could not leave that little girl where the half an hour took me, and the more I found out, the less I could stop. I have been writing for an hour now, and feel that Jamie is in good hands until tomorrow. Mary2 is up to the task.