Growing up is hard to do, especially when life starts you down a completely different path...

"This is not happening to me," I told myself again, staring at my reflection in the full-length bathroom mirror. "I am not growing tits!" I didn’t say it out loud though because someone might hear.

They certainly looked like tits. Small, pointy, with nipples about the size of a Hershey's Kiss sitting on an miniature cupcake. Two of them, one each side. I poked one. "Ouch," I said.

My younger sister Donna tapped at the door. "Hurry up!" she said urgently but only loud enough for me to hear. "I swear, you take longer in the bathroom than anyone."

“Shut up,” I said. “Go away,” I added when Donna rattled the door knob.

“I’ve got to get ready, too!” Donna complained.

I pretended to ignore her. My hands shook as I tried to wrap an elastic bandage around my chest. It didn’t cooperate, I couldn’t get it tight enough to stay in place as I brought the second layer around. Frustrated I left off the attempt and struggled with an urge to start crying. I had to do something, I couldn’t go to school with nipples showing through my shirt.

“Mom!” In the hallway my sister appealed to a higher authority. “Jon is going to make me late for school, hogging the bathroom!”

“You can use mine,” our mother called, probably from the kitchen.

“But my stuff is in there!” Donna protested.

And it was, some of her pink babydoll t-shirts hung from the shower rail. I seized one of them, maybe it would fit tight enough that under one of my own t-shirts and a regular shirt….

Only fifteen months younger than me, Donna was not actually smaller as the growth spurt I had been waiting for had yet to arrive, so the shirt was not as tight as I had hoped. Still, with two more layers, it did a lot to conceal the unwanted growths on my chest.

I glared at my reflection. Shaggy white-blond hair, slightly unfocussed blue-gray eyes (I didn’t have my glasses on), clear and fair complexion (I tended to burn instead of tanning), tip-tilted nose and a wide mouth with full lips gave me less of a masculine face than I would have preferred.

“What am I going to do?” I wondered. School had started up again at the beginning of the week, my sophomore year in high school and how would I ever get through gym class once they started insisting students change clothes in the locker room?

I would just get killed if I had to do that. Or die of embarrassment. I imagined my face bursting into flames that would cook my brain and put me out of my misery.

Donna screeched outside the door again and this time I flinched. After one last look in the mirror, I reached out and opened it, brushing past her with only a mumbled, “Sorry.”

“Grr!” said Donna.

*

A few days later, I waited for the bus to take me to school. It was Monday of the second week of the new school year. This was the day that everyone would be required to dress out for P.E. meaning to change into the gym uniform at the beginning of class, take a shower at the end and change back to street clothes.

I couldn’t do that. People would find out that I had tits. They would laugh at a boy who had tits. I wanted to cry but I couldn’t do that. A girl would cry, could cry, but a boy wouldn’t, couldn’t. And I was a boy. A boy with tits.

Just as Donna arrived to wait with me for the bus, I bent over at the waist and threw up green bile, since I’d had nothing for breakfast.

“Jon!” Donna exclaimed. “You’re sick?”

I shook my head. If I were sick, I’d have to go to the doctor and the doctor would find out that I had tits. I couldn’t let that happen.

“You are sick,” Donna decided. She grabbed my hand and tugged me back toward the house. “C’mon, we have to tell Mom.”

“Leave me alone,” I protested. “I’m not sick.”

“Throwing up is sick.” Donna pulled harder and I resisted. But I had forgotten that my sister, though a year younger, was several inches taller and more than ten pounds heavier. When she made a third try at pulling me toward the house, she started with a strong yank that left me off balance. Then she kept pulling as I staggered along, trying to stay upright.

“Let go!” I yelped.

“Mom!” Donna called out. “Jonny is being a poophead! He’s sick and doesn’t want to tell you!”

“D-dammit!” I complained, nearly tripping over some toy left on the lawn by our younger sister, Linda. Donna left me no slack to recover gracefully but dragged me on toward the front door where Mom and Linda were just emerging.

“Jonny’s a poophead! A poopyhead, a poopy-poop!” Linda chanted. Linda was four, on her way to day school with Mom who worked in the county administration building across the same parking lot.

“Oh, great! She heard you call me that,” I accused. Linda was that age where she repeated everything she heard, with amplifications and variations.

Donna grinned but hushed her. “Yes, he is, but we don’t tell the whole neighborhood about it.”

Linda clamped a hand over her mouth but giggles escaped like bubbles from a bottle of pop.

Mom rolled her eyes. Probably from the joy of raising a toddler who’s more than ten years younger than your other kids. Linda was the result of an unplanned pregnancy, or as she put it herself, “I’m an accident that already happened.”

Everyone paused in the driveway while Mom checked my temperature with the back of her hand on my forehead. “No fever,” she observed. “Are you sure you’re sick?”

“I’m not sick,” I said again. “I just threw up a little and Mahomet is making a Mountain out of it.”

Mom snickered. “You’re mixing metaphors, maybe you are sick.”

Linda asked, “What’s a metty-four?”

“It’s like a suicide slushie,” Donna told her “All the flavors mixed together. And he is sick enough to almost get barf on my shoes.”

“Sewer-size slushie! Sewer-size slushie!” yelled Linda.

“There’s the bus,” Donna added, pointing at the end of the block where the big yellow vehicle had just turned off the circulating road around the subdivision.

Donna put my wrist into Mom’s grasp and headed for the bus. “See you later, sickie,” she called back.

I started after Donna but Mom tightened her grip. “Get in the car, Jon,” she ordered. “Your color is bad, I think you are sick.”

“I’m not sick!” I protested, but I began to comply. Doing what your parents told you to do was just the way the world worked, even if you didn’t want it to.

Mom settled Linda in the child seat in back, while I buckled into the passenger seat. When Mom closed the back door and before she opened the driver’s door, Linda joyfully chanted twice, “Jonny’s a poopyhead! Jonny’s a poopyhead.”

Rolling my eyes but otherwise ignoring her, I tried to summon more arguments for not seeing the doctor. But it was too late, I knew. I wasn’t crying when Mom got into the car, and she didn’t notice the effort that cost me.

*

The humiliating examination over, and my shirts back on, I sat quietly on the end of the exam table while Dr. Silva explained things to Mom. The room gleamed with chrome and smelled of disinfectant, and I know I fidgeted without noticing I was doing so.

“It’s called gynecomastia and it is quite common in young boys who have just started puberty,” Dr. Silva told Mom, then turned to me. “When did you start noticing the swelling, Jonny?” he asked.

“I guess last winter sir. Just before school started after break. Around New Year’s. Uh….” I had to blush. “Some of the guys in gym class noticed, and teased me about growing -uh- tits.”

Mom and the doctor both smiled at that, but it wasn’t at all amusing to me. I looked around for some sort of solace. Mom put a hand on my arm, but I hung my head in embarrassment because I wanted to clutch at her touch.

“They’re quite noticeable now,” the doctor mused.

I could only nod miserably.

“If you were a girl,” said Mom, “I think I’d be planning on buying you a bra.”

“Not funny,” I managed to say, and could not keep the resentment out of my voice. Mom’s eyebrows went up but she didn’t say more.

“You’re how old? Fifteen?” Dr. Silva checked the chart. “Yes. November birthday. Hmm.” He looked up. “In fact, Jon, your development is almost median for a girl your age. Tanner Stage III or early IV.”

I didn’t understand the jargon but it didn’t sound good. I heard the blood rushing through my ears, felt my pulse pounding in my throat and temples.

Suddenly, the doctor spoke in alarm. “Bend forward, rest your elbows on your knees, put your head down,” he ordered. “Breathe slow and deep.” He reached for me.

“Huh?” I said. My vision began to turn red at the edges.

“He’s hyperventilating,” I heard the nurse say.

“We’ve got you, Jonny,” the doctor said.

The nurse stepped in to help and the three adults eased me down off the examining table and into a chair as I got my breathing back to normal by pinching my nose.

They talked past me for a bit, discussing blood draws, cheek swabs, and a possible ultrasound. “Feeling better?” the doctor asked when I looked up.

I nodded. “Yes, sir. I’m sorry about that.”

Dr. Silva smiled. “It’s okay, Jonny. I know this is stressful. How are you doing in gym class this year?””

“Uh, we haven’t had to dress out yet. We only had two days last week, but today we were supposed to bring gym clothes and get lockers assigned.”

Mom frowned. “I didn’t know about that.”

“I didn’t tell you,” I admitted.

“Would you like a note to be excused from gym class?” Dr. Silva asked.

“I—you? Yes, please,” I answered. Wait. Going to see the doctor was turning into a good thing?

Mom was still frowning. “I guess you would get teased even worse with…” she made a vague motion. “Things,” she finished.

I nodded. They all looked at the very visible mounds in my shirt. The nipples didn’t show because of three shirts but the swellings were there if you knew to look.

“I’d say you’re about a full A-cup,” said the nurse.

“Maybe a bit more than that. His sister is a year younger and already a B,” said Mom.

The nurse opened her mouth then closed it again, apparently thinking better of what she had started to say.

“Is there anything you can do to help me?” I finally got up enough nerve to ask.

“Perhaps,” said the doctor. “We need to get results from the blood tests we ordered. Hmm,” he looked at his charts again. “You’re not shaving anywhere, are you?”

I rubbed my chin. “I don’t have anything to shave, sir.”

“You don’t have any pubic or axillary hair, either. You haven’t been shaving those areas?”

I knew what pubic meant but not the other word, but since I hadn’t been shaving anywhere, I just answered, “No, sir.”

Dr. Silva seemed to think this might be a wrong answer. “No depilatories? Waxing?”

“Uh—no, sir. I just don’t have any hair there.”

“Gynecomastia with lack of body hair, I know I’ve read those indications in a book somewhere,” Silva mused. “I’ll do some research. We’ll get the lab results back, and the nurse will make you an appointment for later in the week.” He smiled at me.

“Is there anything you can give me to make the -uh- swelling go down?” I asked.

Dr. Silva shook his head. “Not yet. We have to see the blood tests first.” He still smiled but I did not feel reassured.

“Do they itch?” the nurse interjected. Mom and the doctor both looked interested in my answer.

“Yes,” I said. “Almost all the time.”

“No pain?” asked the doctor. “Aching or throbbing or sharp flashes?”

“Uh—only if I bump them or scratch too hard.”

Mom and the nurse nodded while Dr. Silva frowned, but I wasn’t sure why.

*

Dressed again in the two t-shirts, one much too small, and my regular outer shirt, I felt like I was escaping the exam room while I followed Mom down the hall. She paused at the nurse’s desk on our way out of the clinic to make another appointment, this one for Thursday afternoon. “To be sure we have time to get the blood tests back,” said the nurse.

“Okay,” Mom agreed. “Four thirty Thursday then.” We moved through the waiting room, me imagining that everyone sitting around reading ancient magazines or playing with Lincoln Logs was watching my chest, though I knew that was unlikely to be true.

At the car, Mom said, “It’s almost noon. I’ve missed half a day of work and you’ve missed half a day of school.” Without an appointment, we’d had to wait to be ‘squeezed in’ to see the doctor. “Why don’t we declare a holiday and just take the rest of the day off?”

I was almost scandalized. This didn’t sound like my mother. “Okay by me,” I agreed as we buckled ourselves into our seats. “First period after lunch is Gym anyway, and I’ve got a note to skip that. So I’ll only be missing two classes in the afternoon.”

“Okay,” Mom said. “Let’s get ourselves a nice lunch then.” She steered out of the parking lot, headed toward the downtown mall. “You got any other secrets you’ve been keeping from me?” she asked casually.

I babbled a denial convincingly, and Mom laughed.

You can fool most of the people some of the time, but how long can you fool yourself?

 
There's a salad bar place in the mall, and that's where we ended up. They had a bacon, cheese, and potato soup that I liked, plus a plate of greens and crusty bread made a good lunch.

"Your appetite seems healthy," Mom remarked when I came back from the dessert table with a piece of chocolate cake covered in soft-serve ice cream.

I didn't feel that hungry, but the cake and ice cream were tempting. I shrugged, content to dig in and enjoy the treat. It would have been even better if Mom had quit looking at me as if she were planning something.

"What?" I finally asked as I finished scraping the plate for bits of frosting.

She shook her head. "I guess I had better tell you." She didn't look happy about it.

I felt a bit of ice in my middle like I had eaten the ice cream too quickly.

"It's something I know, and your father, the doctor and anyone else in his office who have looked at your records closely. Some people in the hospital, the surgeon…." She kind of trailed off.

"Mom," I said, "you're scaring me."

"I don't mean to." She took a deep breath. "Most of those people don't know you or have any real reason to remember a baby that needed a small operation."

The ice had grown.

She went on. "You see, honey, when you were born, there was some confusion."

"No," I said.

"The doctors, at first, couldn't tell if you were a boy or a girl."

I looked around quickly, but no one was near enough to hear. She was speaking very quietly, in fact, and I kind of wished that I couldn't hear her either.

"But they looked very closely at your, um, your little business," she paused, maybe watching me blush. "And they found your testicles, so they told us you were a boy."

There was a glass of water on the table, and I pulled it toward me to take a small sip. Not that I needed liquid, but it's a trick to keep yourself from hyperventilating.

Mom didn't stop. "They fixed things for you. Down there." She waved a hand vaguely. "They closed up a hole and made it so you could pee through your, uh, your penis."

I shook my head. This explained maybe why I dribbled. Other guys shot it out like a hose. Mine came out like a leaky faucet. Mom wasn't lying or playing a joke on me. It was all true.

She looked at me thoughtfully. "We did what we thought was right. If we made a mistake back then, I'm sorry, honey."

"Are you saying it's possible I'm—I'm not a boy?" I almost swallowed another sip of water the wrong way.

"I don't know, honey." She made a gesture with one hand. "And it seems like the doctors aren't sure either." She reached out and patted my hand.

"No one told me till now?" I asked, almost strangling on the words.

She shook her head. "You were just a baby at the time, not a month old. And since we had made the decision, we, your father and I and the doctors, decided not to tell you until you needed to know."

I made a noise. I don't know if I was trying to say something.

She patted my hand again. "I'm so sorry, honey."

I nodded. I felt confused, and there may have been a little anger there. I didn't want to be angry at my parents, but what had happened didn't seem to be anyone's fault. And if they could get things straightened out, what would it matter? Maybe they could figure out why I hadn't got any taller in the last year or so at the same time.

*

We spent some time in the mall, just walking the halls and looking in shop windows. It struck me how many stores aimed their marketing, inventory and displays at women. The skew for young women vs. young men had to be 3-to-1 or more. There were ten shoe stores in the mall, and five of them were women only, with only one that kind of, sort of, catered to men: a men's boot shop that still had a few styles for women.

"Why do women need so many shoes?" I asked Mom, but she only laughed.

She asked if I wanted to buy or look at anything, but I couldn't think of anything except maybe some books. So we spent a while in Walden's, and I came out with a couple of paperback science fiction. Normally, I'd have to use my allowance to pay for books, but Mom bought two books herself and included mine when she paid.

We wandered the mall a bit more, and Mom seemed to enjoy this. I wouldn't say I liked it but said nothing, lost in a depressing chain of thought.

Was it possible that I was a girl and the doctors would find that out? They hadn't made that decision when I was a baby, but now they had other evidence. I cringed to think about it, but almost a year of developing breasts made a powerful argument. I didn't like having breasts because I was a boy, and boys don't have breasts.

But what if…?

What would my friends say? Not that I had many close friends, especially since I had been avoiding people over the last year or so. What would they say if they found out I was a boy with breasts? Or that I was turning into a girl.

They talked about sex change cases in the news sometimes. Most of them were people who wanted to be something they were not. I wanted to stay who I was.

I'd read a few stories, some in medical books I looked up in the library, about people who had been misidentified at birth and got reassigned when they started puberty. Those were the ones I worried about. Would they reassign me if I didn't want to be reassigned?

"Jon," Mom called my name.

I realized I had been just standing in front of a shop window, leaking tears. Worse, it was a teen girls' shop with mannikins that looked like kids my age, all dressed in colorful outfits and looking like they were having fun. I made a noise, wiped my face and moved to catch up with Mom. "Can we go now?" I asked.

We headed home without saying much. After the talk in the food court, I was reluctant to start any conversation, but the silence in the car gave me too much chance to think. I started down the same spiral of dread that had sucked me into tears in the mall.

"Jon," Mom said again. "There's no point in worrying about things until we know something."

I nodded. "I wish it were Thursday."

She showed me a crooked smile. "Don't count on them being decisive. Medical types always want more tests. Now, do you want to go home, or should I drop you somewhere you can meet your friends?" It was a quarter after three, and school would let out in ten minutes.

I shook my head. "Let's just go home. Everyone will be on the bus." I didn't mention that I didn't have any friends.

Mom looked dubious but agreed. "Home it is, but I think you need some distraction."

"Books, television, Oscar," I said. The last made Mom smile. Oscar is our twelve-year-old Labrador who does a lot of sleeping. Maybe I would take the old dog for a walk, it's been a long while, and we used to walk for miles. I doubted Oscar was up for a long walk now, but it could be pleasant to cover a few blocks with him. I smiled back at Mom. It didn't look scary because she smiled back.

"Go easy on the old guy," Mom warned.

I nodded, sort of looking forward to it now. Oscar had been the new puppy when I was three, and for a time, we might as well have been brothers. Anticipating a quiet walk with my old friend through the autumn leaves, I completely forgot whose house a walk to the park would pass.

*

We made it home before the bus (and my sister Donna) arrived. Just as well, I didn't want to answer all the questions she would have asked. Linda, the five-year-old, was at the neighbor's house. She stayed afternoons there when Mom worked. The Pattinsons had a little girl, too, Annabelle.

The two seemed to create a battery of little-kid energy together, energizing each other to greater levels of creative mischief. If they hadn't mastered the weaponization of their cuteness, they might not have survived long enough to start school. Mrs. Pattinson claimed to enjoy the challenge of dealing with them, but any sane person would have to doubt that.

But for a few minutes, with Mom in the kitchen, I had the rest of the house to myself. I did a quick change of clothes to something less at risk from dirt, leaves, dog drool and possible sudden San Diego showers. My old jeans fit tight across my seat, but they were comfortable and adding a long-sleeved flannel shirt would ward off any chill coming off the mountains.

I found Oscar dozing in his bed behind the living room couch, but he perked right up when I suggested a walk. "Who's the Best Boy?" I asked him as I clipped his leash to his collar and called to Mom that I was taking Fooler to the park. Oscar wagged with some enthusiasm and started eagerly toward the door when I had gotten his leash sorted.

The old dog had acquired Fooler as a nickname years before, earned by his well-developed talent of staring off into the distance at some imaginary point of interest while he sneaked up on whatever you were eating. His black coat had grayed significantly on his head and tail, and he had lost some teeth, hearing, and energy, but he was still my Best Pup.

The local park surrounded a small pond with both white and mallard ducks that seemed to live there year-round. In the fall, tourist waterbirds might visit it on their way to winter vacations in Mexico, and I anticipated seeing a few of the magnificent Canada geese. Fooler feared the geese due to an incident years ago, but he seemed to enjoy watching the ducks.

So did I, and I looked forward to the calm pleasure.

I didn't remember whose house I would be walking past until I was almost on top of it. Rodney Pick and I had been friends at one time, but when we started junior high three years before, he'd had a growth spurt and a personality change. Since then, he had nominated me as a favorite of the crowd of bullies he ran with, both in junior high and now in high school.

It wasn't steal-your-lunch-money or stuff-you-in-a-locker bullying, more the trip-you-in-P.E. or random-elbow-to-the-head sort. Casual bullying, almost like it was just ordinary behavior.

I never hit a real growth spurt, so I'm small, short even, and up until last year, I thought that was the main reason I was a target. But now I don't know. A few people had seen the changes in my chest before I started making an effort to cover them up.

The last few weeks of freshman year in the spring had been tough. I missed some school and even forged a note from my parents to be excused from gym class. That had only worked for a three-day reprieve. Longer than that, you needed a note from a doctor on his office stationery.

Which I now had. If I could stay out of gym class, I might survive my sophomore year—if nothing else changed, like my unwanted ornaments getting too big to conceal.

Oscar paused to sniff at a rock, and I saw the Pick house three doors down. Until I got near the place, I had honestly forgotten that it would be on this route. But the bus still hadn't run yet, delivering kids from the schools. Rod probably wasn't home.

I tried to hurry Oscar along toward the park because the bus could show up at any minute, but the old dog wasn't eager to join me in a trot. At nothing more than a medium walk, we headed toward the corner where I could turn left and be out of sight of the Pick front door.

I resolved that when we left the park, we would take a different route home. But before we got past Rod's house, the bus appeared as if from a trap door, and kids were being let out at the very corner I was trying to reach.

And one of them was Rodney. We were the same age. Both our birthdays were between Halloween and Thanksgiving within a few days, but he was six or seven inches taller and at least thirty pounds heavier.

I felt something beating against my leg and looked down. Oscar had recognized Rod, who was now walking directly toward us.

"Woof!" said the old dog, remembering only the friendship we used to share.

Rod laughed and smiled at us. "Woof yourself, Fooler," he said, raising a hand.

I raised my hand back, confused. At school, Rod did not smile at me, though he sometimes grimaced.

"Hey, Jonnie," he called at me, only yards away. "You weren't in school today, watcha doing taking the Best Pup for a stroll?"

Oscar pulled on the leash, and Rodney bent down to ruffle the graying ears. "Best dog ever," he crooned. I remembered that Rod's family had never had pets because of allergies, and he had always been one of Fooler's favorite beings and vice versa.

"Doctor's appointment. Took nearly all day," I managed to mumble.

Rod straightened up. "You don't look sick," he commented, still smiling.

Then we both turned at a voice calling, “Hey, guys. Hey, Fooler.” My sister Donna had seen us from the bus and had made the driver wait while she got off a stop early.

Oscar, of course, went nuts to hear and see her in an unexpected place, and dragged me toward her. She bent down, crooning at him and ruffling his old ears.

Rod grinned at her, too, and if he’d had a tail, he’d have been wagging it. But why did I feel a stab of something painful in my chest?

“Jonny, why are you such a girl?” he asked, grinning down at me.

“Is Mom at home?” Donna asked, taking turns with Rod ruffling Oscar’s ears.

I nodded.

“You guys going to the park?” she asked, looking at Rod, not me.

“Yeah, I guess,” Rod said, not looking at me either. “I have to put some stuff in the house,” he added, waving at his books.

“Me, too,” Donna agreed. “And I’ll need to tell Mom that I’m home. Meet you guys at the park,” she promised, heading off back the way I came. “Jon,” she said as she passed me. “What did the doctor say was wrong with you?”

I shrugged. “He wants more tests,” I muttered. I resented her sort of co-oping my walk with Oscar into some sort of social thing with Rod.

“I’ll be right out,” said Rod, heading toward his own front door. I kind of resented him, too. He was acting like he thought we were still friends.

Donna waved at him, and he paused on his doorstep to watch her go. She was only fourteen, but she already had the family curves like Mom and her sister, Aunt Hilda.

Oscar, aka Fooler, tried to follow Donna at first but then returned to me, sitting on the sidewalk so he could look up at me more easily. Why do old dogs drool like that? I didn’t have anything to wipe his face with in my pockets, just the bag I had brought for picking up after him.

I grabbed a few wisps of autumn grass and tried to clean him up. He thought this was me offering him a treat. “No!” I told him. “Don’t eat the grass! Silly dog!” He wagged his tail, clomped his jaw and gave me the puppy dog look. I laughed at him.

Rod laughed, too then finally disappeared inside his house and Fooler and I continued toward the park. After the corner, it would be one block over and diagonally across the street. I thought about maybe just following the block around back to our house, but Rod caught up with us before we got far enough to take that option.

“Hey,” said Rod, falling in beside me.

“Hey,” I responded. I glanced up at him. Rod’s birthday would be the end of the month; he would turn sixteen almost two months before me — he was already taller and bulkier, half a foot and twenty pounds at least. He had turned into something of a bully since we started junior high two years ago and he got his growth spurt. Or at least, he hung with the crowd of bullies. Why was he being nice to me, now?

“Your sister has done some growing up,” he commented.

Oh. I glared at him.

He shrugged. “She’s taller than you,” he said.

I ignored him. I hadn’t had a growth spurt and Donna had, so yeah, she was two or three inches taller than me. He didn’t have to point it out, though.

We reached the corner where we had to cross two streets to get to the park. Fooler wanted to take a shortcut, trying to drag me diagonally across the intersection. “No!” I told him.

Rod took the leash out of my hand, yanked it hard enough to get the dog’s attention and said in a commanding voice, “Heel!”

Fooler, summoning up memories of leash training I’d totally forgotten he ever had, fell in behind Rod and followed him around the crosswalks. “You are such a wimp,” he said to me, handing the leash back as we entered the corner of the park. When I reached for the leash, he grabbed my wrist and pulled me close.

“Hey!” I yelped. “Let go!” I was afraid — what was he doing? But all he did was muss my hair, laugh and let me go.

“Jonny, why are you such a girl?” he asked, grinning down at me.

I stared at him.

“Let’s take Fooler to the dog park,” he said, motioning to the fenced off far corner of the green space. “It’s got a fence around it, and he can play with other dogs.”

I nodded vaguely. The dog park was new and Fooler loved it. We walked slowly that direction and I tried to avoid looking at Rod. It wasn’t easy because I knew he was watching me and grinning. Had he noticed my chest? I felt self-conscious.

“We used to be good friends,” Rod commented. “We even used to get in trouble together, sometimes.”

“Yeah, well,” I muttered.

“Remember when we went down to Santee Creek and hunted mudbugs?” He waved generally in the direction of the creek north of our subdivision.

I nodded. “Crayfish,” I said. Rod has an uncle from Louisiana where they have some odd names for things.

“What were we? Eight? You didn’t want to get muddy so you sat on the bank with the bucket and I brought the crayfish to you.” He laughed. “Then you slipped when you stood up and fell in the creek. You got all muddy, anyway, and all the bugs escaped.”

Well, it was kind of funny now. I made a noise.

“See?” said Rod. “You giggle like a girl, you carry your books at school like a girl.” He leaned over as it to look behind me. “You’ve even got a round little bottom like a girl.”

My eyes got wide, I know they did. Now I wanted to turn around and look at my ass. I didn’t, of course.

We reached the gate of the dog park and Rod took over getting Fooler inside and getting his leash off. “Go have fun, Oscar,” he ordered the dog. The old guy didn’t need a second invitation, but shot off toward a border collie he sort of knew from previous visits. They were the only two animals in the large dog side of the park and they were soon doing the play-bow and sneezing at one another.

We stood there at the low fence watching the dogs, then moved away from the gate when a couple arrived with a pair of golden doodles. The man just grinned at us but the woman gave me an odd look and I wondered what she thought she was seeing.

Rod snorted.

“What?” I asked.

He shook his head. “She’s wondering why I have such a tomboy of a girlfriend.”

“She is not!” I looked away. My eyes were burning.

Rod stepped closer and put a hand on my back. I tried to shrug him off but his hand stayed there. He started remembering another story.

He said, “We were ten and we went to visit my uncle in Julian, we stayed a couple days, camping in his backyard with my cousins.” Rod might have been talking to himself since we weren’t looking at each other at all, but his hand was still on my back.

I nodded. He couldn’t hear that, of course, but he went on. I already knew the story he was going to tell. “We went exploring, just you and me, and we found this cruddy old house on, like a country road outside of town.”

“It looked like no one lived there,” I put in. We were in the shade of some big trees and his hand felt warm.

Rod laughed. ‘Yeah. The yard was overgrown, the windows were dirty, there were broken boards in the porch that you could see. The screen door had a rip in it.”

“Uh, huh,” I grunted. We were almost laughing again, remembering.

“It had a tin roof,” he said. “I threw a rock up there just to hear what kind of noise it made.”

“It must have sounded like thunder inside,” I said. He took his hand off my back and pushed at my shoulder so we were facing each other again.

Rod grinned wide. “That old man came rushing out the door, yelling at us.” He laughed out loud. “I didn’t know what he was saying but he was scary. It was summer and he had on way too many clothes, like he was cold and couln’t get warmed up.” Rod looked right at me, grinning. “We started running to get away and you ran into that tree limb.”

I nodded. “Right across the eyebrows, knocked me down. It hurt.” I pushed his hand off my shoulder, and he let me.

Rod was still smiling. “I had to come back for you, you were crying and couldn’t see where you were going.”

“Yeah, well…”

“That old man picked up a rake or something and shook it at us. I ran all the way back to Uncle Andy’s place, towing you behind me like a kite.”

We grinned at each other, but I knew my face had turned red, I could feel the heat. Why had he touched me like that? “I was trying to keep up, cause I thought if I fell down, you would just drag me home.” A noise escaped me and Rod burst out laughing.

“I might’ve,” Rod admitted. “That old man scared both us.”

“We laughed a lot about it later,” I said.

“I laughed right away,” he said. “I thought it was funny when I realized the guy wasn’t chasing us.”

He looked at me and my face got hotter.

“You were crying. You cried a lot.” He grinned at me, a little less friendly of a grin this time. He put a hand on my hip this time and I pushed it away immediately.

“I was scared.” I felt my face get hotter. Was I scared now? It was something like being scared.

“Then when I made you see how funny it was, you giggled.” Rod kind of rolled his eyes. “It was like you couldn’t laugh like a boy, you giggled like a girl.”

“I just laugh quieter,” I protested. His fingers were around my wrist, his thumb in the palm of my hand. I wrapped my fingers around it; his hands were so much larger than mine.

“Yeah, you laugh like a girl, all giggly and high-pitched,” he said. “Why do girls do that? Sometimes they act like they’re afraid to laugh out loud. Why do you do it?”

I glared at him but he just shrugged then pointed with his other hand.

My sister, Donna, waved at us from the far corner of the park. Rod waved back and let me go.

I took a step away. Had we really been holding hands?

I looked at Donna — had she seen us, doing whatever we had been doing? I wasn’t sure if I wished she would just go away but I certainly hoped she hadn’t seen what we were doing. Whatever it was.

She’d taken time to change clothes. Instead of the blue skirt, white blouse and loafers she wore to school, she had on pink capris, a flowered top and sneakers. She’d tied her hair back in a ponytail, too. She looked really cute.

“Sometimes, you’re more of a girl than Donna is,” Rod commented.

“What?!” I crossed my arms over my chest.

“Yeah, like that,” he said. “Girls do that.” He reached out suddenly and mussed my hair again. “And like if I did that with Donna’s hair, she would either kick me or slug me.” He was still grinning and shaking his head, before suddenly looking alarmed. “Aw, jeez, Jonny, don’t cry!”

“You’re bullying me!” I snapped at him.

He put his hands up, making pushing motions. “Yeah, get mad. Don’t cry.”

I turned away from him, trying not to sniff. Fooler came over and looked through the fence at me, his tail waving. Were the things Rod was saying true?

“Yeah,” Rod said. “I guess I put up with you turning out to be gay for two more years, but when we got to junior high, I had to cut you loose.”

“I’m not gay,” I protested. Had it been like that?

“I don’t really care,” said Rod, the guy who used to be my best friend. “But if you’re queer for me — well, that just ain’t gonna happen.”

If it wasn’t…. What the heck had we just been doing? I remembered his remark about the lady with the goldens thinking I was his girlfriend.

I thought I really should kick him, but instead I ran to intercept Donna, taking Fooler’s leash with me. I’d give it to her and she could bring the old dog home, but I had to get away.

Secret origins...

I didn’t say much to Donna, just handed Fooler’s leash to her and kept running but by the time I got to the corner, I was done. One problem I had was the jiggling of my— my breasts. Even inside three layers of shirt they rubbed against the fabric with the impact of each step. It made it uncomfortable to run and impossible to think. How do girls with bigger breasts manage it?

I walked across the intersection and headed home, taking the longer route around the block. I needed time to think.

Rod had as much said everyone at school thought I was queer. Maybe some of them said gay, the new word that was supposed to not be as insulting. That I acted queer or like a girl. How I carried my books? I just carried my books, didn’t I? How else were you supposed to do it?

Lots of times I had been told right to my face that I ran like a girl. But no one ever told me what that meant. Some guys were really good runners, and so were some girls. But what was running like a girl supposed to mean? I didn’t know any other way to run.

I tried not to get mad about it. That wouldn’t do any good and besides, when I really got mad about something, lots of times I ended up feeling bad and crying. And that sure was an easy way to get accused of acting like a girl.

I sighed.

I’d almost reached the end of the first block when someone called my name. I turned and saw Mrs. Henderson hurrying out of her front door, waving at me. “Oh, Jonny,” she called. “Jonny, you’re just the person I wanted to see.”

I knew what this was going to be about. The Hendersons had five-year-old twins, a boy and a girl. I had babysat for them in the past but in the last year, had given the job over to my sister. “Do you need Donna to come watch Marie and Mike some time, Mrs. Henderson?” I asked.

She caught up with me but waved a hand. “Well, no, I was hoping I could get you to sit. Marie and Mike seem to like you better.” She frowned. “Besides, the last time I asked Donna, she told me she had things she’d rather do on a Friday night.”

“Uhh,” I blinked at her.

“Will you, Jonny?” She looked at me hopefully. “Friday nights are Benjie and I’s best time for a date night.”

“Date night?” I said. “But you guys are married,” I pointed out. “To each other.” It occurred to me that she and her husband were ten years younger than my parents or more and probably did like to get out and do things together like they were still dating. I had to smile at her at the thought.

Mrs. Henderson was a nice-looking lady in her blue Capri pants and white poofy blouse, her sandy red hair piled on top of her head, and she laughed like I had made a really funny joke. “Jonny!” she said like she thought I was teasing her. “We meet with our friends and go to a movie or out to eat, or both. So, can you, this Friday? Marie asked for you especially and Mikey agreed.”

I actually enjoyed babysitting but what I was thinking about was the doctor’s appointment on Thursday. I hesitated.

“Besides,” she went on, “Donna is only fourteen and can’t stay out as late as you.”

“I’m only fifteen,” I said.

“But your birthday is in just a couple months. November 21st, right?”

She remembered my birthday? How could I get out of this? “I’ll have to be sure we’ve not got some family thing planned….”

“There’ll be a bonus, a big tip,” she promised.

That actually caused me to laugh. “Can you call me at home later tonight?”

“Oh, yes,” she said. “Thank you, Jonny!” She turned to go. Knowing those twins, she was probably worried they might get up to something while she was outside.

“I didn’t say yes, yet,” I warned her.

She giggled as she hurried away. “You will. Teenagers always need money.”

Well, that was true, I reflected. Her offer had certainly changed my mood and I went on my way, smiling a bit.

But as I turned the next corner, it occurred to me. Babysitting is usually a job for a girl. Did I get offers for the task because I acted more like a girl than a boy?

* * *

When I got back home, Mom followed me into my room. Before I could let her know I didn’t appreciate the company, she spoke up.

“I called your father,” she said.

I nodded like a marionette.

“He wants you to see another doctor. A specialist,” she continued. “An endocrinologist. I made an appointment for next week.”

“Okay,” I said. I’m the eldest and a boy, so you would think Dad and I would be close. But we never had been. Perhaps because of his work; he was a chemical engineer and supervisor on several big projects and contracts with the company he worked for: Novella Therapeutic Solutions. He spent a lot of time in Mexico on things down there, too.

Mostly they built, operated and managed automated medical drug factories. So, no surprise that they might have an inside track with high-level doctors. There might actually be a chance that someone could do something to help me, but at that moment, I felt hopelessness hanging over my head like a water balloon full of despair.

“And I made something for you, honey,” Mom added before I could shoo her out of my room. She held up something that looked like a thick, beige sleeve. I realized it was made of the same material as the Ace bandages that I used to use to wrap around me to conceal my development before things got too awkward.

“Uh?” I ventured, taking the item when she presented it to me.

“I noticed you wearing one of Donna’s tight t-shirts, this ought to work much better.” She showed me the details of the construction. It really was made of the same stretchy material as Ace bandages, two layers, with anti-roll stiffeners sewn in. “Those go in the back,” she explained. She backed toward the door. “Try it on,” she urged. “Then come out and show me how it fits.”

“How do I put it on?” I asked.

“Just put your arms through it and pull it down over your head.” She left the room, smiling, and I smiled back. How funny that Mom’s thoughtful little creation had brightened my mood.

Once she was out of the room, I slipped out of my shirt and tried to put Mom’s gift on. It wasn’t easy. It actually fit kind of tight across my face and getting it over my shoulders turned out to be a job. I had to sort of scooch one arm up so I could pull it down into my arm pit with the other hand then repeat.

But wow! Just glancing down I could see it had flattened out my chest mounds, pretty much completely. And no nipples were going to show through two layers of thick fabric. I moved over to look at myself in the mirror over my dresser. I made some adjustments, being sure that the four anti-roll stiffeners were all in the back, then pulled on my regular t-shirt and the top shirt I had been wearing.

Perfect. Nothing showed that I was wearing anything extra or had any extra flesh where a boy should not be showing any. I grinned at my reflection. Then squirmed a little. The roughness of the stretchy fabric had irritated my nipples while the garment had been pulled down and adjusted. I rubbed gently but that did not seem to solve the problem.

A light knock came at the door, and Mom called softly, “Can I see?”

“Oh, yeah,” I said. “C’mon in! It’s great!”

* * *

Mrs. Henderson didn’t let any grass grow before calling to see if I could watch her twins on Friday. I asked Mom and she said okay, a little pleased it seemed that one of her friends thought me so trustworthy.

So, that was set, even if I still felt a little unsure of just why I got such an offer.

* * *

Later, while we worked on making supper, she explained to me the concept of the sports bra. “To keep things from jiggling, mostly, but they also minimize things.”

“Uh,” I grunted while cutting up veggies for salad. “But what you made for me isn’t any kind of bra.”

“No,” she agreed. “But the principle is the same.”

“I guess so,” I admitted.

Mom had frozen breadsticks in the oven and leftover roast turning into stew in a big pot on the back of the stove. “You’re always good help in the kitchen,” she commented. “Not like your sister who acts like she’s afraid to learn how to cook.”

“Looks like Donna is going to be washing dishes tonight,” I mentioned as I slid the lettuce, tomatoes, mushrooms and peppers into the big salad bowl. Whoever helped with making dinner was exempt from that chore. Served her right for dawdling in the park with Rod Pick.

* * *

Dad made it home in time to eat some salad, breadsticks and stew while Mom explained in more detail what the doctor had said about my symptoms.

He asked questions, though he didn’t sound happy about the answers. I was in the living room but I could hear them talking and every time I glanced that way, Dad was looking back at me.

I knew I’d been something of a disappointment to him. I wasn’t a jock of any sort, not even before dressing out in gym had become a problem. My Little League career had involved a lot of bench sitting and digging little pits with my toe in the emptiness of right field. He’d never been a big sports hero, himself, but he had been a three-letter-man in high school.

I wasn’t a big brain either, my grades were mostly Bs, with Cs in the subjects I wasn’t much interested in. Like math and science, things Dad did excel in. I could draw and play the piano, but those didn’t seem to impress him.

When he finished eating, he went to the bar and made himself a short whiskey-and-soda, something he did two or three times a week. He claimed it helped him fall asleep when he was wound a bit too tight. Mom kept a dish of sliced limes in the big refrigerator for various reasons and stopped him to decorate his drink with the bit of color. I looked away then as I realized he was headed right toward me.

I was sitting in one of the straight-backed chairs from the dining room, and Dad sat down next to me in his recliner. Mom called Donna in to the kitchen to finish the clean up. Linda had been put to bed as soon as Dad got home, it already being after her bedtime. So it was just me and Dad in front of a television neither of us was watching.

Dad took a sip of his drink, made a satisfied noise and sat it down on the little table between us. “I’m sorry, Jon,” he said.

I looked at him sideways without completely turning my head. “I don’t think any of this is someone’s fault,” I said. “Stuff happens. You know, it’s not like I got cancer or torn up in a car wreck. It’s embarrassing, and I wish it wasn’t happening….” I stopped.

He nodded. “I just want you to know that—that if we made a mistake when you were a baby, we’ll—we’ll do whatever we can to make it right.”

“Huh?” I thought back to what I’d learned that day. “You mean when you decided to raise me as a boy?”

He cleared his throat. “Yes, I suppose that’s what I’m talking about. We let the doctors convince us that minor surgery would put everything right.”

“And now… you think... you might have been wrong?” I still wasn’t looking at him, in fact, I had turned partly away and stared at the corner of the ceiling as far from him as possible.

He was silent for a beat. “I guess we really don’t know yet… son.”

I made a noise. “I don’t want to be a girl, Dad. I want to be me.”

I saw him nod out of the corner of my eye, and I finally turned to face him. He didn’t look comfortable, as if now he was the one who wanted to look away. He looked at his drink but didn’t reach for it.

“I’m sure the doctors will be able to figure things out….”

He trailed off even before I interrupted to ask, “Like they did fifteen years ago?” I felt hot tears spring up in my eyes. “If they made a mistake then, how can we— I— be sure they aren’t going to make one this time?” My nose started to run and I put my hand up to catch the liquid.

“We don’t know,” Dad said sadly. “We can’t. We just have to get all the information we can and then make our decision. Your decision, Jon, because this time you’re old enough to make your own.” He bent forward to snag a tissue from the dispenser on the coffee table and hand it to me. “Blow your nose,” he said kindly.

“Thank you,” I said, taking the tissue and wiping my eyes with it before using it on my nose. “I don’t want to make a decision, Dad. I just want to be me like before.”

He moved his shoulders, as if shrugging some great weight to a different position. “We do what we can, Jon,” he said. “And sometimes, we do what we must.”

I nodded, wadding the tissue up in my hand, and staring at the amber and green drink on the table between us. I actually knew what whiskey tasted like from hot toddies Mom had given out when the whole family came down with colds. I didn’t understand why anyone would drink the stuff voluntarily if they weren’t sick, though.

That thought made me smile, and when I looked up at Dad, he smiled back at me.

“You’d better go to bed, son,” he said. “You have school tomorrow.”

“Okay,” I agreed. I stood up and so did he. I took a step toward him and he pulled me into a hug. It wasn’t like we never hugged, but they were rare.

And I had a hard time not sniffling again when he whispered to me, “We love you, Jonny. I love you.”

I murmured an “I love you, too,” back, and we just stood there for a long moment, arms around each other. Dad isn’t a really big guy but he’s a lot bigger than me and I realized how much his hug meant to me right then. I felt safe and protected in his arms.

Then we separated and said good night and I went to my room.

* * *

"You gonna live?" he asked...

The next day of school, Wednesday, was excruciating. I tried to talk to no one and not look anyone in the face. I did have to take my note from the doctor to the school office, and they changed my schedule so I would go to study hall instead of gym.

And I wore Mom's little elastic chest-band every day. Heck, I even tried to sleep in it, but it turned out to be a little too uncomfortable for that, riding up under my armpits in my sleep and stabbing me in the back with the stiffeners.

But no one at school paid much attention to me, just another short skinny sophomore. It didn't even seem to be bully season, though I did see Rod Pick chatting up my sister. He gave me an almost friendly wink, but I clutched my books and hurried past him.

Was I carrying my books like a girl? They were heavy; how else could I carry them?

I got my helping of gruel at the cafeteria and originally went out to find a place to eat on the patio, but everyone else had the same idea. Every table had several people already.

I started to turn back to find someplace to eat inside when Donna caught my eye by waving. My sister was in the same grade as me, being only ten months younger, a preemie. The family joke is that she's been in a hurry since before she was born.

I hesitated, so she stood up and waved harder. "Jonnie," she shouted.

I winced and decided I might as well expose myself to her and her friends while I ate brown rice, dubious chicken and steam-flavored vegetables. So I went in her direction, nodding to show I had seen her.

She sat back down, saying to her friends. "Jonnie's a sophomore, too, but we have, like, almost no classes together."

'Homeroom and World History, which are in the same place and time," I said, putting my tray down. I had ditched the heavy books in my locker before heading to the lunch line.

Two girls made room for me next to Donna by scooching over, and I settled into the empty spot. The patio tables were those picnic-style, with three curved benches around them and a center umbrella that was open but leaned toward the wrong side to provide any shade. The September sun was bright, but it's almost never hot in North San Diego, anyway.

"Wow, you two look so much alike," one girl exclaimed. She had a brown pageboy haircut and a sitcom smile.

"Well, they're twins; they ought to look alike," a second girl remarked. Her blonde hair was in braids, and she kept her lips almost closed, stretched over her braces.

Donna rolled her eyes. "We're not twins," she protested. We get this a lot and have ever since she caught up and passed my height back in the seventh grade.

"You're both sophomores, both fifteen? How are you not twins?"

I let Donna explain while I examined my lunch. The daylight had worked a strange alchemy on the color of things. Brown rice is not supposed to be gray; the crispy chicken coating had turned Hunter's Orange, and the veggies had achieved a limp rainbow in muted tones. I tried the rice. It wasn't any worse than it looked.

Pageboy suddenly stabbed a finger at me, excited, "So you're the little sister!"

I frowned at her, and Donna exploded, laughing so hard she almost fell off the bench. It only got more embarrassing.

* * *

Thursday morning came at last, and I got ready for school as usual. My appointment was at 9 a.m. So the plan was for me to go to the doctor in the morning and attend school in the afternoon. I stayed out of Donna's way till she left for school, then I did my own morning routine, including putting on the chest-band.

Mom and I had an hour or so to sit around the kitchen table before we really had to think about leaving. I don't drink coffee, and it was still too summery for hot cocoa, so I had a cup of tea while Mom sipped her coffee.

We nibbled a bit on butter cookies. She looked at me curiously, and I fidgeted under her gaze. "What?" I finally asked.

She tilted her head and looked at me a bit more intently. "Just noticing who in the family you look like."

"Um," I said.

"You actually look more like your Aunt Hilda than you do me," she commented.

I shrugged. Aunt Hildy was four years Mom's junior, but they looked quite a bit alike. Both round-faced blondes with blue eyes and dimples. "I look like you," I said simply.

She nodded. "Yes, but you've got that determined little chin, like Hilda. And when you grin, it goes a little sideways, just like hers. And your hair has red highlights in the sun."

I rolled my eyes. I wanted to think I looked like Dad, but really, that was Donna's department. The narrower eyes, more gray than blue, darker hair and a wider mouth — since Dad was adopted and didn't know his birth family, we didn't have any of his other relatives to compare to.

Dad always claimed he looked like Barney Fife or maybe John Denver, which made Mom laugh and shake her head. "Your ears don't stick out far enough," she would tell him. He didn't really look like those guys, though he was skinny and a bit less than average height by a couple of inches.

But talking about who I looked like reminded me of what Mom had admitted after the last doctor's appointment — that they hadn't been sure when I was born if I were a girl or a boy. I'd been trying not to think about that. It was just too weird.

* * *

The doctor wanted to do a lot of tests, including ultrasound and several blood draws. Why do they need several tubes of blood? Can't they do it all with just one tube?

By the time I'd been examined (I had to take off the chest-band), poked with needles, tortured with an ice-cold sonic screwdriver, and dressed again, the morning was gone. Mom and I sat in the doctor's private office, waiting for her to finish looking at test results.

The walls of the room were covered in bookcases with a few places left for framed documents attesting to Dr. Silva's qualifications to practice medicine.

Oh, I had a new doctor, also named Silva, but Dr. Beatrice Silva this time. Being switched over by the clinic to a female doctor disturbed me a bit. Did that mean anything? And if so, what? So I fidgeted.

"Sit still," Mom scolded, just as the new doctor entered carrying a sheaf of folders. She was tall, blonde, and slender and looked more Northern European than someone named Silva probably should. I wondered if she were the other Doctor Silva's wife. She certainly didn't look like his sister; he looked like you might expect anyone named Silva in Southern California to look.

Smiling at me, Dr. Silva, the lady one, leaned against her desk. "Jonny?" she said. "Do you prefer to be called Jon or Jonny?"

I shrugged. "Either is okay, I guess. Being short, I'm not going to talk everyone out of calling me Jonny, am I?"

She smiled wider. "Probably not," she agreed. "Well, the ultrasound didn't show much, some technical problem, but we have your blood test results from before. I ordered another sequence to confirm because they are a bit — unusual."

I felt a sinking sensation in my chest. I wanted to make a joke, but I'm not a comedian and something like, "Give it to me straight, Doc. How long have I got to live?" likely wouldn't go over well, anyway. Something in her stance or attitude prepared me for bad news.

"I'll try not to get too technical," she said. "The actual numbers are not that important, but your body, Jon, is beginning puberty with the wrong flavor of hormones."

"Huh?" I said. Strawberry? I thought inanely. I did mention I wasn't good at comedy.

She nodded as if responding to the unasked absurdity. "You have slightly more estrogen in your system than a girl your age and almost no androgens. We've ruled out conditions like adrenal hyperplasia and androgen insensitivity, but the imbalance seems key to what is happening."

I blinked. I didn't know what those conditions were. I felt Mom's hand grasp mine, but I kept looking at the doctor.

She nodded again. Maybe it was a nervous tic. "This is almost certainly why you are experiencing your symptoms. It's unusual but not unheard of. Both sorts of sex organs normally produce both kinds of hormones. You just seem to be making more of the opposite kind than usual."

I wanted to protest that I was not doing it on purpose, but I swallowed that and looked across at Mom.

"Is there anything we can do?" Mom asked.

Dr. Silva nodded again. Definitely a tic. I repressed an urge to fidget and tried to keep listening and not let my mind go screaming off into the mental underbrush.

"We've already got you an appointment with a specialist, someone your Dad's company recommended, an endocrinologist, next week, but I just spoke with her on the phone and made a suggestion she agreed with."

"Huh," said Mom. "What would that be?"

The doctor looked at me. "Your problem seems to be that your body is not producing enough androgen. We decided we should try boosting your blood level of androgens with an injection."

I don't like shots, but it would be worth it if it went some way toward solving my problems. No one mentioned that injecting testosterone into a muscle is one of the most painful shots you can get.

* * *

I was still rubbing my thigh where I got the shot in the car on the way home. Mom was saying something, trying to be supportive and optimistic, but I really wasn't listening.

I had a lot to think about, but every topic seemed to end up in tail-chasing circles. What if I really were a girl? Nobody was out-and-out suggesting that, but something sure wasn't right with me. My ex-friend Rod thought I was queer and girly. Even my own sister seemed to have doubts about my masculinity. Mrs. Henderson wanted me to watch her kids, not an offer made to many teenage boys.

I thought again about what Dad had been saying the night before. Had the whole point of that conversation been to give me permission to… to do what? Even if the testosterone shot made my body more manly, would that really solve my problem?

"…after the swelling goes down," Mom was saying.

I had totally lost the thread of what she was talking about. "Huh?"

"If the shot works, you'll probably be able to stop wearing the chest band I made for you," she said, evidently repeating herself.

I glanced down at my chest. The homemade constriction kept it nice and flat, making me look more like a boy. But was that just a lie?

I remembered the girls at lunch the day before deciding that I must be Donna's little sister. My hair is a bit shaggy, but it isn't that long, and I was wearing boys' clothes, except for the chest binder they couldn't see. What made them think I was a girl?

I must have sighed loud enough for Mom to hear because she gave me one of those worried looks. She didn't ask, though, so I didn't tell her anything.

*

Thursday afternoon at school was pretty uneventful, except Rod caught up with me in the hall after the one class, Science, that we had together.

"Where were you this morning?" he demanded.

I may have cringed a bit. He sounded annoyed, and I looked around for the cohort of bullies he usually ran with. None in sight, but I kept my answer terse. "Doctor."

"Oh." He looked thoughtful. "You gonna live?" he asked.

I shrugged, as if it weren't important.

He grinned at me, and I smiled back because, for that moment, he seemed like the old Rod who had been my friend.

Then he slapped my books out of my hands, and I almost tripped, trying not to step on them. I felt my eyes burning as I watched him walk away while I stood there with my books scattered at my feet.

“Sorry, but you know…,” I heard Rod mutter as he sauntered away.

Somebody commented, "Dropped your books." Like I hadn't known. Nobody stopped to help me as I gathered them back together, but I saw the girl, Donna's friend, that I thought of as Pageboy standing near a classroom door. Just watching.

I guess we'd finally convinced her I was a boy yesterday. If she'd still thought I was a girl, she probably would have come over to help.

I left, probably carrying my books like a girl with them held close; no one was going to knock them out of my hands. But I went down the wrong hallway and walked into room 231 instead of 321. Someone was sitting in my seat, and I glared at him.

He looked confused. "Que cosa, chica?" he asked. What is it, girl?

Then I looked around, realizing my mistake. I hurried out and was late for class, but no one cared. I settled into my own seat this time.

My eyes were burning again.

"I'm sorry, Jonny. I didn't try to convince them you were my brother," Donna admitted.

We got loaded up with too much homework at school on Friday, but since I had a babysitting job for the evening, I thought I would just knock it out there and be free for the weekend. It wasn't interesting stuff, math exercises and a short history essay, but it wasn't hard either.

Someone tripped me on my way out of study hall, but I didn't see anyone I could blame. Some of Rod Pick's pals smirked at me when I almost dropped all of my books again, but they were too far away to have done it.

I felt my face burning, and for a moment, I felt a bit sick to my stomach. Was this going to be happening all year?

By the time I got on the bus, I had stopped leaking tears and sat like a sack of potatoes, not looking at anyone or saying anything, even though I felt sure people were looking at me and maybe talking about me. I knew that was a bit of a crazy worry, but I couldn't help how I felt.

Rod Pick didn't ride the bus on Fridays, and neither did his jock friends, so at least I was spared dealing with them. I got off at our corner and headed for home, my head down because now I was not so scared and beginning to feel angry about it.

What had I ever done to anyone? It wasn't fair. I got tired of the names they called me long ago: sissy, fag, queer; I didn't even know the real meaning of some of the words, especially the ones in Spanish like puto, chingaso and mariposa. Mom knew some Spanish, but I couldn't ask her, could I?

Donna ran a few steps after getting off the bus to catch me up, and I noticed her glance at Rod's door as we passed it. That made me mad, too. So why did my face feel hot and wet?

I almost flinched when Donna touched my arm, but I turned to glare at her.

"I'm sorry about lunch," she murmured. "They're my friends, but I didn't like some of what they said."

"Did they talk about me when I wasn't there?" I asked. My mouth twisted, and I turned away.

"Uh," she didn't answer.

"I've got sitting at the Henderson's tonight," I mentioned.

She snorted. "Those brats. I'm sorry for you for that, too. Mrs. Henderson didn't like that I said no the last time she asked me." She put a hand on my back, and I moved further away.

"What are you wearing?" she asked, feeling around where the stiffeners in mom's contraption lay between my shoulder blades.

I shrugged, partly to move her hand off my back.

"Are you wearing a bra?" she wanted to know. "Is it one of mine?" She felt the shape under my clothes.

"No," I answered. "Mom made it for me," I told her. "It's just a strap, to, to keep me from… Just leave me alone, Donna!"

"My brother is wearing a bra," she said.

"I am not!" I took several quick steps to get away from her, but she easily caught up again.

"Sorry," she murmured. She had known about my lumpy chest before. "What did the doctor say? You hadn't told me, and neither will Mom?"

We stopped at the patch of sidewalk where tree roots had broken the cement into uneven blocks. I glared at the ground.

Donna reached out, but I dodged her touch. "I like those kids," I complained.

She made a face. "They didn't like me because I wasn't you. When I got there the last time, they asked me where my sister was." She flashed a grin. "I thought they meant Linda. Can you imagine putting Miss Non-Stop with those two? When I put them to bed, they complained that my sister read stories better than me, and I remembered that you had sat for them before."

We both looked away. "I didn't try to convince them you were my brother," she admitted.

I found myself smiling, and I wasn't sure why. I shook my head. The twins were a hard-headed pair, and if they got an idea, it would be hard to just talk them out of it.

"What?" Donna asked. But now she was smiling, too.

"Just don't laugh when they talk about me at school," I said.

We both headed for our front door, which opened just then to show Linda hopping up and down and squealing something about Fooler, the dog. And there he stood at her shoulder with her toy bunny in his mouth. She squealed again and wrapped herself around his neck.

Donna and I laughed like loons then we all went inside.

*

After dinner, I went over to the Henderson's with my books and homework and some cash to give a tip to the pizzaman who the Henderson's had already called for a delivery of a thin-crust ground beef and veggie special.

I was greeted immediately with cries of "Jonny's here, Jonny, Jonny, Jonny," and "Read Wocket in my Pocket! Wocky in My Pocky!" Mike was getting his vote in for which book he wanted to read early. His sister Molly simply gave me a hug, dusted with graham cracker crumbs.

Later, the twins had half a slice each of pizza, plus a dish of fruit and some carrot sticks, and I sat on the floor between their beds to read the book of Dr. Seuss nonsense, using voices and pantomiming movements and provoking both shrieks and giggles.

They were both asleep before eight o'clock.

After watching my baby sister Linda, only a year younger than these two, it all went like a symphony. Getting Linda to go to bed was more like a Battle of the Bands in comparison.

After getting the kids asleep, I had another slice of pizza and did some homework at the kitchen table but found myself napping on the sofa a little before ten. I'd been having an odd dream about swimming in soup, and I woke up in a sweat.

I felt off. My skin was clammy, my throat dry, and my head hurt. Great, I thought, I'm coming down with something. I went to the kitchen to draw a glass of water through the dispenser in the door of the fridge. It went down quickly, but the cold seemed to hit my stomach wrong, and now I felt nauseated.

A mild cramp ran across the top of my belly, and I decided to hurry to the bathroom, but nothing was happening when I got there. Except, well, I felt — overheated? I was sweating again, the armpits and front of my t-shirt soaked.

And the band Mom had made for me, still around my chest to keep my unwanted accessories from showing — the band seemed tighter than before. Much tighter. I put my hands to my chest. Did it feel — bigger?

And a new sensation, as if the band under my shirt were trying to climb upward. I felt the band through my shirt, and it seemed like a roll of flesh was squeezing its way out from under the homemade binder, pushing the flexible garment upward.

I went to the bathroom again and pulled my shirt up, watching with a feeling of dislocated horror as the roll of flesh under the binder grew and grew, separating in the middle as two breasts appeared, pushing the band of restraining cloth upward.

This is not happening, I thought, I've fallen asleep on the couch, and I'm having a nightmare. I peered out of the bathroom and down the hallway to see if I could see myself lying on the Henderson's couch. But no, my sweating, panicked face stayed in the mirror. And the mirror also showed my new, larger breasts hanging below the chest band Mom had sewn for me.

There was at least twice as much flesh there as had been examined in the doctor's office. I touched them. They were warm and sweaty and soft as pillows. And they ached. My skin had a stretched feeling. I must be losing my mind, I thought. This can't be happening.

I pulled my shirt, and the little band Mom had made me off over my head. When freed from the restraint, the mounds of flesh bounced a bit. Then they just hung there, feeling very, very weird. The cool air in the room caused the nipples to crinkle a bit, but the swollen flesh still felt warm, even hot to the touch.

I pulled my shirt back on over my head and went looking for the windbreaker I had worn on the way over. I needed Mom, I decided. An adult to tell me what to do. But I couldn't leave. The twins were asleep, and it was barely two blocks to my house, but I still couldn't leave them alone.

Just as a reminder, I heard one of them cry out. "Jonny?"

I felt staggered by what was happening. Keeping one hand on a wall, I made my way to the twins' bedroom. "Jonny?" the little voice came again.

I glanced down at my chest. Then I opened the door a crack. "Mikey?" I whispered. He was usually the more restless twin.

"I need a drink of water, Jonny," the little boy whispered back.

"Okay," I said. I went to the hall bathroom to fetch a paper cup of water, feeling a bit of jiggling. Don't freak out, I told myself. You'll scare the babies. I let myself into the bedroom without opening the door wide. The light down the hallway might wake Mikey up too much to get back to sleep.

I sat on the bed beside him and held the cup for him to drink. As usual, he drank less than half the five-ounce cup. "Better?" I asked when he stopped drinking and pushed my hand away.

"Yeah," he murmured. "Thank you, Jonny." He was already almost asleep again. "You got boobies just like mommy," he said with a smile in his voice.

I got out of there.

Back in the living room, I found the windbreaker I had arrived with. The Hendersons had promised to be back before eleven, and September could be cool in San Diego at night. Could I wait for them to get home?

I looked down at myself. Were they still growing? They still felt hot from the inside, but I didn't touch them with my hands.

I could call Mom, I decided. I tried to tell her what had happened but I cried through the whole conversation.

In less than ten minutes, she pulled into the Henderson's driveway in the family wagon. I went outside to meet her, but she motioned me back and followed me in. She had her big straw purse with her, and a small paper bag seemed to have been stuffed into it.

In the light of the entryway, she stared at me then pulled me into a hug. I felt the softness of my chest pressing against hers. I was already crying, had been crying when I called her, but somehow I felt things would be better now that she was here.

I had my t-shirt on and the open windbreaker, so I knew she could see what had gone wrong. I wasn't sure if it was still happening. The cold air that had come in when I opened the door felt chilly on my skin where I had been sweating, but I still felt warm inside.

"Take off the jacket and shirt," she told me. "And where's the bandeau I made for you?"

"The what?" I asked, my lip trembling. I peeled off the windbreaker and t-shirt and stood there, naked above the waist. Mom stared at me for a moment.

"This can't be happening, can it?" I asked. When I moved, I felt a countermovement of my chest. "They're two or three times bigger than they were."

"The chest band," she mentioned. "That isn't going to work, is it?"

I shook my head, glancing down as I felt movement. "No-o-o," I moaned. "It hurt to wear it."

"Chiggers," Mom muttered, a family word replacing more vulgar ones.

Reaching into her bag, Mom drew out a folded bit of white cloth. She shook it out, and I recognized it as a bra. I set my mouth in a hard line and frowned at the item.

"This," she said, "is a sports bra, like the ones your sister wears for gym at school. You just pull it on kind of like a t-shirt." She handed it to me.

"Huh?" I questioned. "Do I have to?" The thing was made of some stretchy fabric, like heavy-duty cotton underwear stuff.

"I think you'd better. You can wear your shirt over it and the jacket on top." We were sitting on the couch now, on the same level, and she looked me in the eye. "Put it on, Jonny," she urged. "You don't want the Henderson's to be asking questions."

I tried to follow her instructions, pulling it on over my head and slipping my arms through the straps like they were sleeves. I tugged the thing down to cover my mounds. It didn't quite, and there seemed a lot of me sticking out of the top. I felt my lip quivering again.

Mom tried to make some adjustments. "Hmm," she said. "That's a 30A/C." She blinked several times. "You certainly fill it out more than your sister does."

I lost it then, blubbering and crying and trying to get the thing off.

Mom pulled me into a hug. "Shh, it's okay, baby. It'll be okay."

I wanted to believe her. I really did.

“I’m hundry,” Linda informed me. “Donna said you would make hopgakes for us.”

Mom asked if I wanted to go home before the Hendersons came back. It was almost ten and they should be back soon. I didn’t want them to see me wearing a bra. So I nodded, “I wanna go home,” I said, crying again.

She cuddled me. “Okay, but you can’t walk through the neighborhood this late, even if it is only two blocks away. It’s two long, dark blocks; if you don’t go through the alley, it’s more like four blocks.” She pushed me back a moment so I could see her face. “You are not going through any dark alleys, not even the one behind our house.”

I felt my face twist up. “The babies,” I said. “You can’t take me home and leave the babies.”

She shook her head. “No, I’m going to call your father to come get you.”

“Isn’t he out with his buddies watching football?” Every other Friday night in football season, Dad met some of his old friends in a bar in Mission Valley where they would drink beer and watch football on a giant television set.”

“I know where he is,” Mom said, moving toward the telephone.

“But he’ll see me. I don’t want him to see me,” I protested, very near to blubbering like a baby myself.

“Hush,” she said, picking up the phone and dialing. “He’s going to have to see sooner or later.”

“M-maybe the swelling will go down,” I suggested.

Mom shook her head at me and put her left hand over one ear while talking loudly into the receiver. I could sort of hear the noise coming through the telephone from the other end of the couch. It must be noisy where Dad was.

I curled up in a ball of misery. My chest still felt hot, and I imagined it throbbing and pulsing like some B-movie monster. What was happening to me? Wasn’t the injection I got two days ago supposed to help me become more of a boy?

But boys didn’t need to wear bras. They didn’t have soft mounds of flesh on their chests. Was I turning into a girl? Had the doctors made a mistake in what kind of shot they had given me? Or was the mistake made back when I was born, and I had been a girl all along?

Mom was still talking, but I couldn’t seem to hear her anymore. I was exhausted from the stress, the crying, and maybe the changes. Unbelievably, I fell asleep.

I woke up when I felt someone slide an arm under me and lift me off the couch. I knew it was my dad from the smell. After one of his Friday football nights, he always smelled of beer and cigarettes. “I’m sorry,” I murmured as he put my head on his shoulder and held me against himself with one arm.

It felt very familiar and still completely different. “It’s okay, sugar,” he whispered into my ear. “Daddy’s got you.”

I wiggled a bit, getting more comfortable. “I’m sorry, Daddy,” I said again. “I didn’t mean to,” I tried to explain.

I felt him chuckle. “You didn’t mean to what, punkinhead?”

I almost woke up trying to figure out what I was apologizing for, but the mental effort drove me further into a dream where Daddy was carrying me on his shoulders. Somewhere I heard his voice again, saying, “He’s sound asleep, like one of the babies.”

Or did he say, “She’s asleep?”

* * *

I woke in my bed, wearing a pair of my old pajamas and covered by a light blanket. I thrashed around a bit, trying to figure out if something was wrong. I felt hot as if I had a fever. I threw the blanket off of me and immediately saw the swelling of my chest inside my pajama top.

I stared. I’d avoided touching myself there, but now alone in the quiet darkness, I reached up to feel the soft round new growths. I could feel myself touching myself there, and I could feel the heaviness too. And my skin felt both warm and cool. Cool because of the night and warm because of the blanket. Or…?

Unnaturally warm like before, and I wondered if they were still growing. How big would they get? There’s a story we read in English class about a man who turned into a cockroach. I thought I knew how he felt.

But the horror, if that is the right word, was muted by being in my own room, in my own bed, wearing my soft old pajamas. The ones that had always been a bit too big for me. I’d pretty much stopped growing in middle school, and clothes that had been bought for a growing boy would never fit me right.

Was I still a boy? I took a deep breath and sighed. I was both thirsty and in need of the bathroom. I sat up, turning at the same time to sit on the bed, pointing my toes to touch the floor. The weights on my chest shifted and swayed as I moved, stretching and pulling my skin in unexpected ways.

I scooted off the bed, standing up when my heels reached the floor. The swaying and jiggling of my chest felt intense, and I noticed something else. My pajama bottoms felt tighter than before as if they were stretched over a bigger, rounder bottom, though the waistband seemed to droop loosely.

Most of my clothes had been getting a bit tight in the ass lately and my waist was always small, but this seemed a new, accelerated development. I sighed again.

The nightlight function of my clock radio showed that my bedroom door was not quite closed, and I could hear somewhere the murmur of adult voices. Mom and Dad were still up. I squinted at the clock, the numbers hard to read. Where were my glasses? I hadn’t left them at the Hendersons’, had I?

I’d taken them off when I was crying, but Mom had been there. She would have brought them home. They were probably lying there on my dresser, near the clock. I didn’t stop to find them, though. My need for a bathroom had gotten a bit more intense.

But when I opened my bedroom door, I discovered Fooler had been sleeping against it in the hall. He had always done that when one of us was sick, choosing to sleep in a doorway near the sick person. His ears and head came up, and his tail quivered.

“I’m going to step over you, Oscar,” I murmured. “Best pup, good dog.” He made a pretty sizable black lump in the darkness, but I navigated across him. He did that clopping noise dogs do with their jaws, and his head went back down.

I have the front bedroom in the house, so my door is right across the hall from what Mom calls the guest bathroom and Donna and I have to share. The door was open, and the nightlight inside showed it was empty.

The rest of the house was dark, so Mom and Dad must have been in their bedroom, even if I could still hear them talking quietly.

I slipped inside the bathroom, pulled down my pajama bottoms and sat on the toilet. Yes, I’ve always had to sit to pee—like a girl. The surgery they did on me as an infant to make me look more like a boy had been less than perfect. I piddled in squirts and dribbles; it made a real mess if I didn’t sit.

I rocked back and forth on the seat, feeling the movement of my breasts, the shift of their weight. It didn’t seem real, but there they were, and I had called them breasts. Girls have breasts. I must be a girl.

I used toilet tissue to clean myself up, but I did not flush, thinking I did not want anyone to know I was awake.

I wandered back to my bed. Fooler had moved from the doorway (he’d been stepped on in the past) and was now sleeping against the wall further down the hall. His soft snores made me smile. I knew to leave the door open a crack because if it were closed when Fooler came to check on me, he would scratch to be let in. “Good old dog,” I murmured as I climbed back into bed.

I tried to think what life might be like for me now, but the effort was too much, and I was soon asleep again. I dreamed about sharing a bedroom with Donna, the way we had done when we were as young as Linda or the Henderson twins.

* * *

Someone was poking me gently in the side. “Jonny, Jonny, Jonny. Are you awake?”

I opened my eyes. Linda, of course. She generally got up before anyone else on Saturday morning and watched cartoons in the living room with the sound turned down until someone else rejoined society.

“I’m hundry,” she informed me. “Donna said you would make hopgakes for us.”

She stood there in shorts and a t-shirt, one pudgy knee wearing a colorful bandaid, her favorite plushie, Turkle, under one arm and four fingers of her other hand lingering near her mouth.

“Can’t you just eat fingers like usual?” I asked. I pulled the covers off and yawned, aborting a stretch as my new accessories reminded me of their existence.

“No!” she told me, snatching her hand away from her mouth. Mom was trying to break her from sucking on her fingers, and she knew it because Donna and I teased her about it whenever possible.

“Jonny! You make good hopgakes! Pease?” The kid was doing well with the big-eyed expressions, and I grinned at her. Then she spoiled her efforts by poking me in the tit! Right on a nipple, too!

“Ow,” I yelped, sitting up to put further poking out of reach for people less than four feet tall. This produced quite a bit of bouncing and swaying, and I put an arm across my chest to stop that.

“Howgum you gots boobies, Jonny?” she asked, eyes getting even bigger.

‘I dunno,” I answered honestly. I used my other hand to scrub my face, trying to get completely awake. “Girls have boobies. Maybe I’m a girl.”

She laughed. “Ogay! Jonny’s a girl!” She spun in place, holding both arms out, Turkle dangling precariously from one. “Jonny’s a girl. Jonny’s a girl.”

“Wuf,” Fooler commented from the doorway.

“Not so loud,” I warned my littlest sibling. “Now you’ve told Fooler, and you know what a gossip he is! He’ll tell everyone that I don’t have my license yet!”

That set off a storm of giggles, punctuated with a patented four-year-old squeal. “What’s a light sense?” she asked.

“It’s like getting a letter back from Santa with permission to be bad,” I said, improvising. That squeal surely woke up Mom, if not Dad. Donna could sleep through a fire brigade tromping through the house.

“Hee, hee, hee, hee!” The giggle machine engaged for maximum output. Linda pressed Turkle into service to stifle herself, pushing the toy’s head into her mouth with both hands.

I slid to the edge of the bed and stretched my feet down to the floor.

Linda watched in awe, Turkle escaping from her open mouth. “Jonny, you got bigger boobies than Donna! Maybe bigger than Mommy’s.” Her eyes followed the bouncing as I stood up, putting an arm across my chest again. They were like two soft round water balloons hanging there.

“You want hotcakes or not?” I demanded. “My anatomy is officially off the discussion list.”

More giggles. “Yes! Pease! Hopgakes! Jonny’s making hopgakes! And-at-or-me what?” She turned and ran out of the room, almost colliding with Fooler, who scrambled to get out of the way.

I took a moment to try to decipher that last bit and realized it was her effort at asking me what ‘anatomy’ meant.

“Wuf,” said Fooler from the doorway, glancing at me then down the hallway where Linda had gone.

“I suppose you want me to make hotcakes, too?” I asked.

He gave me a big doggy grin, waved his tail and set off toward the kitchen.

“Best pup wants hotcakes,” I said. “I’d better get moving.” I started toward the door, but Mom suddenly appeared there, wrapped in a green terry cloth robe.

“Jonny?” she said, staring at me.

I nodded. “It’s still me,” I said, glancing down at what she was looking at. “Have they gotten bigger?”

“Uh-maybe,” she said, dodging the question. “That pajama top fits so badly it’s almost indecent.” She sighed and I nodded again.

“Do you want to make hotcakes?” she asked.

“It’s my turn,” I told her. Donna and I make breakfast most weekends. It would be her turn tomorrow.

“Hopgakes! Hopgakes! Less all hop for hopgakes!” Linda sang from the kitchen.

I grinned at Mom. “It’s okay. I like hotcakes, too.”

She rolled her eyes. “Okay, but let me get you a robe to wear,” she said and headed down the hallway to her room.

I had a robe, but it was not going to fit me. I shook my head and headed for the kitchen myself, where my public clamored for my performance.

“Jonny gots bitsy feet,” Linda told Turkle. “But not littler than mine!”

Mom brought me a robe in the kitchen, where I set out the makings for hot cakes on the kitchen counter. The item was one of mom’s, of course, pale blue with embroidery at the hem, collar and cuffs. At least it wasn’t pink. It did cover me up better than the loose pajama top after I pulled the belt around and tied it in a big loose bow.

I’m several inches shorter than Mom, so the robe almost reached the tops of my feet.

“Hee hee hee,” Linda giggled, pointing at my feet. I wiggled my toes, provoking another squeal.

“Linda!” Mom barked. “Jonny, don’t encourage her. And let me get you some slippers. Kitchens are dangerous places to go barefoot in.”

I set out the electric griddle and started it heating while I mixed up the dry ingredients for hotcakes. Once you get the mixture wet, it has to go on the griddle pretty quickly.

Mom brought back a pair of fuzzy slippers that almost matched the robe I was wearing, and I slipped them on. “These aren’t mine,” I commented.

“They are now,” Mom said. “I bought them by mistake, and they’re too small for me or your sister.”

“Jonny gots bitsy feet,” Linda told Turkle. “But not littler than mine!”

“Hush!” Mom told her, rubbing her forehead.

“Go wake up Donna,” I told the Turbo Toddler. “Dad, too,” I added.

“Ogay!” she agreed and sped off toward the bedrooms, squealing about ‘hopgakes!’

“That’ll keep her busy for a few,” I told Mom.

“But not quiet,” she mentioned as we could hear the uproar down the hallway.

I grinned and poured her a cup of coffee from Mr. DiMaggio’s Magic Machine. Dad would want one, too, and maybe half a cup for Donna. I’d never acquired the addiction.

We could hear Linda rousing the rest of the household, and I had time to reflect on whether Donna had seen me last night. Dad had brought me home and put me directly to bed. I hadn’t seen Donna. Had she seen me?

I sighed. Well, she had to see me sometime. I glanced down at my chest. Yes, I was definitely bigger down there now than she was. And no real explanation to offer anyone. Could there even be an explanation? My chest had grown in just a few hours from barely more than a pre-teen girl might have to a full bust that would’ve looked large for a woman.

Hearing family members in the hall, I began mixing the wet ingredients in a second bowl. Oil, eggs, and buttermilk whisked together then dumped into the dry stuff to be whisked some more. The best oil for fluffy hotcakes (a family secret) is not one of the new poly-unsaturated oils but extra-light olive oil that had most of the olive taste removed.

I used a whisk to stir with and felt my breasts move inside my robe from the energy of my efforts. I remembered the bra Mom had got for me last night. Did I need to find that and wear it? My face got hot, and I tried to concentrate on what I was doing.

I stopped myself from stirring the batter more than needed; that’s how you end up with the leathery hotcakes in cafes that have been mixed with a machine. Mom passed me the four-ounce ladle, the perfect size. I turned the heat down on the griddle and poured the first hotcake just as Linda, Dad and Donna reached the dining room.

I beamed at them. Despite what may have happened last night, I know I can still do this. “How many ‘cakes do you want?” I asked. “I made enough batter for more than a dozen!” I figured one or two for Linda, two or three for each of the bigger people, and one small one for Fooler.

“Hopgakes!” Linda screamed, and Mom winced. Dad snatched the tiny terror off her feet before she could run across the room like a knee-seeking missile and tackle me.

“Let’s let Jonny finish cooking them before we try to eat them, huh?” he asked while holding her upside down. She giggled furiously and waved her feet in the air. “Three for me, Jonny, and two for cartoon-girl here,” he said over his shoulder. Linda’s cartoons were still on the TV in the living room with the sound off.

“Cartoonities!” shrieked Linda, and Fooler ‘wuffed’ in agreement.

Donna just stared at me. Nope, she hadn’t seen me last night. “Two or three for you, sis?” I asked her.

“Yeah,” she said.

“Which?” I pressed for an answer.

Her eyes moved from one of my new breasts to the other. “Two, please,” she said. “Three would be too many.”

Mom had already set the table and put cartons of milk and orange juice in the middle with a stack of cups next to the coffee maker. Now she took the plate with the first four hotcakes and quickly forked them onto individual plates.

Donna just stood there, staring at my chest. “Are those real?” she suddenly asked.

“Donna!” Mom snapped. “Let Jonny make breakfast. We can talk later.” She inclined her head towards Linda, now sitting in Dad’s lap.

My sister nodded vaguely and sat down at her usual place. “They look real,” she muttered over her shoulder in my direction. She pulled out a chair and took a seat.

I rolled my eyes at her.

“Can you make me just one bigger one next batch, Jonny?” she asked. This was a typical special order by Mom. “‘Course,” I agreed, ignoring Donna’s snort.

I usually aimed for 6 or 7-inch cakes, but poured one 8-incher for Mom in the second batch and one 5-incher for Fooler.

“Bigger is better,” commented Donna.

I ignored her, announcing instead, “Chocolate morsels in the next four cakes!”

“Choconaut!” squealed Linda.

The fourth round of cakes included frozen blueberries added to the batter at the last moment, and the traditional, smaller, last cake went to the cook, me. I took my cakes and sat down next to Donna, feeling a bit of a bounce and jiggle as I did.

Donna stared with a forkful of syrupy hotcake near her mouth.

“Yes, they’re real,” I said.

* * *

Since I cooked, Donna would have to do clean-up duties. Tomorrow would be her turn to cook and mine to repair the damages. While she rinsed and stacked plates in the dishwasher, Mom pulled me into the living room, and we settled into the area we called the library since there were bookcases on two walls there. The chairs in the library had their backs turned to the television and so shut out the rest of the living room/dining room by design.

“Baby,” Mom said to me, “we need to get you some clothes.”

It wasn’t that unusual for Mom to call one of us kids ‘baby’, but I frowned at her.

She motioned at her own chest, “You need a good bra that will fit, and maybe some other stuff….”

“I duwanna wear a bra,” I whined.

“Honey,” Mom began, “you just really can’t leave the house looking like an advertisement!”

I blinked. “An advertisement for what?” I asked.

She snorted. “Never mind what. No child of mine is going out and about with all that bouncing and swaying.”

“But, Mom,” I whined again. “I’m a boy!”

She snorted again. “I doubt anyone is going to believe that.”

I bit my lip.

“Have you looked in a mirror?” She accused.

I nodded reluctantly.

“So, do you think you have anything to wear that is going to make you look like a boy?”

“Ouch!” I said aloud. I shook my head, which caused sympathetic jiggles, causing me to glare down at myself. I looked back up at Mom, catching her with a bemused expression. “It’s not funny,” I pouted.

“I wasn’t laughing,” she excused herself and demonstrated by frowning.

“What’s not funny?” Donna asked, having finished with the clean-up and joined us in the library.

“Jonny’s problems,” Mom supplied.

“You’re telling me?” Donna snarked and got a warning glare from Mom. “Well, how did this happen?” she asked, frowning around at both of us. “At lunch, the other girls thought Jonny was my little sister, and now this?” She waved at me.

Linda escaped from Dad about then, running up to declare, “I’m your little sister!”

Mom winced at the volume. “We’re not on the playground, Linda. We’re indoors.”

“Uh, huh,” the little one agreed. “We had hopgakes and Daddy is going to take me and Fooler for a walk!” The dog was already at the front door and made a whuffle noise at the sound of the word ‘walk.’

“C’mon, Linda,” Dad called to her. “You don’t want Fooler to have an accident, do you?”

Linda laughed and ran to join them. “Fooler can’t cause an accident. He doesn’t have a light sense,” she told Dad, and I hid my grin.

“He what?” Dad asked, bending to clip the leash to Fooler’s collar.

Donna spoke up. “You sure you’re putting that lead on the right one, Dad?”

“Pretty sure,” Dad answered, smiling.

“Hoo, hoo, hee, hee,” Linda giggled, bouncing up and down on her toes.

“Helen,” Dad called out to Mom before opening the door, “I’m going to take these two out to work off some energy, then I’m going into the office to see if I can talk to someone about….medical stuff.”

“Okay,” Mom replied, glancing at me. Mom was Helen, and Dad was Lawrence, but it always seems weird when your parents call each other by name. I waved at Dad, and Linda used both arms to wave back.

Dad managed to get out the front door without getting tangled or tripped up. As the door closed behind them, I could hear Linda explaining to Dad that Fooler would have to write a letter to Santa to get his light sense.

“Well,” Dad said, “I don’t think he can wait till Christmas to go for his walk.”

I grinned at Mom, and Donna rolled her eyes. Mom just shook her head, smiling. “I don’t know where she gets it. Neither of you two were like that as babies.”

I saw where Donna’s gaze had landed and frowned at her.

She shrugged. “You said they’re real. How could that happen? They were just little bumps when I saw them before.”

I shook my head. “They just grew, last night. They got warm, and they grew.” I wanted to check to see if they felt hot again, but I didn’t.

“What are you now, a D-cup, like Mom?” asked Donna. “It took me most of a year to get to an A-cup, and another year...” She glanced down. “Chiggers, you’re more than twice as big as me!”

I knew I was blushing, but .there’s nowhere to turn that off. “I didn’t do anything,” was the best response I could come up with.

“Yeah, well,” Donna admitted, “if you did do something, there are a lot of flat-chested girls out there who would like to know what it was.” She smiled to take a little of the sting off that, but I felt my lips begin to tremble.

“Hey,” she offered, holding out a hand. I took it in mine, and we traded soft squeezes. “I give you a hard time because we’re related, you know?”

“I know,” I said. “You’re annoying, but you’re my sister.”

“I could say the same thing, and it looks like I might be right,” she grinned and nudged me with an elbow.

“Don’t!” I protested, but I gave her hand another squeeze.

“Donna,” Mom began, looking severe. “Do you have anything in your wardrobe that might help Jonny look like a boy?”

“Chiggers,” said Donna. “You’re kidding, right? Uh, I’ve got a cowboy hat?”

“I don’t think that will help,” Mom commented.

I remembered the hat. It was blue straw with a purple ribbon. It wouldn’t help at all. I frowned at Donna.

Mom sighed. Donna sighed. I sighed.

“What have the doctors said?” asked Donna.

“Nothing that helpful,” Mom replied. “That shot on Thursday was supposed to help Jonny’s problem, and it seems to have made it worse.”

“What kind of shot was it?” Donna looked at me.

“It was supposed to be, you know, boy-stuff, like hormones,” I said. “I guess?”

“Huh.”

We all looked at each other, unsure of what to do.

“I guess we have to go shopping,” Mom suggested.

“It’s 9 a.m. on a Saturday. Nothing is open except K-mart,” Donna pointed out.

“I don’t want to go anywhere,” I said. “Not, not like this.”

“Honey, neither your sister’s stuff nor mine is going to fit you right. We have to get you something to wear.” She made vague motions.

I tried to fold my arms, but there was nowhere to put them.

Mom stood. “Let me find my sewing basket so we can get your sizes sorted out.” She headed down the hall.

Donna got up and pulled me to my feet. “Come on to my room,” she said. “We might be able to find something that makes you look a bit less like Loni Anderson.”

I groaned, glancing down at myself. For the last two years, the guys at school talked about her and her character of the busty secretary on WKRP almost every lunch period the day after the show was on. She was a blonde too. “Maybe I could dye my hair,” I offered.

“Seriously? I don’t think that would help.”

“You’re probably right,” I agreed, following her to the bedroom.

*

“Wow,” she said. “The boys are going to be watching that show.”

Donna’s bedroom was smaller than mine by perhaps half a foot, but it had a bigger closet. Being a corner room, she had more windows than I did, too. It was a nice room with the walls painted a soft dusty rose and a brighter, pinker ceiling. The sun coming in reflected off two large mirrors and filled it with light.

My room, by contrast had pale lavender gray walls, a blue ceiling and only one big window over my bed. Linda’s room, the smallest, between ours, was done in greens and yellows.

Donna threw herself at her still unmade bed and wrestled the pillows and covers into a sort of nest. She propped her head up on one hand and looked at me expectantly.

“Huh?” I said smartly.

She gestured at her chest. “How did it happen?”

“Heck if I know,” I said, sitting down on the bench in front of her dresser. “Slowly, at first, you know about that, then last night it all just…” I gestured at my own chest. “It…they…like…exploded.”

“Huh,” she said, pinching her lower lip with her free hand. “Did it hurt?”

“Sort of, but not really hurt-hurt.” I tried to remember. “It ached, it felt hot, then it kinda burned when it felt like my skin was being stretched.” I glanced down at the mounds and the furrow between them.

“Doesn’t hurt now,” I explained. “Except…they’re kind of heavy.” I put a hand behind my back and felt how some of the muscles were a bit tight. “You know?”

“They look heavy,“ Donna agreed. She blinked several times then looked down at herself. “Huh,” she commented. “You’re like more than twice as big as me, and I sometimes notice the weight, so….” She looked up and grinned. “Ow, I guess?”

I twitched, nervously, and felt the swaying inside my shirt. Donna’s eyes seemed drawn to the movement.

“Wow,” she said. “The boys are going to be watching that show.”

“Aggh!” I tried to fold my arms in front of my breasts but they didn’t fit and folding them under just sort of pushed things together and further forward.

Donna made an “Ooo!” face with her lips pursed. “Jonny, you are definitely going to need a bra!”

“I duwanna!” I said. “I’m your brother!”

“Nobody’s going to believe that!” She sat up, looked at me sideways. “Mom said she gave you a bra to wear last night. Was it one of mine? Where is it?”

I frowned, a little worried that I looked like I was pouting. “I think Mom said it was one of yours, it sure wasn’t one of hers. And I don’t know where it is, I didn’t have it on when I woke up.”

She nodded, pulling on her lower lip again. “Yeah, you’re big but Mom is bigger. She once told me she gained a cup size with each of us kids.” She grinned suddenly, bounced off the bed and sat beside me on the dressing table bench. “Let’s see if I’ve got something that fits you.”

“Something that will make them look smaller?” I suggested.

“Nah,” Donna scoffed. “Why would I have something like that?” She pulled open a drawer, saying, “By the way, very few people go to sleep wearing a bra, most of them aren’t that comfortable.”

She pulled something out of the drawer and held it up, a plain white object with satiny round pockets. It looked familiar.

“This was on top, and I haven’t worn it in a while cause it’s almost too big. A 30A/C.” She presented it to me.

I resisted but she pressed it into my hand. “That size sounds familiar, I remember mom saying something like that. What does it mean?” I don’t know why I asked; I didn’t really want to know.

“I had two of these, so this probably wasn’t the one Mom gave you to wear. She wouldn’t put it back in my drawer if you had it on for any length of time.”

I nodded. “And I was all sweaty,” I added.

“Ew!” She snatched the bra back from me and sniffed of it. “No smell, so this isn’t the one she stole for you.” She handed the item back to me again, and like an idiot, I took it.

“Put it on,” she urged. “We’ll see how it fits.”

“I don’t know how,” I said.

“Pftt! You put your arms through the straps and then fasten the snaps in back of you.”

“Huh?”

“Or you can fasten the snaps in front of you, then turn it around and slip your arms through the straps.”

I handed it back to her. “No,” I said.

“Jonny!”

She tried to hand the thing back again but I dodged, got up from the bench and went toward the door. “I’ll be in my room, estivating like a horntoad.” I said.

I don’t know if horntoads actually do this but my grandfather in Arizona told me that the little lizards bury themselves head down in the sand when the weather gets too hot. He added the detail that they use their short tails to close off their assholes to keep from drying out, so it really sounds like a grandpa story to me. Still, the image had stuck in my mind and Donna knew the story, too.

“Jonny!” she called after me.

Before I reached my room though, Mom appeared with a tape measure in hand. “Oh good,” she said. “Let’s get some measurements so we can know what your sizes are.”

“Mo-om,” I protested as she followed me into my room. “I duwanna do this.”

“Big baby,” said Donna out in the hall behind Mom. “He’s afraid to put on a bra.”

“Go away, Donna!” I yelped.

“Calm down,” Mom urged. “This isn’t going to hurt.”

“Yes, it will,” I insisted. I scooted around the bed, opened my closet and tried to climb in. Climb is the right word because my closet is elevated with drawers under it for things like winter bedding, I guess.

“Jon Lawrence Edwards!” Mom using my full name would normally stop me but I was determined to hide as best I could. Which wouldn’t be very good with Mom right there and Donna behind her laughing at me.

“Ow!” I said. I’d forgotten about the electrical junction box hidden behind the clothes and a corner of the open door of it had poked me in a tender place, right in the nipple.

“You okay?” Mom asked pulling on one of my arms.

“Yeah,” I admitted. But I couldn’t see anything with clothes wrapped around my head, and that had really hurt. “Something poked me,” I complained. “Having big titties is dangerous.”

Mom and Donna were laughing at me as they helped me down out of the closet.

“It’s not funny,” I protested, but I had to stifle a giggle myself. “That hurt.”

“So, you admit you need a bra?” Donna asked.

“Oh, sure, kick me when I’m already injured.”

“Let me see,” said Mom and dang if she didn’t just pull my t-shirt up to get a look at my chest!

“Mo-om!” I squealed, holding my hands and elbows up out of her way.

Donna was braying like a jackass, and Mom gave me a quick squeeze to see if anything really hurt. “It’s just a little red spot, baby,” she assured me.

I pulled my shirt back down causing more jiggling. “Donna’s in my room and you pulled up my shirt!”

I distinctly heard Mom roll her eyes, but Donna laughed even harder.

“Pfft,” I said, trying to get mad about it until Donna reached around Mom to poke me in the ribs below my boobies. I’m really ticklish and that was so unexpected that it went through me like an electric shock and I burst into giggles. I tried to tickle her back, she’s just as ticklish as I am, and we both protested to Mom at the same time.

“Mo-om!” in perfect chorus, which reduced us all to giggles.

“You’ve got a cute giggle,” Donna whispered in my ear as we got disentangled after the tickle fight..

“I do not,” I insisted.

“You both do,” Mom said, making that clicking noise that seemed to be the sound of her rolling her eyes again. “Now get out here where I can measure you, Jonny.”

“I duwanna,” I said but I knew Mom wouldn’t tolerate any more protests, and I stepped into the middle of my room to stand in front of her.

“Over by the doorway, sweetheart,” she said. “I want to see how tall you are, now, too.”

“At the doctor’s office,” I put in, “the nurse said I was four-feet-eleven inches and I weigh 85 pounds.”

“Uh, huh,” said Mom, looking at the marks she had just made on the doorframe. “I make it almost four-eleven-and-a-quarter. The bathroom scales aren’t very accurate but we can check them, later. C’mere, Donna. We’ll measure you, too.”

I got out of the way so Donna could stand next to the doorframe. I hadn’t grown at all in at least the last year but neither had Donna, really.

“We measured in gym class,” Donna was saying. “I’m five-three-and-a-half and I weigh 98 pounds.” She’s been taller than me since we started eighth grade, but she hasn’t grown in the last year either.

“Pretty much,” Mom agreed. “Now measure me,” she said, taking Donna’s place.

“Almost exactly five-foot-two,” my sister announced.

“Eyes of blue,” Mom commented. Well, we all had blue eyes, even Dad, but for some reason this made us giggle.

“How much do you weigh?” Donna asked.

Mom frowned. “Too much, but let’s take Jonny’s measurements.”

I pretended to make a break for the hallway, but Mom caught my arm. “Enough of that!” she scolded.

“Yes, ma’am,” I said and stood still while she worked the yellow tape under my arms and around my chest, above the flesh on my chest.

“Goodness,” she exclaimed, and took the measurement all over again. “Twenty-seven inches! Can that be right?”

“She is a skinny-minnie,” said Donna. Mom didn’t seem to notice the pronoun but I did and glared at Donna.

Mom tried the measurement again, decided it was twenty-seven after all, and had Donna write that down. She also measured under my new boobs and got pretty much the same number. She seemed almost offended by this. “You’ve got a smaller band size than my waist!” she complained.

“I didn’t mean to,” I whimpered.

“Super skinny-minnie,” Donna commented. “My band size is thirty, and I’m small.”

They stared at me and I felt my lip tremble. Mom suddenly hugged me and when she let go, Donna hugged me too. I sniffed back something that might have been a tear in my nose but I did feel better. “You guys,” I said.

“Okay,” Mom agreed. She moved the tape and took a measurement right around me at the level of my nipples. It felt weird. She did it again, showing where her fingernail was on the tape to Donna. “Thirty-two-and-a-half,” they agreed after a third try with Donna marking where the end of the tape reached.

They stared at me again. “What?” I asked.

“That’s almost a double-dee cup,” said Donna. “No wonder my borrowed bra didn’t fit you.”

I really wanted to cry this time so we all swapped hugs again and Donna snagged some tissue from the box on my dresser.

“Measure her waist,” Donna suggested, getting my pronoun wrong again. “I bet it’s like twenty-two or something.”

It was twenty-two inches or just a hair over. Donna had some chart she had retrieved from a magazine in her room. “That makes you a size-0 dress size,” she announced.

“I’m not going to wear a dress!” I protested.

Last, they measured my hips at the widest part. “Thirty-three inches,” said Donna. “When did your butt get so big and round? Did that happen last night, too?”

“I—I think it happened in the last year. My pants kept getting tighter.” I tried to look over my shoulder. “Is it really that big?”

“It’s tremendous,” Donna suggested.

“Don’t tease her about it,” Mom scolded.

“It’s bigger than her bust, and that’s huge,” said Donna, pretending to be reasonable, but they had both called me her. I know I was pouting, but it was just so unfair.

“That just means you’ve got an hourglass figure, honey,” said Mom to me.

“Great,” I moaned. “I’m never leaving the house again.”

“There are girls that would kill to have curves like you’ve got, sis,” Donna assured me.

“I’m not a girl and I’m not your sister,” I told her. I was pouting again so I tried to turn it into a glare. But another round of hugs, plus Mom kissed me on the forehead, and Donna gave me one on the cheek, left me feeling less bereft but more confused.

Then Donna whispered to me, “You’re like the big sister I never had,” and I wanted to pop her one right in the ear.

*

We had somehow made it out to the kitchen and Mom pointed at the clock. “Look at the time! Your father isn’t back with Linda yet, but if we leave when they do get back, we can be at the mall at eleven when things start opening up.”

“Shopping!” Donna squealed. I glared at her but she just grinned back.

“I’m not going,” I said.

“Don’t pout,” Mom warned. “You are going because you need something decent to wear.” She headed back toward her own bedroom. “I’m going to get you one of my tops you can put over that t-shirt so your nipples don’t show through.”

I looked down and sighed. My nipples did show and I really couldn’t stay in the house for the rest of my life. “I’ll pick out a nice, neutral-looking blouse for you, honey,” Mom said from the hallway.

“I’ll wear it, but I don’t have to like it!” I called after her.

“You were trying to get me in trouble!”

I insisted that I had not been flirting, and Dad pretended to believe me, so we could drop it as a point of discussion.

Except between Donna and I. The treats we had bought didn’t last that long and when they were gone, she said something that set me off.

“Daddy made those guys you got to follow us skedaddle, huh?” she commented.

“You rat,” I accused her. “You were trying to get me in trouble.”

She seemed unconcerned. “I think you were the one trying to get into trouble.”

“Ahhh!” I disputed her point, waving my hands in frustration.

“Kids,” Mom said from the front seat, “The movie is starting, try to keep it down back there.”

“I wanna sit up front, so I can see better,” Linda complained.

“Crawl up here then,” Mom said, patting her lap, and Linda squeezed through the gap over the center console into the front area.

“Really,” said Donna. “You seem to have a real talent for flirting.” She glanced at my chest. “Maybe two of them.”

“I’m gonna call you a bad word,” I warned her.

“You better not,” Mom warned from the front seat. “But Donna, that subject is off-limits for teasing.”

“Oh, this is the one with Barbara Streisand,” Dad commented.

“Barbra Streisand,” Mom corrected him.

“Isn’t that what I said?”

“Barbarella Streisand?” Dad suggested.

“NO!” Mom insisted.

“Is the lady with the nose supposed to be the funny one?” Linda asked.

In the back seat, Donna and I had retreated to the corners, me on the right and her on the left, but you could only see the screen well from the middle. so we ended up just glaring at each other in the dark.

“She’s not really funny,” Linda commented. “She just sings in her nose. Is she going to do that the whole movie?”

“Probably,” Dad observed.

“Maybe you’d rather watch it from the playground?” Mom suggested.

“Yes, please,” Linda agreed.

“Me, too?” Dad suggested.

“No, you stay here,” Mom said, sounding annoyed. “Joni, take Linda to the playground, would you?”

“Oh, okay, Mom.” It would get me away from Donna before our little feud escalated or something, at least.

Mom let Linda exit from the front and I got out of the rear door on the passenger side, to take charge of my stickiest sibling. As usual, she had spilled sno-cone juice all down her front and managed to get popcorn stuck in her hair.

“Let’s make a stop to clean you up a bit,” I told her.

“Kay,” she said willingly. Despite her talent at turning herself into a junkfood sampler, Linda actually preferred to be clean.

The restrooms and the playground at the Moto-View Starlite Drive-In were both down at the front under the big screen, so we were automatically headed in the right direction. Except…

Linda had three of my fingers in her grip and tugged me sideways when we reached the restroom building. “Not that side, Joni,” she said. “That’s for the boys.”

“Oh,” I mumbled.

“You don’t have to take me there anymore,” she explained. “Cause you got boobies now.”

“Yeah, thanks for reminding me,” I said. No lie, I hadn’t even been thinking about that, witness that Linda had to apply a course correction removal.

I heard a little girl snigger and looked down. Linda was grinning at me. “You didn’t forget,” she assured me. “It’d be like that lady forgetting her nose when it’s right in front of her face.”

I had to laugh at that, too. “Just don’t tell everyone, Linda,” I reminded her.

“I won’t tell nobody,” she assured me. “What’s it I’m not s’posed to tell?”

I frowned at her but her sly look told me she was teasing me. “Don’t be sassy,” I told her.

She took my hand and we went into the no man’s land of the Ladies’ restroom.

I guess I had expected it to be cleaner, and maybe it was a bit; no urinals with nasty wire splash guards. With the movie already on, there were only two other people inside: a woman and her three-year-old-looking son.

The kid stared at me creepily the whole time he had me in sight, and I kept an eye on the pass-under that he wasn’t trying to get into the stall with me. I did my business sitting down, washed up at the sink and tidied Linda up a bit before exiting.

“See? That wasn’t so bad,” she assured me. “Can I go on the merry-go-round?”

I looked at the tiny carousel with its four prancing ponies and nodded. It seemed odd for the ride to be turning without its own music, but someone not Ms. Streisand was belting out something about not being pretty up on the big screen, and four speakers brought the music to the people in the playground.

We wandered that direction. The whole area wasn’t bigger than a large backyard and we reached the merry-go-round just as the guy running it pulled the lever to bring it to a stop. “Climb aboard,” he encouraged us.

We picked two of the horses, and a boy about my age with a younger boy took the other two. The ride operator started it up, and around we went, Linda’s giggles setting a mood.

About the third time around, I realized that the ride operator and the boy my age were both looking at me. Not staring exactly, but definitely watching me. I’d go out of sight behind the column in the middle, then when I came around again, there they were.

And with a shock, I realized I knew the older boy. Kevin Something-or-other, he’d been in my history class at high school. We’d gone across town to try to avoid meeting people we knew, and here was a third kid from my school.

And he kept looking at me!

---

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"Hi, my daughter needs to be fitted for a new bra."

Dad and Fooler came home about ten-thirty. Linda had been left to play with Mrs. Pattinson's daughter next door. "She'll get lunch and a nap there," Dad said. "One of us can go fetch her back about two."

I was sitting on the couch next to Donna and had Mom's beige blouse wrapped around me, and Donna and I had arms around each other's waist.

Dad smiled when he looked at us. "You two look adorable," he said, which made me squirm and protest. "Dad!"

Donna protested too. "Daddy!" She made that face where she turns up the corners of her mouth but isn't smiling. Dad laughed at her.

"How are you doing, Jonny?" he asked me.

I shrugged and regretted it when I felt my breasts move.

"Jon," he said. "Do you feel you're being pushed into doing things you don't want to do?"

"Well, yeah," I said. "But it isn't like I feel picked on or anything. I mean, it isn't fair to have to deal with this, but…. Things happen." I could feel that I was about to cry.

Donna gave me a squeeze, and I squeezed her back. I looked down at myself and sighed. "It's embarrassing."

Dad nodded. "I'm going to work the phone this afternoon and see if I can get you some medical specialists who might know what is happening. It's Saturday, but we have excellent insurance, so I've got access to buttons and levers."

"Thanks, Daddy," I said without thinking about it.

He flashed a grin at me, then stood and hugged Mom, who had been standing beside him. They kissed, and Donna and I exchanged glances and smirks.

"Going shopping?" Dad asked, nodding at Mom's purse.

"Jonny needs things," Mom said simply.

"Use the cards," said Dad, "that's what they're for." Uh, oh.

I felt numb. We really were going to do this. Go shopping for some clothes that would fit me, which meant girl's clothes. Why did I have to go along? Mom and Donna had my measurements, they didn't need me there.

I glanced down at my chest. People would see me.

"Jonny?" Mom and Donna were at the door. How long had I just been sitting there?

"I'm not going," I said. I knew I sounded desperate.

"Yes, you are," Mom said firmly.

I got up and moved slowly toward the door. I didn't like it, I didn't want to do it, but I was doing it. "People will see me," I protested.

"You look fine," Mom insisted. "The blouse is loose enough…." She shrugged. "You're just my other teenage daughter, honey."

I winced and covered my face with my arm.

"I thought you were going to be all right with this," Mom complained.

"I am. I will be," I said. "Just give me a minute or two."

Donna fetched me some tissue from the dispenser box, and I used it to wipe my eyes. Then we stood there for a bit, Mom by the door, though she had closed it again, Donna and I near the steps that led into the rest of the house.

Donna handed me two more tissues, and I put the wad of paper into a pocket and sighed. "Okay, let's go."

—

A few moments later, we trooped out to the car. I let Donna have the front seat, something we often contested, and I sat behind her with the child seat behind Mom. Linda was not going with us, so it would likely be much quieter and less stressful for Mom.

For me, I wasn't so sure.

"We should consider what we are going to go looking for," Mom commented. "That way, we can decide where to go, to begin with."

"Fashion Valley," said Donna quickly. "Five large department stores and 30 shops."

Mom and I nodded, deferring to the expert shopper in our midst. Donna didn't drive yet, but buses ran to Fashion Valley frequently. As the largest indoor mall in San Diego, it was an obvious place to go and had several restaurants and eating places, too.

"That's 'where' sorted," Mom noted. "Now, what do we need."

"Well, obviously, Jonny needs a couple of sturdy bras," said Donna. I cringed in the back seat, but this was already a given and no use arguing against it.

Donna went on. "Some tops, she can't wear most of mine. Or would stretch them out of shape." I made a noise.

Mom glanced at me in the back seat to see if I was objecting to the pronoun.

I pouted, but there wasn't much to say or do about it—except—"I took a deep breath. "We're going to get funny looks and more of them if you refer to me as 'he' in the mall," I said. This was the point that had brought me close to panic before we left the house. I had to deal with it.

Donna looked at me approvingly. "She's right."

Argh. "Just don't overdo it, okay, sis?" I whined. "Until my medical problems are sorted out, I look more like a girl than a boy. Doesn't mean I have to like it." My throat got tight, and I ended my acquiescence, muttering.

"Overdo it how?" Donna asked.

"No teasing me about wearing dresses, or getting my ears pierced, or nails painted. Or stuff like that…."

"Oh," Donna turned around to look at me, I guess assessing my mood. "It was the furthest thing from my mind," she said innocently.

"Yeah, right," I snorted.

She grinned and turned back to strategizing our assault on the local shopping mecca. "Nordstroms'," she announced. "We can probably get everything Jonny needs in one stop if we forego chasing bargains." Nordstroms' was a quality store, and their sales were often good, but they weren't J.C. Penney's or even Macy's.

Mom decided. "Okay, Nordstroms' it is." She glanced over the seat at me and confirmed my decision. "So you're my oldest daughter for the day? That's okay with you, honey?"

I shrugged, causing things to bounce which went a long way to explaining my attitude. Nothing I could do would make me look like a boy, not with my new equipment.

"Jon?" Mom prompted since I hadn't said anything.

"It's okay, Mom. Not right, and this is just for today, but we can be less noticeable, I guess."

We pulled into the big parking structure behind the mall, and my stomach started growling. Donna noticed, of course. "How ladylike," she smirked.

"Shut up," I said as I got out of the car. "Mom, can we get a snack?"

"I suppose, but we just finished breakfast two hours ago. I thought we might go shopping first and have lunch at The Catch. Are you hungry?" The Catch was a large seafood restaurant.

"She's either hungry or smuggling puppies inside her blouse," suggested Donna, looking at me sideways. "Come to think of it…."

"Hush, Donna!" Mom snapped. "No teasing, remember?"

"I didn't think smuggling puppies was on the list," Donna began but noticing the looks Mom and I gave her, she subsided. "Okay, okay," she raised a hand.

"The Catch does sound good…." The seafood place was not usually one of our planned stops. We mostly just ate in the food court, but a three-way shrimp plate would be great, and my stomach agreed. "Okay, lunch later, but right now?"

Surprisingly, Donna chimed in, "How about a pretzel from the little stand in the courtyard?"

"Sounds… sounds good," I said. I was too hungry to object that people could see me if we went into the mall.

"We can split a couple of pretzels then and go to The Catch after shopping," Mom decided, so we walked thru the doors beside Nordstrom's into the center court. I was terrified of such a public place, but I did it, and nobody seemed to notice.

The place wasn't that crowded yet. I tried to stay close to Mom and Donna and not look at anyone else. By the time we got our snack, I was feeling a bit light-headed.

"I don't know why I'm so hungry," I complained when we sat in front of the big windows with pretzels and little cups of sauces. "I ate three pancakes and one of Dad's sausages." Which was a lot for me.

"I can think of two reasons you might be a little hungry," said Donna.

I ignored her and continued eating. I don't think I've ever had plastic cheese sauce that tasted as good. I finally scraped up the last of the cheese with the last bit of pretzel. A sip of lemonade and I did feel better, though not exactly ready for what we were about to do.

Which, of course, was Mom's next question after directing Donna to dispose of our trash. "Everybody ready?"

—

One thing about Nordstroms' I hadn't counted on—nobody walks into the store without some salesperson offering help almost immediately. We weren't fifteen feet from the entrance, me mostly trying to hide behind Mom again, when a saleswoman approached.

"Can I help you ladies find something?" she asked.

"Teen Fashion," said Donna, "but I know where it is." She pointed, and the lady smiled at her. My sister headed for that corner of the ground floor where it sometimes seemed she and her friends from school lived.

"We need the lingerie aisle," Mom said. I looked closely at an exciting display of kitchen canisters.

"Up the escalator, turn left. It's along the back wall," the saleslady directed us with hand gestures.

"Thank you," Mom murmured.

I followed Mom, but the saleswoman was looking at me and smiling at my chest. Maybe she works on commission, I thought sourly. Then I had to hurry a bit to catch up to Mom, which encouraged bouncing and swaying.

"Mom, Mom," I whispered. "We're not in a hurry to collect bruises, are we?"

She turned a bit to look at me. "Huh?"

I folded my arms but had the same problem I'd had before; the only place to put them was on top of my chest. And I had seen how that looked in a mirror.

"Oh," said Mom and walked a bit slower.

"The sales lady was watching me bounce," I complained.

Mom gave me a look. "Well, that's why we're here," she said.

"So people can watch me?" I whined.

"Jonny," she warned me. Dad is the patient parent. Mom has less tolerance for what she calls acting out. But she linked her hand with mine and gave me a squeeze that made me feel less likely to throw up pretzels and cheese sauce.

"Oh, no," I said, spotting another employee lurking near a cash register. But there was nowhere to hide. We had reached the lingerie section, and bras and panties hung on racks all around me, along with items of clothing I didn't even know the names or purposes of.

And Mom walked right up to the woman (girl, really, she was probably just out of high school)! "Hi, my daughter needs to be fitted for a new bra," she said.

Meaning me! I looked away, but there was nowhere to look.

"Well, come back here," the girl said. "We've got a little fitting room for some privacy." She came around the counter and stuck out her hand. "I'm Sandra," she said.

Mom let go of my hand, and somehow I ended up with Sandra holding my two middle fingers, pulling me along! "I'm—I'm?" Did I know who I was?

If there was anyone in the world I didn't want to be right then, it was me.

"What's that?" Sandra asked, gently tugging me toward a curtained doorway.

"Um," I hummed. I knew the tune, but I couldn't think of the words. "I'm Joni, like the singer," I finally managed.

"Joni Mitchell?" Sandra asked.

"Uh, huh," I murmured. Where did that come from? "But it's Edwards, not Mitchell. Joni Edwards." I swallowed something and almost choked on it.

Sandra pushed a leathery curtain aside and stepped into a small dressing room, tugging on my fingers that I should follow. "That's cute," she said. "Do you spell it the same way?"

Oh, she meant my name. "Yeah," I said. "It's only four letters instead of six." I had no idea why I said that.

But it struck Sandra as really funny, and she laughed, causing me to make a noise that sounded like a giggle.

I glanced back at the curtain, calling out, "Mom?"

"I'll just be right out here, honey," I heard her reply. The room was tiny, but three people could fit, and I felt the need of reinforcements.

"We don't need her," Sandra assured me. "Just us girls back here." She produced a measuring tape much like Mom's, except it was narrower and beige instead of yellow. "You're not wearing a bra right now," she observed.

"Uh, no," I admitted.

"What size do you usually wear?"

What had been the size Mom had got for me on Friday? "A 30C," I said. I remembered that? Oh, crap! "But it doesn't fit."

"Uh, huh," said Sandra. "I shooden wunda." I hadn't noticed until then, but she had some kind of East Coast accent. I surprised myself by giggling again. Well, it sounded funny.

"You ticklish?" she asked.

"Oh, God," I said.

Sandra laughed again. "Okay, you've got a t-shirt under your blouse, so take the blouse off, and I'll show you how to do the measurements yourself. That way, I won't accidentally tickle you, Joni."

"Joni," I repeated.

"That's what I said, isn't it?" She sounded confused.

I laughed, nodding. I'm Joni. No boy named Jonny here to get embarrassed about having breasts like a girl.

"I'm Joni," I repeated again.

"You said that," Sandra noted, handing me the tape measure.

She shook her head and grinned at me. “Do you get hate mail?” she asked looking serious.

I was still testing out the new name I had chosen. Joni. It gave me a little insulation against what had happened to me. Jonny would not have to deal with getting measured for a bra, Joni could do that.

Speaking of which, Sandra was showing me how to measure myself by using her beige tape measure on herself. “See,” she was saying, “I’ve got a 32 inch band size, and my bust measures 34 so that’s a B-cup.”

“Uh-huh,” I said, taking the tape when she passed it to me. “Mom did these measurements at home” I told her.

“What did she get?” Sandra asked.

“Let’s see if we get the same,” I suggested.

Sandra nodded, smiling.

I wrapped the tape around me, right under my armpits. Sandra helped me keep it straight. “Twenty seven,” I read.

“Can that be right?” Sandra asked. “I know you’re small but that’s tiny. The smallest band size we have in most styles is 28. And we don’t have odd-number sizes anyway, no one does.”

I started to shrug but stopped myself. “I’m just small,” I muttered. Then blushed, remembering that I wasn’t small everywhere.

We measured under my breasts next and got the same number again. Sandra rolled her eyes. “I have to starve myself for a week to get my waist down to 27.”

“My waist is 22,” I said before I thought about it.

She shook her head and grinned at me. “Do you get hate mail?” she asked looking serious.

“Huh?” I goggled.

“Just kidding,” she said. “Let’s get the money number, your bust.”

She put a thumb on my backbone to help me keep the tape level. “Thirty-three,” she read.

“What!” I almost yelped. “That’s more than it was this morning.”

“Maybe the tape had slipped up or down?”

“No, no,” I shook my head. “Measure it again. You do it this time.”

She did and got the same number. “Thirty-three…that’s pretty big…. Uh, you’d be a size 28DD. Wow.”

“They’re still growing,” I said and I felt tears fill my eyes.

“Don’t cry, honey,” Sandra urged. “Lots of girls are, uh, extra-busty.”

“You don’t understand,” I whimpered. “On Thursday, I would have barely filled a B-cup.”

Her turn to boggle, if that’s what you call it when a person’s eyes get real big and their head wobbles up and down.

“It was just like they exploded Friday night.” I didn’t realize it but I was whispering. “This morning I woke up with these,” I waggled my shoulders.

She blinked. “You’re kidding me? You grew three bra sizes over night?”

“I guess so,” I said, feeling tears leak onto my cheeks and fill my nose from the inside. “That’s—that’s why I need new bras.” I almost choked, saying that.

“Did it hurt?” Sandra paused. “It had to hurt, right? No, you are kidding me, aren’t you?”

“Huh-uh. You could ask my Mom out there. And it did hurt some, it ached, then burned, like my skin was stretching.” I hiccoughed.

Sandra was staring then she began to giggle. “You’ve got to be kidding me! I’ve never heard of anything like this.”

“It’s true,” I said. Maybe I sounded really upset because Sandra stopped laughing and patted me on the arm. “Look it’s okay. Do you know how many girls come in here wanting me to pad them out a bit? Some of them would kill for your figure.”

She stepped back and looked at me. “You’ve got hips, too. Heck, You’re a regular half-pint Venus!”

I burst into tears, trying to be quiet.

Sndra looked stricken. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I mean, you’re small…” Her eyes landed on my breasts. “Uh—most places. I didn’t mean you were short.”

“I am short!” I insisted. “I know that. My little sister is four inches taller than me.”

Sandra tried a smile. “My little brother is like a foot taller than me.”

“And that’s the worst part,” I said hiccoughing again.

“What—what is?” she asked.

“I’m a boy!” I told her.

She busted up laughing. “I knew it, I knew it!” She handed me a tissue and I blew my nose.

“You knew I was a boy?” I asked, trying not to keep blubbering.

“No, you goof! I knew you were spinning a story.” She grinned. “But you went too far. No one is going to believe you’re a boy with these!” And she poked me in a tit! “C’mon!”

I tried to laugh, but it came out as more blubbering.

“Joni?” Sandra said. “Uh—should I get your Mom?”

I nodded.

She went through the curtain while I shredded soggy tissue and wished I had a fresh one to blow my nose. “‘Snot fair,” I whimpered. “I told her the truth and she doesn’t believe me.”

Then Mom was there holding me while I cried. “Honey, honey. It’s okay, I’m here.”

“I told her I was a boy and she laughed at me,” I said as quietly as I could.

Sandra looked stricken. “I didn’t mean to laugh, b-but,” she looked this way then that. “I—I thought you were joking.”

“I’m a joke,” I muttered.

“No, you’re not, honey,” Mom said reassuringly.

“Yes, I am,” I said, whining. I felt very sorry for myself.

“Baby, you’re okay.” Mom insisted.

Sandra handed me more tissue. “Thag you,” I said. I looked directly at her. After blowing my nose and throwing the tissue in a box Sandra held out, I took another wad she handed me. “Thank you,” I said again.

“Um,” said Sandra looking distressed.

Mom pushed me far enough away she could look me in the face. “Better?” she asked.

I shook my head. Mom pushed some hair out of my eyes. “Baby, I’m so sorry.”

I looked at Sandra again. “I’’m a boy with tits,” I said. “Big ones, so big I’m gonna have to wear a bra.” My lip trembled. Mom took tissues Sandra was holding out and wiped my eyes.

“Do—do you want me to get a manager?” Sandra asked.

“Why? So he can see me too?” I whimpered.

“Hush,” said Mom, pulling me in close again. Then to Sandra, “Don’t call a manager, she’ll be all right. She just needs a good cry. Joni? You’re okay, everything is fine. Okay?”

“‘M Jonny,” I said but she held me close enough to muffle that. Mom wiped my eyes and had me blow my nose again. “You gonna be okay now?” she asked.

I nodded, feeling absolutely ridiculous, still being held around the shoulders by Mom. “Sorry,” I said to Sandra.

“Are you okay?” she asked, looking as if she were about to be attacked by rabid dogs.

Just then, Donna arrived, crowding into the tiny room. “Hey, sis,” she said cheerfully. “They’re having a sale down in Teen Fashion! Some great stuff! I found you some blue stretch denim Capris, and this cute jumper skort with a bib!”

I pouted at Donna and Mom put an arm around my shoulders. “Joni’s a bit upset,” she said warningly to Donna.

“Ah,” said Donna. “Don’t be that way, sis. Hey, Mom how much can we spend? Should we get Joni a buncha cute T’s? they got them in all kinds of colors and styles.” She looked directly at me. “You gonna impress the heck out of the guys if you go with a boat neck,” she said.

I didn’t even know what half the stuff she was talking about meant. Capris? Jumper skort? Boat neck? I turned toward Mom and tried to hide my face in her shoulder.

“I’m confused,” said Sandra.

“We all are,” agreed Mom.

Donna laughed, nodding. I so wanted to punch her. My sister was the only person I ever had a fist fight with and she blacked my eye when we were nine, so punching her wasn’t the best idea I ever had.

Sandra looked at Donna. “Um—. Joni told me she’s a boy?”

Donna shrugged. “She’s been claiming that since we were like, four.”

Sandra frowned. “Are you two, like, twins?”

Donna laughed again. “Like twins, yes, but not twins. Joni’s my big sister. She’s ten months older.” Amazing that Donna admitted that. Usually, she tried to amplify any confusion.

I sniffled, turning back around and feeling that the jiggling and bouncing had gotten worse. “Can we go home,” I whined. I was really beginning to hate hearing myself.

“Whoa,” said Donna looking at my bust. “You still need, uh, you really need some bras, good strong ones.”

“Shut up,” I said.

For once, she actually listened to me.

“Do we know your size yet?” Mom asked me.

I looked at Sandra who blinked several times as if she had no idea what we were on about. Then suddenly, “Oh!” she said. “Um, 28DD, was what we came up with. Uh, let me see what we have in that size.” She glanced around at the walls of the small fitting room and apparently decided she needed to check stock elsewhere.

“I’ll be right back,” she promised as she scooted out the curtained doorway.

“I should start calling you ‘DeeDee’,” Donna commented.

“Mo-om,” I protested.

Mom scowled, first at me! I guess she was getting tired of my whining. But she turned her gaze on Donna and snapped. “You agreed to keep the teasing down, so I guess you don’t want any money to spend on yourself?”

“Uh,” Donna looked embarrassed. “I’ll be good, but how she’s supposed to know we’re related if I don’t tease her?”

“Enough!”

“Yes, ma’am.”

I stepped away from Mom and reached out a hand to Donna. “You’ve got something on your nose,” I said.

She slapped my hand away, and we both giggled. She hadn’t fell for that one since pre-school but it was kind of a ritual between us. We might fuss and tease and complain about each other, but we could forgive, too. Donna knew I wasn’t mad at her.

Mom rolled her eyes. “Now I remember why I waited ten years before I had another kid,” she sighed.

I wiped my eyes and blew my nose again. “Sorry for the waterworks,” I said.

Mom nodded. “I understand, honey. But you know, I think you scared that sales girl into the next county. She’s disappeared.”

“Sandra,” I mentioned, as Mom moved toward the door to see if she could spot the girl coming back.

“I really did find some nice stuff I think you’ll like,” Donna said to me. “Not too girly, but you don’t want to look like you’re trying to be a tomboy, either.”

“Why not?” I asked.

She did the eye roll thing. “At our age, everyone thinks tomboys are just trying to get attention. They’re all boy crazy.”

“Oh,” I said, cringing a bit. Did boy crazy mean what I thought it meant?

“Here she comes,” Mom said from the doorway.

To me the boxes for bras seemed very small, then again, I don’t think I even knew that they came in boxes. Mostly, you just see them hanging from racks, but apparently those are the cheap bras. The good ones come in boxes.

Sandra had six or eight boxes in her hands as she came up to me. “Oh, Joni!” she said. “I’m sorry I laughed at the wrong time. B-but it was a joke, wasn’t it?”

“I’m sorry I was grumpy,” I said. “But I really did have some kind of growth spurt almost over night. I—it’s,” —Oh, no, was I going to cry again?—“it’s been kind of terrifying.”

“Well—well, maybe we can fix things, sort of,” she looked around. “It’s kind of crowded in here for trying things on.”

Mom took the hint. “We’ll be right outside,” she said, grabbing Donna by the upper arm and steering her out the curtained door.

“Mom, Mom.” Donna was saying. “Mom, you gotta come look at the sale they’re having downstairs….”

Sandra hooked the door so it would stay closed, I hadn’t known it had a hook. “Just so no one barges in,” she said.

She moved to the little pile of boxes on the dressing table, and I looked past her to my reflection in the mirror. I saw a very busty young woman wearing a white t-shirt and denim jeans, a girl who looked a lot like my sister in the face but with a rounder chin and higher forehead.

“What I’ve got here is three sizes in two different styles. We actually don’t have much stock in unusual sizes.”

“I shooden wunda,” I said, echoing something she had said earlier and imitating her eastern accent.

She giggled and grinned. “You did that well,” she said. “I’ve been out here since I was ten and I still sound like a Mainer, sometimes.”

“A Mainer? Like someone from Maine? Is that where you’re from?” I asked.

“Uh, huh,” she agreed. “So I’ve got 28D, 28DD, and 30D bras in both front and back closure styles. They all have wired cups, I’m afraid. Most small band sizes with large cups do.”

“No clue what that means, ‘wired’? They have tiny microphones?”

Sandra snorted. “You’ll find out,” she said ominously. “You don’t know anything about bras, do you? How is that?”

I pointed at myself. “I spent the last ten years pretending to be a boy.” More or less. “And I didn’t wear a bra ‘cause I didn’t need one—until last night.”

She was taking a bra out of the packaging. “You grew all that over night? That’s hard to believe.”

I looked down at myself. “It’s no easier to believe from this side,” I said.

She held up a bra. “You want to take your shirt off to try this on?”

“Uh, no,” I said.

“Well,” she offered “you can put it on over your t-shirt for a first try.”

“Okay,” I said. “What do I do?”

“That’s a front closure model. Just put it on like you were putting on a blouse. Slip your arms through the straps, then pull the clasp together so you can close it.”

I glared at the item, but did as she suggested. Except, she had to show me how the two plastic pieces of the closure fit together.

Things felt lumpy and awkward. “It doesn’t fit!” I complained.

“Reach your hand into each cup, lift up your breast and let it fall. It will find a fit,” she instructed.

Well, I’d been avoiding touching them, and of course the t-shirt was in the way, but I managed. They were part of me, after all. I was touching them already because I was inside them

“Mmm,” said Sandra. “You’re going to have to take the t-shirt off to be sure of the fit, but it looks good.”

I looked in the mirror. I’d gotten through all of this without realizing that the bra was a very pale pink color. I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths. A pink bra. What would the guys in gym who had given me such a hard time about my tiny nubbins say about me wearing a pink bra over a pair of gazongas like these?

Did it matter? I was going to do my best that they never saw Jonny again.

I undid the clasp, took the bra off and pulled the shirt off over my head. Joni looked back at me from the mirror, naked from the waist up.

Ever think of something that made you blush all the way down to your navel?

I put one arm across my breasts and immediately moved it away. That had looked like I was posing.

Sandra handed me the bra. "You'd better put this on before you ketch your deeth."

I looked at her, but she kept a straight face. I'm the one who giggled. "That sounds like something someone's granny would say."

"Shooden wunda," she agreed, and this time we both giggled.

I put the bra back on and adjusted the fit like she had shown me by lifting my boobs one at a time and letting them fall into the cups.

"Let's adjust the straps," she offered. So we did that too. There were clever little clasps on the straps to hold them in place once adjusted.

"Check the fit," Sandra suggested. "Waggle your shoulders, bend forward then back."

"All at once?" I protested. More giggles.

"Well," Sandra observed. "Nothin' fell out on the floah and rolled unna the fridge."

"You're doing that on purpose now," I accused.

“Ayuh,” she admitted. We both laughed again.

"That one fits so well," she noted. "Do you want to try on any of the others? A back=closing bra often fits better than a front-closer."

"Uh." I looked down. "You don't think the smaller size would fit?"

"Not as well as this one."

I sighed. "I feel like the bra makes me look even bigger than I am," I complained.

"There is such a thing as a minimizer bra," she suggested, "to make women with generous chests look a bit more stingy. Shall I see if we have one in a size that would fit you?"

I smiled at her description. "Please?" I said.

"Be right back." She unlatched the fabric door and left the tiny dressing room, taking with her the bras I wasn't going to try on.

No sooner had she left than Donna slipped in. "I got some other stuff for you to try—oh, wow." She stopped and stared at me for a moment.

"What?" I protested, embarrassed.

"Well," she said. "At least your nipples aren't showing now, but Joni—and someone is going to tell you this, probably a guy—you're built like a brick outhouse!"

I frowned. "That doesn't sound like a compliment!"

She giggled. "Well, it's usually meant as one! You know, like, well-built? 'Cause like, who builds an outhouse out of bricks?"

I kept frowning. "You've got bags. What's in them?"

"Oh!" she said, "Mom and I bought you some things." She waved the bags, then set one down on a bench. "Underwear, besides bras, I mean. And don't worry, they are pretty much like your own tidy-whities, just you know, for girls."

"I'm not a girl," I pointed out.

"Yeah? Is that why you changed your name to Joni?"

"Don't! You—That's got nothing to do with underwear!"

She rolled her eyes. "Sure it does. I told Mom that if you're going to do this Joni thing, you ought to do it right. And she agreed. So we bought you some panties."

"Aigh!"

She continued. "And if you won't wear them, you won't, but if you don't open the package, we can take them back. This is Nordstrom. They'd probably take them back even if you did open it."

I glared at her.

"You're so cute when you do that pouty thing," she said.

"I am not pouting!"

"'She pouted,'" said Donna. "Joni, when your lower lip gets all fat and puffy and the corners of your mouth turn down—that's pouting. Don't get me wrong. You're good at it. And it pays off." She paused to look at me with her lips pursed.

"Tell me something," she demanded. "Which of us gets into more trouble with Daddy?"

"You do!" I said immediately. "But that's not—that's not! You're just a loose cannon!"

"Hmph," she mumped. "And you are the Princess of Pout! And Daddy just wants to make it all better for you!"

"I'm—he?—you!"

She turned away. "Mom and I got you some capris 'cause we figured we'd never get you into a dress today." She pulled a pale denim something out of the bag. "See?" She shook the item out so I could see it was a pair of pants.

"Those are capris? I thought they were called pedal pushers?"

"They're sort of the same thing," she admitted. "But capris can go down to the ankle or even have a cuff. Pedal pushers only reach mid-calf and never have a cuff that could get caught in a bicycle chain."

"Oh," I said. "But they're both kinds of short pants for girls?"

"Yea-ah? Joni, you are so dumb!"

"Well, I don't know this stuff! Remember," and here I used finger quotes, "I've been 'pretending to be a boy' for ten years."

That cracked her up. She nodded, laughing, and tapped her nose. "That was what you call fast thinking!" She laughed, pointing at me. "And the beauty of it is it was true!"

I frowned at her, and that made her laugh more. "Pout, Princess!" she cackled.

I was trying to decide whether it was worth it to maybe pop her one at the risk of her cleaning my clock when Sandra walked back in. She only had two boxes this time. "Hey!" she said to Donna.

"Hey," Donna said. "I brought some pants for Joni to try on and some panties cause I think the ones she's wearing are a bit small." She started for the door. "Maybe you can get her to try them on. And that other bag has some tops, too."

"Oh," said Sandra looking at me. I glared at Donna's back as she headed out.

Sandra watched Donna go and said to me, "You two don't always get along?"

I snorted. Sandra laughed and shook her head. "You're too close together. In age, I mean, didn't she say you were only ten months older?"

"Huh? Yeah," I said. "My birthday is in November and hers in September, so we have been in the same grade at school."

She stared at me. She blinked. "That's effing hilarious," she said.

"You'd think so," I agreed. "But, yeah, no. It's a pain. Everyone thinks we're twins, and we have to keep explaining it."

"But that's what's funny!" she protested. "And you two don't even look that much alike!"

I gestured at my chest. "Well, not now!" I said. And she laughed even harder.

"Don't hurt yourself," I commented.

"So it was hard to tell you apart then?"

"I dunno," I said, shrugging. "I knew which of us was me."

Sandra grinned again. "You were the one pretending to be a boy?"

"Uh—," I know I was blushing. The weird thing about blushing is I could feel the heat go all the way down under my shirt.

Sandra was still grinning. "I think that is so cute." I knew she didn't mean me blushing but still….

I wondered if I should go along with Donna's cockamamie invention.

"Did you have a boy's name you used?" Sandra asked.

"Uh—Jonny," I said without thinking about it too long.

She nodded, smiling. She pulled something out of a box. It looked like it had a lot of lace on it. "Now this," she said, "is a back-closing longline bra that is supposed to be a minimizer." She held it up. "See, it has lacy cups and a bit of lace at the midriff."

Ah, jeez! And it was lavender! With a little flower where everything came together.

"You don't like it?" Sandra asked.

"I don't think so," I shook my head. "Too…."

Sandra grinned. "Too girly?"

I nodded, blushing again.

She laughed. "Even for a bra, it's a bit over the top, huh?"

"Please, no," I said.

"Okay," she said, still laughing a bit, as she put it back in its box.

She waved with the other box she had brought. "This is one just like the one you're wearing now, so you have two. You need at least two good bras, so you have one to wear while you wash the other."

I nodded. That made sense, if anything did.

She looked in the bags Donna had brought. "Package of plain white panties," she commented. "Size three?" She shrugged. "This is four pullover tops in different colors. And a pair of denim pants, size small." She held the pants up. "These are pretty plain. They could almost be boy's jeans, except they don't have pockets or a fly." She giggled, looking at me sideways.

She handed me the pants. "You can try those on in here. I'll just go ring up the two bras. Latch the door."

I sighed but accepted the capris.

"There's a screen, there," she pointed. "You can pull it away from the wall and change behind it, if you're extra paranoid."

"Now you tell me."

She laughed and put the package of panties on top of the capris I was carrying, along with the bag of pullovers. "You can try one of those on, too. The panties, I mean. And yes, we do have the well-known insane return policy."

I looked alarmed. "You don't resell returned underwear, do you?"

She shook her head. "Nope. I think we give them to a charity. Something." She went out the door and reminded me again to latch it.

I did that first, then pulled the screen out from the wall to make a little cubby with a shelf for putting things down and hooks for hanging things up. Walking back and forth across the room, I noticed the swaying of my breasts, but the bra was keeping it down to just disconcerting and not alarming.

I sighed, put the capris, bag of tees, and package of panties on the shelf, then took off my shirt and hung it on a hook. The back of the screen was a mirror with another on the wall, making an angle where I could see my reflection from the front and from the side.

I made such a face at myself!

I decided to try on one of the pullovers first, pulling them out of the bag to look them over. They weren't Polos; they didn't have stand-up collars. Also, instead of an alligator above a pocket, they had a little black-and-white panda and no pocket at all. The tag at the neck said the brand name was Pandaclad, which I vaguely remembered as a brand of little-kid pajamas.

Something else suggested to me that these were not unisex or from a collection for guys. The sleeves were cut on an angle instead of straight across. Girly but subtle. I decided I could live with that.

The colors on offer were red, a greenish blue that was not turquoise, a purple sort of brown, and a foresty-looking green. I pulled that last one on, and it fit well enough, but my shape stretched it out a bit, and it turned out that not having a pocket was a good idea. That would have looked ridiculous.

Thinking about it even made me blush, and I was interested (only a little freaked out) to see that the color did go down into the shirt to turn the barely visible swell of my breasts a definite pink. No blushing in public, I told myself—like that would work.

I wondered if these tops were the boat-necks Donna had mentioned. The neck opening was wide and pointed at the shoulder, and the front did not dip into a vee or even a shallow oval. Hmm. I decided to forgive Donna one crude remark for having had the sensitivity to make a modest choice.

The material of the tee was very soft and slightly stretchy, reminding me again of Linda's pajamas. It felt good against my skin. The shape of the opening made my neck look longer. And the green looked good, too. I decided I liked the tees and would wear them as long as I had to be Joni. The slight girly styling did not look out of place on me.

Sigh. Nothing for it but to continue.

I toed off my sandals, unbuttoned and unzipped my jeans, then hooked my thumbs in the waistband and pulled them down. The waist was loose, but they fit very tightly on my hips, and I had to force them. Just as I expected, getting the jeans down over my hips was impossible without dragging my undershorts.

I pushed them all the way down, ignoring the anatomy revealed but muttering something nonsensical I had heard my grandfather say. "If it ain't lamb, it surely must be mutton." I have no idea what that meant, but it felt appropriate.

Before I could change my mind, I tore open the package of white panties, noting as I did so that the size was marked S for small. They looked huge.

I slipped them on, terrified for some reason. What did I think would happen? I mean, probably the worst thing possible is that they would cause me to grow double-D boobs. Too late for that.

I pulled the waistband up, and it actually fit my waist, not hanging loose. The soft, stretchy fabric covered my ass, too, without binding at the leg holes. Even little Jonny made no complaint. Little Joni?

That thought made me blush all the way down to my navel.

I wiggled around a bit, but the fact was indisputable. Girl's panties fit better than boy's underpants. I rolled my eyes. What had I expected?

Nothing left to try on but the capris.

The softness of the fabric surprised me also—compared to my jeans, the cloth was thin and light. And stretchy. I pulled the waistband up and felt the material tighten over my butt, around my thighs and as far down my calves as they reached. Which was about four inches above my ankles, with no cuff. Ridiculously short for boy's jeans. But…

I looked in the mirror, turning this way and that. I felt my bust jiggle when I moved but at least…at least what? My ass didn't jiggle, even if it looked, well, huge in the tight fabric. It had been getting bigger for the last year and had rounded out with the growth spurt I'd had last night. It was enormous for a boy, but about like Donna's shape down there, truthfully.

Maybe a bit bigger.

I could feel myself blush again. What had provoked the red flush this time—not the sight of my own ass…. I glared at my reflection from two angles. No, I had turned red thinking about Rod Pick seeing me in these capris.

How much of a girl was I going to turn into?

It felt like everyone was staring at the kid with the big breasts.

Mom and Donna came to get me and I said goodbye to Sandy.

“I filled out a preferred customer card on you, with your measurements and sizes,“ she said as we left. “That way when you come back, if I’m not here, whoever is will be able to find what you need faster.”

I smiled and thanked her.

When we were downstairs and on the way out of Nordstrom’s, Donna gave me a peculiar look. “You’ve been crying?” She asked.

“Just shut up,” I said.

Oddly, she did.

“You kids ready to eat here? It’s nearly noon,” Mom asked as we exited the department store into the main concourse.

My stomach embarrassed me by growling a bit, and Donna laughed. “I could eat,” she said. “Hotcakes are good but they don’t last.”

I didn’t say anything. The mall was already crowded and being around people was making me paranoid. It felt like everyone was staring at the kid with the big breasts. I was probably imagining it, I decided.

“I guess we can take our bags inside the restaurant rather than carry them back to the car and return,” Mom was saying as we headed toward The Catch. “We’ll have less time to wait for a table if we get our names in now.”

Donna leaned her head closer to mine. “Those guys near the clock are checking you out,” she whispered.

I didn’t look. “They are not!”

Donna snorted. “Yes, they are!” She paused a beat. “And the tall one is kind of cute.”

I sort of rolled my eyes and accidentally caught a glimpse of three boys near the map pillar. They were all looking in my direction. I quickly moved to put Mom between me and them.

“Joni,” Mom said. “You’d better get used to it.”

I looked up at her, a little disconcerted that she seemed to be joining Donna in teasing me. “I duwanna!” I protested.

This cracked Donna up but we made it to the doors of the restaurant without the guys coming any closer. I still hadn’t looked directly at them.

Once inside, the warm smells of hot butter and fried fish, seemed to comfort Mom and she smiled at the host. “Three please,” she told him.

Grabbing menus, he started to lead us toward the mezzanine above the pool but did a complete comic double take when he got a good look at me. I was tempted to push him off the stairs into the flamingo-infested turquoise waters.

“They’re plastic,” said Donna at my elbow.

The host did his best to drag his eyes away from my chest but Donna’s comment derailed him again and he almost missed a step. “Bumper Parton?” he said, or something like that.

“I thought they were real the first time I came here,” Donna contributed. “But I figured out they must be plastic.”

Mom pushed past the host, perhaps to escape the inane conversation on the stairs. I followed her, and Donna followed me.

“Hanh?” the poor host managed to inquire.

“The flamingos,” Donna explained, finally. “They’re plastic.”

Mom chose seats for us without waiting for an invitation—not on the pool side but looking out the windows on the topiary in the mall’s sculpture garden. “Isn’t this nice, girls?” She asked after the host had rescued his dignity by depositing the menus on the table between us.

I scowled at the ‘girls’ remark but softened it with a murmured, “thank you,” to the poor host, who promptly escaped with some scarcely intelligible remark. It wasn’t his fault Donna’s sense of humor leaves a lot to be desired.

I had the window seat and Donna had chosen to sit next to me rather than next to Mom on the other side of the table. We stuck our tongues out at each other, just on general sibling priorities, before picking up the menus.

“Girls!” Mom said sharply. “Don’t be disgusting!”

I resisted the temptation to giggle until Donna poked me in the side under the table, then we both made fizzy soda noises for about twenty seconds.

“I wanna Shrimp Three-Ways Plate,” I announced which I had been anticipating since we decided to eat at The Catch.

“You ordered that last time we were here,” Donna accused.

“It was good,” I protested. “Shrimp cocktail, fried shrimp and shrimp -uh- scampi. Good!”

Donna frowned. “I want the seafood platter, but that’s what I got last time.”

“So get it again,” I suggested.

She shook her head. “Scallops are those little round things, aren’t they?” she asked.

I shrugged. Then looked down, glaring at my chest. Shrugging was a disconcerting feeling with my new growth.

“I’m having crab legs,” Mom announced.

“Eww!” Donna commented.

“Don’t say it,” Mom warned.

Last time, Donna had complained that crab legs looked just like giant spider legs, which Mom had not appreciated and had caused Dad to snort into his clam chowder.

Which gave me an idea. “You had scallops before,” I told Donna. “The seafood platter is a cod fillet, scallops and your choice of shrimp. Right?”

“Uh huh,” she said. “So scallops are the round things,” she guessed. “I thought they might be made of potatoes.”

“Yeah, no,” I said. “They’re from a kind of marine worm.” I told her. “They slice the little guy up like salami, then bread and fry the pieces.”

“Mom!” Donna protested.

Our waiter arrived, with a friend. “Hi,” he announced. “I’m Trevor, I’ll be your server today and this is Curtis, he’s a trainee so he’ll just be watching unless I give him the signal to go out for a long one.”

Donna beamed at the two boys who didn’t seemmuch older than us, but neither of them was looking at her. I had caught their attention, and both of them were trying not to stare at my chest.

I stared back at them but they didn’t notice.

“A long what?” Mom asked, distracted from looking at the menu.

“Just an expression,” said Trevor. “Can I get you something to drink to start with?”

“Iced tea,” Mom ordered while Donna and I opted for Italian soda, vanilla for me and orange for my sister.

Trevor and Curtis retreated to get our drinks while we resumed discussing what we might order. “Maybe I’ll get crab, too,” Donna supposed.

“Spider legs,” I whispered to her and she grinned.

“Do you have any idea what scallops really are?” she asked. “Seriously?”

“Nope. Well, you know the emblem on the sign at a Shell gas station?”

“The sea shell?”

“Yeah. I think that’s actually a scallop shell. They’re sort of like oysters or clams.”

“For goodness sake,” said Mom. “I thought they came from something like a sea cucumber.”

“Well,” I said. “They do sort of look like deep-fried pickle slices.”

We were all still giggling about that when the waiters came back.

After serving our drinks, Trevor helped us sort out our menu selections, and I got my Shrimp Three-Ways on record. Curtis had brought a basket of bread and a dish of butter, too.

Donna had Trevor confirm that scallops were like oysters who lift weights, and not some kind of marine worm. I tried to look innocent.

Mom asked about the crab legs, “They’re fresh? Not all mushy?”

“No, ma’am,” said Trevor. “They trotted off the boat from Alaska just yesterday. Very fresh.”

We all laughed. Mom looked at him suspiciously, but ordered her “spider legs” anyway.

The boys had a minor collision while leaving maybe because I had accidentally locked eyes with Curtis and he didn’t see Trevor turn around.

Mom frowned at me when they were gone. “Joni!” she said sharply.

“I didn’t do anything, Mom,” I protested.

“One thing we’re not going to have to get her is flirting lessons,” Donna commented.

I know I turned lobster red. “I wasn’t flirting!”

“You didn’t intend to flirt, maybe,” Mom allowed. “But honey, when you look at a boy and make your eyes go wide like that, you’re flirting.”

I blinked several times at that information. “Really?” I said in a squeaky voice. “But he was staring at my —uh— my chest.”

Mom nodded, “And what you did with your eyes told him that you liked that.”

Donna laughed and I squeaked, “But I didn’t like it!”

Mom shook her head. “Every time you moved, those boys’ eyes bounced like pinballs.”

“Cause you jiggle,” Donna amplified.

“I’m not doing it on purpose,” I said and I could feel my lip quiver.

Mom sighed. “Lots of girls have this problem, honey. You have to learn to cope.”

“I duwanna,” I said. “Stupid boys.”

“Pouting about it is not a good idea,” said Donna. “You’re way too cute when you pout.”

“I am not,” I insisted.

“Yes, you are,” she refuted. “That’s why Rod Pick tries to avoid you.”

“Huh?” Rod had told me that he was uncomfortable when I cried or did other things he thought were unmanly. Turning queer, he called it. I felt my face go red again as Donna continued.

“He told me that you started pouting when you didn’t get your way back in middle school. If you didn’t like something, you pouted about it. He didn’t know whether to cuddle you or slap the shit out of you.”

“Donna!” Mom snapped at her. “A little less vulgarity in public.”

“Sorry,” my sis issued a rare apology.

I sat there with my mouth about half open, gob-smacked at this idea.

Donna snickered. “If you really want to drive a boy crazy,” she suggested, “show the tip of your tongue with that ‘I can’t believe how awesome you are’ expression.”

“Huh?” I closed my mouth and glared at her. “Why would I….”

“You might,” she offered. “If you’re Joni for any length of time, it could be useful.”

Mom put a hand over her eyes and still managed to shake her head. “Lord,” she said almost under her breath, “let this all be temporary and give me my Jonny back. Raising two teenage daughters at once is too much!”

Donna tried to suppress a snicker and mostly succeeded.

I didn’t like the idea of causing Mom any grief, but jeez! This whole thing was a lot more problem for me than for her!

“You’re still pouting,” said Donna. “And it doesn’t really work on other girls, like Mom and me.”

— —

“Why not?” I pouted, which got a roll the eyes from Mom and a giggle from Donna.

“Cute,” she added. “Just don’t waste your ammo on the wrong targets.”

I glanced down then wiggled a bit in the seat. Somewhere across the mezzanine, someone coughed like they were choking. I glanced that direction but didn’t see anyone looking toward me. Donna covered her eyes.

Mom shook her head. “You know what you’re doing all the time, don’t you?”

“Not really,” I said, blushing.

“It’s kind of like giving Linda a pair of drumsticks,” said Donna. She glanced sideways at me and added, “A big pair of drumsticks.”

The salads that came with our orders arrived about then and saved Donna from a devastating glare. We got busy eating for a bit. I don’t know why I felt so hungry, though I could think of two possible reasons.

At one point, Donna commented, “Why is blue cheese dressing you get in a restaurant so much better than the stuff that comes in a bottle?”

Mom had an answer. “The good places make it themselves, sometimes every day fresh. I’ve made it at home myself a few times, and it’s even better than most restaurants.”

I took notice of that idea. “What goes into it?” I asked.

“There are different recipes,” said Mom. “I used Gorgonzola cheese, a bit of olive oil, some white wine vinegar, milk, dill, basil, and garlic.” She sipped some tea, remembering. “You have to let it sit for several hours after making it to let the flavors marry.”

“It sounds neat to me!” I mentioned. “Can I try making some?”

“Little Suzy Homemaker,” Donna teased me.

But Mom said, “Sure. I’ll make sure we have the stuff and find my recipe.”

“Too much work,” commented Donna. “You have to like doing things the hard way to go to that much trouble.” She grinned. “Next you’ll be wanting to make your own bras.”

“Well, you always want to be the center of attention,” she accused.

“You know, those capris look good on you, Joni,” Donna mentioned as we left the restaurant after avoiding ordering cheesecake for dessert.

“Hmm,” I muttered, waiting for the zing.

But Mom interrupted before Donna got a charge up for a personal lightning bolt. “They really do, honey,” Mom agreed. “And I can’t believe how we missed seeing your shape for months, I guess,” she shook her head.

“Well, I…I grew some -uh- back there too, you know, last night.” I cringed to say it, but it seemed to be true. “It’s like sitting on a cushion now.”

Donna made a noise.

Mom looked at my ass. How embarrassing could this get? “Not that much, I don’t think.”

“And gruesome isn’t the right word,” said Donna. She grinned, and I glared at her for the wordplay, but she continued. “No, really, Joni, you can stun them with your frontage and then turn around and finish them off.”

“Mo-om,” I protested, but she just rolled her eyes.

“Shake it but don’t break it,” Donna said.

“What does that mean?” I grumbled. “I don’t want people looking at my backside, especially not boys.”

“Not even cute boys like those?” She gestured by nodding her head toward three older boys near the sporting goods store.

Like a goof, I looked in that direction, and all three boys’ faces lit up with smiles. I think I smiled back, but I don’t know why!

“Mo-om!” Donna whined. “Joni is flirting with all the cutest boys!” She was faking the whine, but it sounded authentic.

“Joni! Donna!” said Mom. “Donna! Joni!” Mom glared at both of us.

Normally, getting Mom confused about which of us needed scolding would cause Donna and I to mark one up for teamwork, but I was in no mood for that. And those boys were still staring at me. I tried squinting at them to signal disinterest. If Donna’s idea that widening your eyes was flirting, then the reverse should work.

But that only made them grin instead of smile at me!

“Jeez! Joni, stop making cute faces at those guys, or one of them is likely to come over and ask you out. Do you want a date for Saturday night?” Donna delivered another zing.

“No dating as singles until you’re sixteen, Joni,” Mom warned. “Same rule as for Donna.”

“Mo-om!” I squeaked, in fear, I think. “I don’t want to date guys!”

“Then stop flirting with them!” Mom snapped at me.

“She can’t help it,” Donna offered in my defense, the rat. “She’s just a natural flirt.”

“I am not!”

“Then stop working at it!” Donna glared as if she meant it now. “You’ll give the Edwards sisters a name as sluts.”

“We’re not sisters!” I tried to point out but moving my hands up suddenly in emphasis had unforeseen consequences.

“Oh yeah?” she retorted. “About half my friends can’t tell us apart, even when you dress as a boy!” She looked at my still-jiggling chest. “I guess they won’t have as much trouble now! Maybe they’ll think you’re me and I’m you if I wore jeans and one of your stupid polos!”

I stood up straight and pushed my chest out at her. “Nope!” I said.

“We are so buying you a dress and getting you to wear it to school on Monday,” she said with an evil look.

“Girls!” Mom interrupted. “No fighting in public!”

Donna and I both looked at her as innocently as we could manage.

Mom suppressed a smile. She was onto our act this time but still gave us an eye roll and a glare. “And Donna, we are not going to buy Joni a dress unless she wants one to wear one.”

“She can borrow one of mine,” Donna said quickly. Then to me, “You’d look super-cute in my halter-style A-line, and you wouldn’t have to show off your cleavage.”

“Fat chance!” I snapped back.

“It’s almost too short for me now,” she added. “But it ought to be just about right on you.”

“Is that the one with the blue floral print and the ombré background?” Mom asked. “But you loved that when you wore it at Thanksgiving services!”

“Mom, it hits me above mid-thigh now!”

I remembered the dress they were talking about now, and I know I turned bright red. “You’re not getting me to wear it, and you know that,” I warned her.

“She’s right, though. You would look cute, and being a bit shorter, you wouldn’t have as much problem with the hemline.”

“Mo-om! I’m not going to wear a dress to school!”

“Well, I don’t think Donna can wear it to church anymore,” Mom mused. “So I think it belongs to you now. And you will need something to wear tomorrow.”

Tomorrow? Church? In a dress? I think I turned white this time. Wait! What happened here? I’m being judoed into agreeing to wear a dress to church?

Mom looked stern. “Honey, Joni, you aren’t going to try to dress like a boy at church. It just wouldn’t work.” She glanced at the evidence of why it would be a certain fail. “If you go as Joni, no one is likely to recognize you.”

“We can say you’re a visiting relative,“ Donna suggested. “If anyone asks.”

“I’ll just stay home,” I stalled.

“But that’s against house rules, no staying home from church unless you’re really sick!” Donna pointed out.

“I’m sure I’m going to be sick tomorrow,” I said firmly. But I remembered another house rule, that the girls in the family wore dresses to church unless there was like a barbecue afterward. Which there wasn’t going to be. And if I wasn’t going as a boy….

Maybe I could hold my breath and turn blue to complete a patriotic triple.

“We aren’t finished shopping,” Mom decided. “Joni, we need another pair of slacks or capris for you, at least, maybe some shoes if you’re going to church, and a backup dress if the blue ombré won’t work.”

“Uh—,” I blinked, not sure if maybe I were going to cry. Would that help? Probably not, but my emotions were like the kids in Linda’s daycare, all over the room and screaming at me. The idea of not buying me a dress unless I wanted one was gone!

“We should get your hair done, too,” Donna added to the mix. “And definitely some shoes. With a bit of a heel so you won’t look like a shrimp carrying two balloons.”

I so wanted to smack her for that one.

“I duwanna get my hair done,” I said when we stopped in front of the beauty salon. I knew I was now trying to make a fighting retreat, but I had to try!

“Oh, you big baby!” countered Donna. “Getting your hair cut doesn’t hurt!”

I glared at her. We had dealt with this when we took Linda to get her first haircut a few years before. Linda was worried about us cutting off part of her head.

“I don’t need a haircut,” I continued protesting. “I had one two months ago.” Mom and Donna looked at me with critical eyes.

“Here’s the thing,” Mom said. “You’ve got Jonny’s haircut, which is kind of androgynous.”

“Yeah,” Donna agreed.

“Anthropenous? Like an ape?” I glared at Donna on general principles.

“Androgynous,” Mom explained. “Not really a boy’s cut or a girl’s cut.”

I must have been pouting because Donna pooched out her lips and crossed her eyes. “I like my hair like this,” I insisted, but I knew I was losing the battle.

“But you don’t want anyone to think you’re Jonny, right?”

I shrugged…. I’ve got to remember to stop doing that.

“Put your glasses on,” Mom said. “The stylist will want to see your face with your glasses as well as without.”

“Huh?” I said, confused because my glasses are usually in my shirt pocket if I’m not wearing them, but I didn’t have a shirt pocket anymore.

But Mom was holding them out to me. She had had them in her purse. I put them on; I can navigate and function fine without them, but if I have to do much reading, they keep me from squinting.

Somehow, we were in the shop, and Mom asked if they could fit me in. It didn’t sound good. Donna handed me a magazine about hairstyles.

Mom came back to tell us to sit down, it would just be twenty minutes, and they could deal with my hair. I sat with the magazine and tried not to pout.

Turned out, it wasn’t a magazine but instead a sort of catalog of styles. Donna sat beside me and kept bumping my elbow to get me to turn the page. “It’s all longer styles in front, turn to the middle, and we’ll go from there.”

“I duwanna,” I said, but I did anyway. It was easier than trying to deal with Donna’s aggression.

We looked at several pages, and Donna suddenly reached out and stabbed one image. “Like that,” she said. “That would look super cute on you!”

I protested. “She’s a brunette! Black hair! I’m a blonde!”

“Not the color, you dummy, the style. It’s a kind of a pixie cut.”

“Oh. I’m short enough without making people think of pixies. And that is really short hair. Uh—it looks more like a boy’s haircut.”

Donna giggled right in my ear. “Ow! Jeez!”

“Are you worried about that? Seriously?”

“I’m worried you’re going to damage my hearing!” I rubbed the abused ear. “I already have hair down over my ears, but I should have earplugs!”

“Sorry about that,” she lied. “But you don’t want your hair any shorter?”

“Think about it,” I said. “If we should solve my problem, then I can get a real short cut later. If we went with this pixie stuff, I’d have to shave my head.”

“Hmm,” she said. “You’d probably look cute with a shaved head.”

“I would not!”

“Like one of those adorable cancer kids. Turn the page.”

I opened and closed my mouth a couple of times, unsure of a comeback to the cancer kid remark. Finally, I just turned the page, and she stabbed another picture. “How about this? Add some curliness and body?”

I stared at the pic she was indicating. “Kinda poofy? Sort of like yours? Wouldn’t we look even more like twins then?”

She made a face. “If that gets too annoying, I’ll get the pixie cut.”

We both giggled. Well, it was funny, the way she said it.

“We could get it colored?” she suggested.

“Yours?” I asked.

“No, yours! Red like Mom had hers when Linda was born. Or strawberry blonde like Aunt Heidi.”

“Wouldn’t that break up the set? Whole family of blondes and one redhead?”

“Well, you always want to be the center of attention,” she accused.

“Me!” I was really startled. “No, no, no! Maybe we can dye my hair brown?”

Mom put the kibosh on that. “No brown, red if you want. Being a redhead is fun. But when I dyed my hair brown once, people kept asking if I were ill.” She made an even worse face than Donna had.

More giggles. I sound like Linda when I giggle. I have to watch that.

“You sure you don’t have a boyfriend?” she asked.

I sat silently for a bit, thinking about everything that had happened. Less than 24 hours before I had come home from school, planning to go out later to my babysitting job.

Everything had changed. Especially, me. I wasn’t even using the same name anymore. I glanced down. They were still there, the evidence of my “growth spurt.” I sighed. Was there even a chance that I could go back to being Jonny?

Probably not without surgery. And there was the possibility that maybe I’ve been a girl all along, and just didn’t know it because of bad medical advice when I was a baby.

I squirmed a bit, thinking of that. I certainly hadn’t been very successful at being a typical boy. And I’d lost at least one friend because of it. Rod Pick had said some hurtful things, but he claimed to be trying to be honest. He just didn’t want me to embarrass him with my girlish squeals and giggles.

I felt my face go red. How could I have been so oblivious to how I acted? Had all those kids, mostly boys, going back to early grade school been right when they called me names?

I didn’t want to start crying again, so I stood up.

Mom and Donna were discussing some look for me they had found in a magazine, a look Donna described as ‘cute’, and Mom thought it ‘sweet.’ I had to get away from them or have a meltdown. I started toward the door.

Mom immediately asked where I was going. Since I didn’t have an answer, I didn’t try to give one.

“They’re going to call you in just a few more minutes, Joni. You can’t leave now,” Donna said, speaking as the voice of reason.

I stopped. “Okay,” I said. “Then you two have to leave. I need to be able to think.”

Donna stared at me, then stood and tugged on Mom’s hand. “C’mon,” she told our mother. “She’s serious. If there were a bowl of cereal nearby, we’d both be in trouble.”

I sighed. “You dump one bowl of soggy Cheerios on someone’s head when you’re eight, and it goes on your permanent record,” I complained.

But Mom stood, gave me a smile and a pat on the arm and followed my sister out.

* * *

One of the salon workers called out, “Joni?” and I raised my hand before starting toward the chair she indicated.

“I’m Buffy,” she announced as I turned to sit down.

“Buffy?” I asked, not sure I had heard right. It sounded like a name out of a sitcom.

“Yup,” she agreed, though I hoped she hadn’t heard my internal comment. “It’s a nickname for Elizabeth.”

I couldn’t resist. “What? Betsy wasn’t cute enough?” I winced, wishing I could take that back.

She waved a hand, smiling. “I do have scissors,” she pointed at the chair with them.

I giggled as meekly as I could and climbed into the elevated seat.

“You’re supposed to be the tomboy?” she asked, proving that Mom had spoken with her, and that I didn’t have a monopoly on risking offense.

“I’ve had to give that up,” I admitted, with a glance at my chest.

She nodded. “So, no crew cut?”

I giggled again, wondering if it sounded as silly to her as it did to me. “Can you just fix it, so no one recognizes me?”

That got a real laugh out of Buffy. “I doubt it. You’re sort of—distinctive.” And she glanced at my chest, too.

“Umph,” I said, just for the sake of making a noise. “Did you see my sister?” I asked.

“Blonde girl, about your height? Yeah,” she pointed at where we had been sitting. “You two look a lot alike, almost twins.” Another glance at my chest.

“I’m sort of a set of twins, all by myself,” I said, ruefully.

Buffy snorted. She moved the chair around to get a look at my head from different angles. “So what are you thinking?”

“I think I need my own look, something to separate us besides my recent growth spurt,” I suggested. “We’re not actually twins, but there’s less than two years between us. And I’m older, even though she’s taller.”

She nodded, looking thoughtful. “I’m getting some ideas. You both have this nearly-white hair. It’s not platinum because it has some gold in there. But yours, at least, is very fine and mostly straight.” She nodded again, agreeing with her own opinion apparently.

“Could you dye it, maybe red? I have a red-haired aunt, and she’s got the same coloring as me other than her hair.”

She shook her head. “You need some shape, some volume; I’m thinking a body wave, and your hair is so fine we really can’t perm and dye it at the same time, unless you want to end up looking like a cancer patient.” She grinned. “You’d be cute, but I think we want to avoid that.”

“Argh,” I grumbled. Donna had made a similar comment.

“Not to worry,” Buffy assured me. “We can do a color-rinse instead of permanent dye; it will wash out over a half-dozen shampoos unless you renew it, but I can give you the product to maintain the color until you come back.”

“That, that, that sounds good. Perfect, even,” I looked up at her and smiled.

She laughed. “Whoa! Killer smile,” she said. “What color red are we talking?”

I put a hand up to my hair, thinking. “Aunt Hilda calls her hair color strawberry, but it is really more of a peachy sort of pink, golden, uh….”

Buffy produced a color chart from somewhere and held it out to me. I pointed at the one I thought looked most like Aunt Hildy’s color, labeled Dawn Red. It wasn’t quite the same, but close.

Buffy nodded again. “I’ve got that in a rinse and in a stable dye for when your hair recovers from the permanent. I’m thinking soft, open curls around your face, not the kind of piled-up wavy stuff your sister had.” She showed me a sketch, not a photo, of what she meant.

It looked good, but this was my head, and I would end up wearing that hairstyle for weeks, if not months. “Uh…” I said. Make a decision, I told myself. If it turns out terrible, I can shave my head and get on a telethon somewhere. Please donate to help this poor girl buy a wig. Did I just refer to myself mentally as a girl? “Yes?” I offered.

She laughed. “I guarantee that your tomboy days are going to be behind you.”

“That part is not the big problem,” I said, pretending to look over my shoulder, and she laughed again.

Buffy worked quickly, trimming my hair, then putting it in rollers. The perm solution stank like someone burning skunks, but at least she had warned me about it. She talked a lot actually, and eventually, I sort of tuned most of it out. I remember parts of her chatter though.

“I’m doing a soft perm here and it will be even softer when I do the color rinse afterward,” she explained. I didn’t nod; I’d been warned about that already, so I just grunted.

“Do you have a boyfriend?” she asked at one point.

“Oh, God,” I said. “I’m only fifteen.”

She laughed at that, but now she had me worried. If I went back to school looking like I did now, even with red hair, people recognizing me would not be the major problem. I’d already had a sample of how much male attention I attracted just walking around the mall. It would be twenty times worse than the stuff Rod had complained about, what he called me “acting like a girl.”

Looking at me, no one was likely to doubt I was a girl. That’s why I was hoping I could pass as someone else, my own cousin perhaps. Aunt Hildy’s daughter? Except she went by Heidi now, at least in her job selling real estate. Maybe I could move up to Orange County and live with her.

There was probably something wrong with that idea, but I needed to talk to my aunt about it. Unable to do so, I sort of constructed a scenario in my head where I went to OC and started school there as a girl. Maybe that was the best solution. According to Mom and Dad, the doctors may have made a mistake when I was born, and I really was a girl.

I sighed, and Buffy commented on that. “You sure you don’t have a boyfriend? That sounded like a romantic problem sigh.”

I sighed again. “I’ve spent at least twelve years or more telling people I’m a boy. The last thing I want to do is date one.”

She laughed.

* *

I wasn’t sure of how the process worked, but somehow she used the color rinse on my hair before the perm was finished and brushed out. I ended up with a head full of soft red curls. But it wasn’t all one color; there were pinks and oranges and dark reds that were almost maroon.

I sat there staring at my reflection. On the whole, it was much redder than Aunt Hilda’s hair and more interesting.

“Do you like it?” Buffy asked.

“I think so,” I said. “But it kind of looks like my head caught fire.”

“That might be too exciting a description,” she said, smiling.

My reflection turned this way and that, but I couldn’t detect any sign of a boy named Jonny. Just a flame-haired girl who was going to get a lot of attention and not just for her chest. “Hoo boy,” I breathed. I wasn’t going to get recognized easily but was this really what I wanted?

I wondered what Mom and Donna were going to say?

* *

“Joni!” Donna squealed when she saw me. “Look at you!”

I probably turned the new color of my hair. “Don’t!” I protested. They showed up at the salon just as I ventured out into the corridor to go looking for them.

Mom was smiling at me. “That is an amazing dye job! It looks like you were born with red hair. Even more than Pinkie’s does!”

“Who?” I asked, confused.

“Pinkie is what your grandfather called Hildy when we were growing up,” Mom explained.

“No wonder she goes by Heidi now,” Donna said, laughing. “We’ll have to pick a new nickname for you, Joni.”

“Don’t you dare!” I warned her. Her last nickname for me had been Sluggy when she discovered she could outrun me back in sixth grade. She’s always been more athletic and is the real tomboy in the family.

We headed off toward Nordstroms as if by previous agreement.

“It really does look nice.” Mom was saying as we passed through the food court.

“And not at all like your head caught fire,” Donna put in. Which got an accidental giggle from Mom and a glare from me, even though I had already thought the same thing.

A group of three boys waiting in line at the taco stand all turned to look at us as we passed. I frowned at them and they all grinned back. What the heck?

We reached the door of Nordstrom’s just as Donna said, “I know, we can call you Ember!”

“Huh? Why?” was the most intelligent question that occurred to me.

“Because you’re obviously hot stuff, your head is on fire,” she explained.

“You do need something to wear to church tomorrow,” she insisted.

We entered Nordstroms by the wide doors on the aisle between the Women’s section and the Misses’. Wide counters for perfumes, cosmetics and jewelry filled the center of the aisle. It was nothing less than a shopping Mecca of femininity.

I must have groaned because Mom told me, “No sound effects.” I settled for making a face and Donna laughed.

“What do you need most, honey?” Mom asked, looking around.

“A smoke grenade?” I suggested, but she ignored that.

“You do need something to wear to church tomorrow,” she insisted.

“I’ve got an idea,” Donna put in, trying to steer me into the Misses section by tugging on my arm.

“Not a dress,” I objected.

“Okay,” she agreed, making me instantly suspicious. “I saw something over here that might be more to your liking.”

“Huh?” I was distracted by the colors and sheer feminine vibes of all the clothes. “What’s the difference between Misses’ and Women’s?” I asked.

Mom had followed us and spoke up. “Women’s are sized differently, more room for hips, and the styles are different.”

“Yeah,” Donna agreed. “Misses are intended for younger, more fashionable women.”

“I don’t know about that,” Mom mused. “But there are also, Juniors, Petites, and Plus sizes.”

“And Girl’s sizes and Half sizes. But none of those are appropriate for you, Joni.”

“Then why make my head hurt telling me about them! You’re saying there are, like, eight different kinds of sizes for w-women?” I frowned. “Help!”

“Don’t worry about it,” Donna assured me. “We’ll help you find something that fits.”

“I’m afraid…” I began, but they both ignored me. Donna made a beeline toward her destination, towing me behind her while Mom made a move on something that had caught her eye on another aisle. A glance in that direction looked alarmingly frilly.

But Donna had arrived. “Here you go; you’re lucky they have it in blue,” she said pushing a garment hanger into my hands. “A jumper skort in a dressy but casual style.”

I handled it like I would a snake of unknown origin. “A what?” I asked.

Donna explained. “A jumper is an all-in-one that includes a top and a bottom in one piece, and a skort is a pair of shorts that are loose enough to resemble a skirt.”

“You’re just making up words now,” I accused.

“No, I’m…” She held the disputed piece of clothing up to her own body. “See? The top is styled like a shirt, and the bottom reaches almost to the knees but is two separate legs.”

“It looks like a skirt,” I complained.

“But it isn’t; it’s a skort. A jumper skort since it includes a top.” She pushed one of the short sleeves into my hand. “Feel,” she commanded. “It’s made of really soft cotton that’s just a little bit stretchy.” She nodded forcefully. “For your top bits. And since it has a shirt front, you can decide for yourself how many buttons to leave undone!”

“H-how?” I began. “I can’t see how you would even get it on!”

“Oh, that’s easy,” said Donna. “I’ll show you in the dressing room.” She began tugging on my arm again.

At that moment, Mom showed up holding what was quite obviously a dress with lace at top and bottom. “Oh, Joni! You just have to try this on. It would look so darling on you!”

At least it wasn’t pink. Maybe choosing to go with red hair had some unexpected benefits, since even I knew that redheads don’t wear pink!

But now they were both pushing me toward the dressing room. I looked around for a shop clerk to appeal to for help, but there was no salesperson in sight. “I’m doomed,” I whispered.

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic!” Mom snorted. “It’s not going to kill you to try on clothes.”

“It will if I stop breathing from fright!”

*

I didn’t expect to have to fight to keep them out of the changing room, but they both insisted on going in with me! “No!” I told them.

“But we want to see you in the clothes and make sure you actually try them on. And you might need help!” said Donna.

“If I need help, I’ll holler,” I told her. “But you guys have to back off a little, or I will just melt into a puddle of hysterics.”

“Uh,” said Mom. “I think she means that.” She was looking me right in the eye. “Sorry, hon. C’mon Donna, give Joni some breathing room.” Then to me again. “We’ll wait out here.”

“But you have to come out and show us how each thing looks! Promise?”

“Okay, okay. But just because you guys think something looks good, don’t expect me to wear it outside the store!” I sort of won that one and closed the door to the changing stall behind them. There was a little knob to lock the door from the inside, but the outer knob had a slot so anything stiff could work as a key. Still, it was something.

I decided to tackle the thing they called a jumper skort first. Who comes up with the names for these things? It was supposed to be some sort of pants, but it did look like a skirt with a sort of overall upper part attached. How did you even put it on? I decided to undo the zipper down the front of the upper part and got started.

I lay the unzipped jumper on the bench, took off the capris I had been wearing and folded them over a hangar, then tried to step into the jumper thing, pulling it up to where I could slip my arms into the sleeves, then zip it up. No go; this was not going to fit over the prominent parts of my new shape. The lower half fit fine, but when I tried to zip it up, it stopped underneath my...shelf. “Crap,” I muttered. Also, I had it on over my polo which had bunched up around the sleeves. Did I need some other sort of undershirt?

I pulled the jumper back off and looked for a size tag and found it: size 0-2, Extra-small. Was Donna trying to be funny?

“This won’t fit!” I call out, knowing Mom and Donna are just outside the door.

“Which one?” Mom asked.

“The jumper thing, it won’t zip up. It’s too small!” I called back. “And do I need, I dunno, an undershirt with this stuff?”

“Just your bra,” Mom answered. “You do still have your bra on, don’t you?”

“Yes!” I answered. I threw the jumper over the door, which didn’t go all the way to the top or bottom of the doorway. “I think I need, uh, maybe two sizes bigger?”

“Two sizes bigger!” Donna commented while pulling the skort over out of sight. “How did it fit in the waist and hips?”

“I dunno,” I said, maybe grumpily. “All right, I guess, kinda loose?”

I heard Donna move away, muttering, “I can’t imagine she’s going to need a Large!”

“Have you tried on the dress I picked out yet, honey?” Mom asked through the door.

“Do I have to?” I whined.

“Yes,” Mom sounded firm. “You will need something for church tomorrow, and I think it’ll look lovely on you.”

Urk. Lovely? I looked at the garment again. It was blue, a lighter shade on the green end, and it was trimmed with lace or something at the neck, sleeves and along the bottom. The lace was sort of ruffled, so it stood out.

It was the damnedest, girliest, frou-frou thing! I’d never seen Mom or Donna in anything half as silly! “Mom!” I protested! How had I not looked at this before taking it into the changing room?

“It won’t kill you to try it on for me, honey,” Mom insisted.

“How can you be so sure?” I said, hearing my voice squeak and hating that, too. It suddenly occurred to me that my voice was never going to deepen so that I sounded like my dad, like a man. I realized that I no longer believed that the doctors would find a solution to my problem.

It felt like I was going to be trapped wearing dresses like this for the rest of my life.

*

I stood there trying to swallow my panic.

I wasn’t going to be able to get out of this. I might as well be a girl if I were going to look like one and have to dress like one. I looked down at myself again. No one was going to believe I was a boy, anyway.

I didn’t start crying, though it was a near thing. I knew if I started, I wouldn’t be able to stop until I had cried myself out.

“Joni?” Mom’s voice came from outside the changing booth. “Are you okay, honey?”

I sighed. “I guess so,” I said. I sounded exhausted, even to myself.

“Honey?” Mom sounded unsure. “I guess we really don’t have to do this? I mean, not right now?”

I blinked. Mom didn’t usually back down from something like this. I blinked again, my eyes burning. Was I going to cry now?

Donna’s voice came through from the other side of the door. “Oh, Joni, I didn’t realize I had given you an extra-small! It was the only one they had in blue. But I brought you a small, now and a medium, both in green!”

“Oh!” So she hadn’t been trying to be funny! “Uh?”

“I’ll hang them over the door,” Donna offered. “That okay?”

“Sure,” I managed. “I guess?”

Donna put two of the jumper skorts over the door with their hangers holding them there. “Thanks….” Why did I say that?

“Have you tried Mom’s pick out yet?” Donna wanted to know.

“No,” I admitted.

“Well, I’d like to see you in it, too,” she said. “I think you’d look really good. I mean….” She trailed off. “You know, pretty? You’d look beautiful in something that suited you, like I think that dress would. Huh, Mom?”

Mom agreed. “That’s why I picked that one,” she said. “You would make a lot of other girls jealous, I’m sure.”

I looked at the dress being discussed again. I frowned. “Is that the right attitude to go to church with?” I pointed out.

They both giggled.

I glared at her, “It’s the only thing we got that has pockets!”

I took the blue dress down from the hanger and looked it over more closely. “How do I even put this on?” I asked.

“Undo the snap at the neck in the back and unzip it,” Mom suggested. “Then just pull it over your head like a t-shirt. Get it settled around your waist and come out here. We’ll zip you up.”

“Yeah!” Donna agreed.

I puffed out a sigh. An enthusiastic Donna was not less annoying than a sarcastic one. But I followed instructions. The dress was less frou-frou than I had feared, but it was still a bit creepy to see myself in the mirror as I pulled it down. I wiggled a bit, testing the fit.

My bra—yes, I was still wearing a bra—managed to keep my unwanted accessories from wobbling too much. They did move around a bit, but the cut of the dress kind of helped keep them where they should be, except that they shouldn’t be on my chest at all.

I tugged and pulled the fabric to try to get comfortable, but the main problem was that in the mirror, I saw a busty, redhead girl wearing a dress. I seemed to have disappeared. Maybe it was true. No one would recognize me. Not even me.

The lace at the neck kept me from showing a lot of skin, which seemed like a good idea for a church dress, despite Mom and Donna’s implications that I was supposed to—I dunno?—show off to score points?

I opened the door of the changing stall and stepped out. “Ooo!” Donna squealed.

Mom smiled and motioned me to turn around so she could do up the zipper and the snap. “You look very nice, dear,” she murmured.

“I feel like a goon,” I protested.

“You look sweet,” Donna contributed, smiling in a non-ironic way.

I made a face, and they laughed. The lace at the bottom of the dress fell just below my knees and that felt extremely weird. The sleeves didn’t reach my wrists but didn’t leave my forearms bare, either. It was all strange. The red-headed girl in the mirror looked bemused, perhaps a bit puzzled by Mom and Donna’s enthusiasm for the clothing.

“You look lovely,” Mom told me, and Donna nodded.

“Okay, I guess,” I murmured, not convinced.

“Do you like it?” Donna asked.

I shrugged, (and immediately reminded myself not to do that). “At least it’s blue, not peach or ‘fuchya,’ or whatever.” I was trying to joke.

“Okay,” Mom responded. “We’ve seen how it looks on you, you can take it off, and find out which of the skorts will fit. That’s a medium, so try the larger of the two.”

“Uh?” I tried to stall, but Mom turned me around, undid the snap and zipper and pushed me back into the stall. She also took two dresses off a rack in the hall and pushed them into my arms. “Then you can try these two on.”

“What?” I squeaked. “I’m not—it isn’t? Why?”

“Well, you can’t just buy the first thing that fits and looks good, you know,” she offered as explanation, and Donna was agreeing—with her arms full of another pair of more casual-looking dresses!

“For gosh sakes! Why not?” I protested.

“Sweet!?” I protested, but that only made them giggle.

Mom suggested “Adorable!” as an alternate description, so I just went back into the booth to take the lovely, sweet, adorable garment off. Easier said than done, I’d forgotten the hook-thing at the back of the neck and managed to unzip the top of the dress before figuring out something was wrong.

“You need help?” Donna offered from the hall.

“No!” Last thing I needed just then was my sister to deal with in close quarters. “Stay out!” I warned her.

“Well, hurry up!” she urged. “We have these other dresses for you to try on, too!”

I finally got the blue dress off and hung up and just stood for a moment, leaning back against the padded wall of the changing booth. A glance down reminded me why I wasn’t leaning with my forehead against the wall, a pose I’d been using for years when dealing with Donna’s antics.

I sighed. I could hear them babbling on the other side of the door. “This navy skirt suit would make a good choice for going to school! This yellow sundress with the big pink and green flowers would really attract the attention of the boys! And how about this floofy orange top? It’s almost the color of her hair!”

I wasn’t at all sure I would even be going back to school. Maybe after I joined the foreign legion. And why would I want to attract the attention of boys?!

I briefly considered just running out the door, perhaps screaming as I went. The picture in my mind was funny enough to distract me from my angst, if I’m using the right word. It didn’t look as if I were going to be able to escape this ordeal, and they really were just trying to help me.

I took down what looked like the larger of the two green jumpers and checked the label to be sure. Medium. Maybe it would fit. I followed the prescribed method of putting the thing on, undoing the zipper front and stepping into the wide pants leg part, then pulling it up and zipping the front.

Wonder of wonders, it seemed to fit. It didn’t look too bad, other than being girl’s clothes. The cut was kind of … wait a minute. I turned from side to side, looking at various angles. Hmm. It fit trimly in the waist and flared out over hips I didn’t really have. The zipper stayed where I put it and I could control how much skin I showed. With not a little reluctance, I decided that this would work.

It was definitely girl, but not super girly. I posed a bit in the mirror, trying a big smile on. OH SHIT! I closed my eyes and checked it out again. Yes, the jumper skort made me look cute!

“Joni!” Donna called through the door. “Have you got the jumper skort on? Can I see?”

“I suppose,” I began but she had already opened the door and come into the booth a couple of steps, Mom right behind her. “Oh, Joni! That is just so cute on you!”

“Argh!” I mentioned. “Cute is a four-letter word, you know!”

I managed to get out of there with only three new dresses and two of the skort jumpers. Oh, and two skirts to go with the tops we’d gotten earlier. “But I already have slacks to go with those,” I protested.

“Sometimes,” Donna explained, “you just really need a skirt.”

I rolled my eyes, and Mom giggled.

“You seem to be taking this better now,” she added.

“Yeah, well,” I admitted. “I guess so.”

“You did pick out your own sundress,” she pointed out as we left Nordstroms.

“Yeah, well,” I said, wavering a bit. “You guys are way too fond of pink.” For some reason, I felt the need to fluff my newly red hair.

“And you decided on the denim jumper,” Donna commented, making a face.

I glared at her, “It’s the only thing we got that has pockets!” For some reason, that made them both laugh like loons.

We got back out into the mall proper, and I was surprised to see that the place was still full of shoppers. People rushed this way and that, with a few lingering near the entrance to the food court. I thought we had been trapped in the bowels of the changing rooms for long enough that most people would have gone home, and so could I. But no!

“Time to find you some shoes,” Mom announced.

“I have shoes,” I said, wiggling my feet to demonstrate. My sneakers were practically new, classic Vans in a dark gray. I had an old pair that still fit that were almost identical except for being tan.

“You can’t wear sneakers to church,” Mom pointed out. “Especially not with that nice dress.”

It was a prelude to madness. I tried distraction. “Nordstrom’s has a shoe department,” I pointed out. “We could have shipped for shoes without leaving the store.” The big department store now felt like a refuge for avoiding being dragged through several shops looking for the perfect sandal, brogan, or clog.

Donna huffed. “Nordstroms shoes are mostly old lady styles.” A tactical error on her part since Mom bought shoes there only last month.

Mom spared her only a short glare before marshaling us troops for her campaign. We’d scouted the whole mall earlier and found eleven shoe stores, only two of which were not devoted to fashionable shoes for women and girls.

“We saw some cute shoes earlier, Joni, didn’t we,” Mom suggested, but I didn’t rise to that bait.

“Mphm,” I grunted, which again caused Donna to giggle. We both knew I was doomed.

“You’re going to need a purse, too,” Donna suggested, just to twist the knife.

* * *

Looking at shoes, trying them on, and arguing about which ones were acceptable took the rest of the afternoon and into the dinner hour.

I put my foot down, so to speak, on the idea of heels, or who knows what insanity might have happened, probably at least two or three more pairs. As it was, we, or rather I, ended up with five new pairs of shoes. Including a pair of red-gold Vans I was now wearing almost identical to the gray ones I had had on, except for a sort of fake bow at the top of the vamp. (If you don’t know what part of a shoe the vamp is, neither did I until the boy who had sold us the sneakers told me.)

I also collected a lot of polite, even genteel, compliments on the shape of my feet, the delicacy of my ankles, and the slenderness of my calves. Shoe salesmen seem to all be a bit kinky about lower extremities.

The other pairs of shoes were two of what were called simply flats, one pair of sandals and another called kitten heels. They snuck that last pair in after my prohibition on any heels at all because I really didn’t notice. The lift on the embarrassingly cutely named shoes was barely more than an inch, and actually, I suppose I could use all the help I could get in the height department.

“After all,” Donna insisted when I protested the switcheroo, “you have to have a nice pair just for wearing on a date.”

And that set off an even more embarrassing argument on the way back to the car.

“Pft! No one is going to believe you used to be a boy!”

As eldest, I usually got to sit up front with the driver when I wanted to, and right now, I did because of the psychological edge it gave me in confidence. Enough confidence to say something like, “You know I’m never going on any dates,” and hope it would stick.

But Donna wouldn’t let it alone.

“What never?” she asked on a rising note from the seat directly behind me.

Oh, God. I couldn’t resist. “No, never!” I countered.

“What never!?” Mom came in on soprano, with a bit of a giggle from behind the steering wheel.

“I won’t say it,” I said, backing out.

So they both did. “Well, hardly ever!”

Of course, we all three had to giggle. G&S is just too silly.

“You’re going to get asked for dates!” Donna pointed out.

I glanced down at myself. Yeah, I probably will. I was wearing the denim skort set, and while it had a higher neckline than some of the other things I had acquired, there was no hiding my new shape. “I’ll just ignore them. It would be too risky. They might recognize me.”

Donna pooh-poohed that. “Pft! No one is going to believe you used to be a boy!”

“I’m still a boy!” I protested.

“There’s some question if you ever were a boy,” she pointed out.

I sighed. My medical situation would probably not be sorted out soon. It really looked like I would have to go to school Monday as Joni. We’d worked out a sort of half-baked explanation that I would pose as Aunt Heidi’s daughter, my own cousin, while attending until something got worked out with the doctors. But it already didn’t look good, since a big dose of testosterone had just made my chest grow two cup sizes overnight.

Mom negotiated the complicated side roads to get out of the parking lot around Fashion Valley and back onto the freeway heading east. She’d been concentrating on that task and ignoring the byplay between Donna and me until she actually made it into the traffic stream before commenting, “Your father should be home by now, maybe he has some news from trying to find a new doctor for you, Joni.”

“Eep!” I said. If Dad was home, he’d see me wearing the new girls’ clothes we’d bought, and suddenly that seemed like a bad thing. I tried to grab my nerves and head off a case of the shakes at the pass when Donna stuck her hand through the gap between the front seats to squeeze my arm.

“It’s okay, sis,” she said. “He’ll understand.”

I reached a hand over and grabbed hers to squeeze back. Being called ‘sis’ didn’t actually bother me so much right then because I needed the reassurance from Donna that she would stand beside me. We squabbled and fussed at each other, a lot, and I expected a raft of teasing but I knew we were family and that counted.

Mom changed freeways as smoothly as she ever managed it, and Donna and I kept our hands clasped while my face leaked a bit. We’d be home in a few minutes, and things had probably changed forever, but still, it was good to know I had people that cared about me.

Once home, I had the task of putting my new clothes away. Not that I really wanted to, but I couldn’t just throw them on the bed and expect someone else to do it. For the first time in my life, I contemplated what it would be like to be a truly spoiled princess. It kept my mood from going sour, and I grinned as I decided there would probably be drawbacks I hadn’t thought of.

Linda was underfoot, dashing in and out of my room with four-year-old energy. She had rushed back home from the neighbors’ as soon as Mom got the car stopped, and we opened the doors.

“Joni gots new clothes!” she squealed more than once.

I actually did dump everything on my bed temporarily while I tried to figure out where I might put it. Looking at my closet in its current state, I decided I should do a cull of things that were not going to fit. Hardly any of my shirts would work with my new figure, but I should still be able to wear some of the pants, and the shoes would still fit.

Linda ran in again about then, squealed something I didn’t catch and ran out. Had I ever had that much energy? I’m not even sixteen yet, and my baby sister makes me feel old. Still smiling, I pulled my winter coats and dress shirts out of my closet and lay them on the far end of the bed. Some of the pullover shirts I might still be able to wear, but any top clothes with buttons or zippers went into the sorted-out pile.

Linda was in again with something comprehensible to say. “Momma says you should try everything you got on again to show me!” she babbled.

“No, she didn’t,” I countered. Linda always used shoulds and woulds and coulds when she was lying about something someone else had said.

“Okay, she didn’t,” she agreed. “But would you? Puh-lease, Johnny? I mean Joni?”

“Not just yet,” I stalled. It occurred to me then that Mom and Donna would almost certainly want me to model things again for Dad when he got home. I mean…. I felt myself blush down to my toes. What was Dad going to say when he saw me in some of this really girly stuff?

I turned around and sat down on the only chair in my room. All of my sand had suddenly ran out, and I didn’t think I could stand up.

I had to get up and do something or just sit there until Mom or Donna came in to chivvy me into some other girly activity. Like painting my nails, maybe. This thought caused me to look at my nails, and I was annoyed to see that I had torn a nail and hadn’t even noticed it. Okay, that got me up and moving again. I got out my clippers and trimmed the torn bits off then used an emery board to smooth the nail edge, so I didn’t tear it again.

I’ve always been a little fussy about my nails. They’re not strong and tough like my Dad’s nails, and I am forever scuffing, breaking or tearing them. Especially, I reflected, when putting on or taking off clothes for some reason. Two years ago, Donna had talked me into trying nail polish, just a clear coat, and I had worn it during our vacation at Grandma and Grandpa’s place in Arizona. I’d even renewed the polish a time or two, but then when we got home, Rod Pick had said something about me wearing polish, and I had taken it all off.

I frowned. Rod was going to be someone I had to deal with because he knew darn well I didn’t have a cousin named Joni. I considered what I could say to him, what he might say, and if he would tell everyone who I really was while I put my new clothes on hangers and put them away.

Well, not the bra and polos. I emptied out my t-shirt drawer and put the polos there with my one spare bra folded in the corner. It was embarrassing to need such an item, but it was a heck of a lot more comfortable to wear one than not. I twitched my shoulders experimentally and felt my girls jiggle in their soft containers. Yep, a bra was a necessity.

I used one of the now-empty Nordstroms bags to hold the clothes I had definitely decided would no longer fit and put the bag and contents on the floor at the foot of the bed. Still not done with that chore.

I had all the new stuff put away but had laid my boy jeans and other pants on the bed for consideration. I closed and latched my door against the danger of low-flying baby sisters, then took off my jumper skort by just undoing the front and sort of stepping out of it. I didn’t hang it up yet, though, just lay it on the end of the bed closest to the closet.

I got a polo out from the drawer and put that on, then started trying on pants. Neither of my dress pants fit well anymore, and I scowled over my shoulder at the image of my round butt in gabardine or whatever it is such pants are made of. I would not be wearing those to church, that was certain, and both pair went into another empty shopping bag.

I tossed a pair of jeans in with them because I knew they wouldn’t fit without trying them on. But there might be hope among my other three pair. In the end, only the stretchiest pair fit at all well enough to be seen in public wearing them. Had my butt expanded at the same time as my bustline? I sighed. The view in the mirror looked a bit painted on, but at least I had one pair of boy jeans that sort of fit.

Someone tapped gently at my door. Had to be Mom. I stepped over and lifted the Linda-proof latch. “It’s open,” I said. “Come on in, Mom.”

She entered smiling. “You look nice in that,” she observed. “I sent Donna out to help Linda burn off a few fuel rods while I get some dinner ready. Do you want to come help me in the kitchen?”

I blinked. I help in the kitchen more than Donna probably does, but somehow suddenly, this feels different. But I agreed, “Okay. I was just trying on some of my old stuff, and this is the only pair of pants I have that fit anymore.”

She grinned. “Well, don’t complain! They fit very nicely.”

“You haven’t seen them from behind,” I warned her, but she only laughed.

I followed her toward the kitchen table, where I saw she had laid out some vegetables and implements of destruction.

“Your father is on the way home. I talked to him on the phone,” she said as she got out her measuring cups and spoons. “He’s arranged for you to see a specialist on Tuesday.”

I nodded. So maybe there was some sort of hope of getting me out of this situation.

“Oh,” Mom added. “I talked to Heidi, too. She’s at work showing homes in Newport, but she has promised to come down this week to see her new niece.”

I rolled my eyes, but Aunt Heidi is a practical person who knows how to have fun, too. Maybe she’d be a help. And if I’m going to be masquerading as my own cousin, then Aunt Heidi must be my new Mom?

“You’re not as bony as you used to be,” Dad commented.

I cut up veggies for salad—we eat a lot of rabbit food, as Dad sometimes calls it—but Donna and I are teenagers and no zits between us. I love raw carrots, and you can make a wonderful salad just from turnips and spinach. We had more choice for this one, though: carrots, red onions, cucumber, cabbage, yellow peppers and those little radishes that bite back.

Mom busied herself with a sauce for the pasta and made commentary on our purchases. “You came through like a trooper, Joni. I thought several times that you were gonna cut and run out on us, but you stuck it through.”

“It wasn’t easy,” I admitted. “Is shopping for clothes always so exhausting?”

“Hmm,” she murmured. “Needs basil.” Then she laughed. “Heidi’s the real champion shopper in the family. I’ve known her to spend four hours just buying a pair of shoes.”

I rolled my eyes and peeled another cucumber.

“You only have to take about half the peel off those; they’re English. Leave part of the peel, and they’ll have a stronger flavor.”

“Their behavior going in is not the real concern,” I mentioned.

We both laughed.

“Cutting them fairly thin helps with that, too,” Mom suggested.

“Mmm, hmm,” I agreed. I sliced little cucumber medallions about twice coin thickness and tossed them into the salad bowl. The little yellow peppers only needed their stems removed; we all liked the bit of bite they had if you left them with their seeds. Well, all of us, except Linda, who had once mistaken a jalapeño for a mild yellow pepper and was wary now of anything that looked like a “holy-pain-o.”

I found the cruet in the cabinet and began to mix up some salad dressing with red wine vinegar, a packet of spices, water and extra-virgin olive oil. “If the extra virgins are all making olive oil, what job were the first batch needed for?” I asked.

“That’s one of your father’s jokes,” Mom commented.

“Yeah, and no one would explain it to me until I was eleven!”

We laughed again, and I realized that Mom and I had always gotten along like this. Donna was the prickly one who could always find something to snark about.

I smiled at Mom, and she winked at me, exactly like she knew what I was thinking.

* * *

Dad arrived home while I was outside playing pickle with Linda, with Donna as the girl in the middle. We kept the game kind of low-key so Linda could keep up and make a few catches of my soft throws.

Donna sneered at me at one point. “You still throw like a girl,” she said.

I snorted, “You try throwing around these volleyballs.”

“Boobies!” Linda snickered. “Jonny’s a girl now and has big boobies!”

“Don’t tell the neighbors,” Donna chided her, but Linda ignored the advice.

She tossed the ball back to me, and I almost fumbled it.

“I think your big boobies are pretty,” Linda said to me.

I rolled my eyes, and she giggled some more.

Just then, Dad opened the back door and called us in for dinner. “Your mom says dinner is ready, girls,” he said, then stopped with an apologetic glance at me. “Sorry, Jonny,” he began, but a low-flying Linda hit him just above the knees.

“Joni has some new clothes ‘cause she’s a girl now, too, like you said, and she’s going to give you a fashum show after dinner!” Dad laughed, picking up the four-year-old for a quick hug.

“I didn’t say I would,” I protested.

Donna laughed. “You said you would have to,” Donna put in, collecting her own hug before taking Linda to go inside.

“I didn’t say that either,” I whined, even if I had thought it.

But now it was my turn to get a hug. Dad’s arms went around me, and I leaned into it. Hugs were always good, but this felt more special than usual.

“You’re not as bony as you used to be,” Dad commented, holding the door open for me as we finished the embrace.

“Das ‘cause she’s got volleyballs now,” Linda called as Donna put her in the taller chair.

Everyone laughed, even me, and Linda asked, “Wha’d I say funny?”

The kid is too cute to live and too adorable to strangle.

* * *

We sat down to eat, and Dad explained that there was no way to get in to see a specialist on Monday, so Tuesday, I would go to University Hospital to see an expert in childhood endocrinology.

“I had to borrow some strings to pull,” he noted.

“Thanks, Daddy,” I said. “I guess I can get out of two days of school this way?”

“One way to look at it,” Mom commented.

“I like school,” Linda put in, making all of us smile at her. Maybe not me, even if it was my own joke.

I must have looked a bit mopey because Donna put in, “I thought endocrainiology would just be about stuff that’s all in your head?”

Dad started to explain about hormones being the field of endocrinology, and Mom and I exchanged a look, knowing Donna was just winding Dad up.

I didn’t want a scoop of ice cream for dessert, so I asked to be excused.

“Oh, yeah,” Linda said. “You gotta get the fashum show ready. C’n I have your ice cream?”

“There’s not gonna be,” I began, but Donna interrupted.

“I get Joni’s ice cream,” she proclaimed, “cause I’m next eldest!”

Which got Linda to protest, “But I’m youngest!”

“I’ll flip you for it, squirt,” Donna offered.

“Nuh-uh!” Linda refused. “Last time you flipped me for it, I bump’ded my head!”

I got out of there while Donna was coming up with a response to that.

“Why can’t I come in?” Linda wanted to know.

I made it to my room and sort of threw myself at the bed, pretty much like I’d been doing for fifteen years—big mistake. My bra gave up holding things in on the first bounce, and my new accessories assaulted me. I almost turned into a joke punchline with two black eyes before I got my hands up and wrangled—things.

“Damnit,” I whispered. My herding skills weren’t that good, the heifers were loose under my shirt, and my bra was sitting on top of them, more or less around my neck. I wondered if I had broken the damn thing. It took me a minute or two to sort things out. The front closure of the bra had basically come undone. I struggled a bit to re-close the row of hook-type fasteners. Boy’s clothes had no such finagling required.

But things did not seem to be quite what they had been. I worried that I had had another growth spurt. I found a trick, though, which was just o allow my pillows to fill the corners of their cages under my armpits.

I sighed when I could finally lie back and take the silent breather I had been trying for. But I made the mistake of sniffing and caught a whiff of something. I smelled of my hands; they had the odor of sweat on them. A quick feel inside my bra, and yeah, I was a bit damp there, and yeah, it did smell like sweat.

Did massive titties like mine sweat normally? I mean, just like any time they felt like it? No wonder girls got all intense about bathing and using deodorant if that were so. Better if it were true and not some fresh evidence of whatever it was that was wrong with me.

I tried to wipe the smell off on my coverlet; not an ideal solution. I surely needed a bath before I could do the fashum show Linda and Dad were expecting. All the tromping around the mall in the September humidity near the beach, even inside with A/C, maybe the excess sweating was just—normal.

I felt my lip tremble, and then tears were leaking out of my eyes and rolling toward my ears. “No fair,” I whispered.

Feeling sorry for myself didn’t seem profitable, so I gave it up after a few minutes and managed to sit up on the bed by first rolling off the side, catching myself, then standing up so I could sit down. I guess I’m a special case, but who would expect breasts to be so heavy?

I caught another whiff of ripeness in my gyrations and remembered that I had determined that I needed a bath or at least a quick shower. I trudged to the door and called down toward where everyone else had fallen into the so-called boob tube. Whoever came up with that nickname for television had no idea, I reflected.

I smiled a bit woefully and gathered things together for a bath. I guessed I would need a fresh bra, but I only owned two of the large-size over-the-shoulder-boulder-holders. If I was going to sweat enough to need a bath and a change of bra every day, did that mean I would have to wash one of the damn things every night?

I dithered a bit, but a sniff test settled it—my brand-new bra needed washing. I found a little tag on the garment and read that it should be washed in cool water with mild soap and air-dried. Mild soap shouldn’t be a problem, Donna had a bar of Ivory she kept in our shared bathroom. I gathered some clean panties, too, and my bathrobe (which didn’t quite close around my chest now); there was nothing for it. I needed a new bathrobe, too, but that could wait.

The TV still made noises in the living room, and no one was in the hall except the dog, who gave me permission to pass with a thump of his tail. “Watch for Linda, Fooler,” I told him. My darling little sister was a menace who might walk in on anyone in the bathroom. But I could only pretend that Fooler might stop her. In fact, he was often her principal accomplice.

I started the water running to warm up, then I hung my things on the extra towel bars, took off my bra and ran a basin of cool water to dunk it in. I wasn’t sure I was doing this right, but I rubbed some Ivory in the places that seemed most likely to be stinky and put the cruel device back in the water.

I pulled a shower cap on since I didn’t want to mess with wet hair in the evening. The blue cap was mine and the pink one Donna’s, but I used Donna’s this time because it was slightly larger and held my long hair well. And who cared about the gender of inanimate objects anymore? I couldn’t possibly be embarrassed by using the wrong cap after everything else that was going wrong with my life.

I adjusted the temp of the water and stepped under the artificial rain. I’d always like showers better than bathing in a tub, but our bathroom didn’t have a tub anyway. I used some of Donna’s body wash and two different kinds of soap, making sure I got everything lathered up good. Using a washcloth let me know that I did not scrub my tits. “Ow,” I said.

In fact, I felt kind of tender everywhere, as if my whole body had grown extra sets of nerve endings. Instead of scrubbing, I just sort of stroked gently; even down between my legs felt tender. Then I let the water hit me in the face and tried not to fall into self-pity again. Lots of people had worse things happening to them somewhere, I was sure.

“Joni?” came a treble voice outside the bathroom door just as I was stepping out of the shower stall and reaching for a big bath towel.

“Don’t come in, Linda,” I warned. I wrapped the towel around me, a little annoyed that it stayed in place so easily now.

“Why can’t I come in?” Linda wanted to know. “You’re a girl too, now, so we’re both the same.”

“Uh, well, I’m—I’m not quite a girl all the way. I’ve still got some boy bits, so don’t come in.”

“Huh? Well, I’m sure your boy bits won’t last much longer, then you’ll be a girl just like Donna and me and Mommy.” She laughed.

Somehow, I was afraid that she was right.

I used the big towel carefully, patting myself dry more than any kind of rubbing motion. Somehow, my skin was tender and sensitive, not just my new appendages but all over, like even the back of my neck.

I twisted the towel into a sort of dress and wiped some moisture from the big mirror on the back of the door. I still had on the pink shower cap, and the towel hung out from my body, held up by my new shape.

I stared for maybe half a minute, looking at the tiny girl with the huge breasts. They looked even bigger if I turned sideways. Had they grown even more? I closed my eyes and hoped and wished as hard as I could that they would go away. “I’m a boy,” I muttered. “I’m not supposed to have big boobs like some centerfold.”

I sighed for about the fortieth time and started getting dressed. The softness of the girls’ panties was welcome on my tender skin. My boy parts hardly caused a bulge at all, but experimentally, I tried pushing my junk up inside me. The accessories went up easily, without pain or discomfort, but the longer bit of my penis popped right back out. I tried again, pulling my panties up tight.

I couldn’t see down there very well because of my new geography; I had a much closer horizon. It seemed like Things stayed out of sight for a bit, but I could feel them inside me, sort of creeping toward the exit. I sighed again. What the heck was I doing, anyway? Did I want to look more like a girl?

That wasn’t exactly it. I just didn’t want to look like a boy with tits. Looking like a girl, even being a girl, would be better than being something in between. Maybe.

I took my clean bra and wrapped it around me, putting it on with my arms through the straps kind of like a shirt or jacket. Then I worked to close the hooks in the front and position them between my breasts. It still amazed me how heavy the damn things were. Softer than pillows but without the support of the bra, they were already making me tired of their weight and a bit sore in the lower back.

And I had to sort of mooch them into the cups, then reach inside and pull them forward so I didn’t end up with lumps of boobage in my armpits. After a bit of a struggle, I got the beasts back into their cages and had a little shake to settle things. Damn, it felt weird when they jiggled like that.

A light knock on the door told me that Linda, for once, had been patiently waiting for me in the hall. “Joni?” she called in her sweeter voice, not the one she used for removing nails from timber. “We can’t have a fashum show without you?” she said, applying a bit of subtle coercion.

“I’ll be right out,” I promised. I pulled on a pair of walking shorts that fit more or less and an oversized T-shirt of Dad’s that had ended up in my laundry months ago. If I were going to be putting on and taking off clothes again, might as well make it easier to do.

“Jo-oh-onie!” Linda knocked and called again, more forcefully and with her volume and pitch moving toward her natural range like a chainsaw looking for a spike.

I sighed to make it an even number and opened the door.

Does it get easier? Not enough to notice...

By the time I got through changing clothes six or seven times, I was thoroughly sick of the whole thing. Everyone tried to be supportive and encouraging, and Linda was positively enthusiastic, but I ended the “fashum” show by coming out of my room wearing a pair of my old jeans and one of Dad’s polo shirts that had ended up in my laundry somehow.

Donna scowled at me. “Your little alligator is lying on his side. You’re cute even when you’re not trying to be,” she accused.

Linda laughed. “Hey! Cute is what I do!” Which made everyone laugh, even me.

Sisters are unnecessary at the best of times, and just annoying most of the time, but Linda can always make me smile.

“Well,” said Dad. “That was …quite something, Joni.” His expression seemed at odds with his words. I felt my lower lip tremble, so I grabbed it between my teeth.

Dad was smiling as he continued. “I guess I have three beautiful daughters now.”

Linda crowed like Peter Pan and proclaimed, “Daddy says you’re booti-ful, Joni!”

“I think he may have gotten a rear view of those jeans,” Donna commented.

I glared at her, and she smirked back, but I didn’t feel like crying about Dad’s hesitation or his compliment anymore. I had to push things, though, “Do you like my red hair?” I asked him.

Dad surprised me by chuckling. “Of course I do, honey,” he said. “It makes you look a bit like your aunt and less like, um, Jonny, so I guess that was sort of the idea?”

“Yeah,” I admitted. “And getting it cut in a more, um, feminine style?” I blushed to admit that.

“It seems like…you have more of it, too?” Dad looked a bit confused.

“They put in some curl and fluffed it up, I dunno.”

“Teased it,” supplied Donna. “But not really; I dunno what it’s called.”

“Well, you’ve been teasing me, so that’s not it.”

“We’re sisters; we’re supposed to tease each other.”

That got a giggle from Linda. I looked at her and crossed my eyes, causing her to explode into such a violent storm of giggles that she had to lean on the dog who had appeared beside her when she needed him.

We all got a smile out of Linda and Fooler, and it helped things not feel so desperately painful. Mom kept things going by ruffling Fooler’s ears and Linda’s hair.

“Would anyone like to go see a movie?” Dad asked. “We could go to the drive-in, the show doesn’t start for more than an hour, but no one has school or work tomorrow.”

Mom looked thoughtful. “Linda always falls asleep in the drive-in,” she mentioned.

Dad smiled. “Don’t say that like it’s a bad thing.” They both laughed.

“What’s playing?” Donna asked.

This turned into a real discussion. There were a couple of musicals, Mom’s favored movie style and a couple of caper flicks, Dad’s favorite, playing on nearby screens. One of the nice things about living in the San Diego area is the weather is always good for drive-in movies.

“What do you kids think?” Dad tossed the ball in our direction. Surprisingly, Donna, Linda and I all agreed on Funny Girl, the Barbra Streisand musical.

“You’re outvoted, Dad,” Donna consoled him.

He laughed about it and pretended to give me a dirty look. The two caper movies playing looked like fun, but I just wasn’t in the mood for wise-cracking thieves. “I guess I better get used to it,” Dad conceded.

“You’ve always been outnumbered,” Mom told him.

“I know, but sometimes it used to be close,” he commented.

“Get dressed in something really comfortable, kids,” Mom ordered. “Linda’s not the only one who falls asleep in movies.”

Donna wrinkled her nose and held one hand up so she could pretend that I couldn’t see her pointing at me with the other one. I just rolled my eyes. One time, a year or so before, we both fell asleep watching some Disney movie we had seen before, so it wasn’t all one way.

It wasn’t until I was in my room that I thought to wonder about what Dad said.

Donna appeared at my door while I was trying to decide if I had anything more comfortable than I was already wearing. She looked at me as if waiting for permission to come in.

“What?” I asked.

“Umm,” she said, hesitating. “We’re going to Springdale Motor-Vu, right? That’s right here, you know?”

I began to get an inkling of what she might mean, so I frowned at her.

She came right out and said it. “You want to go as Joni, so if we meet anyone we know, they won’t recognize you.”

I glanced down at my chest and put a hand to my hair. “It’s not really a disguise, but I don’t think anyone is going to recognize me as Johnny.” What was she thinking?

“You’re still wearing the same face,” she said, direct as always. “I think you should let me put a little makeup on you.”

“No,” I said firmly. “Let me rephrase that. Hell, no.”

“Joni!” Mom’s voice came from the hallway. I hadn’t known she was there. “What are you thinking, Donna?”

“Well,” said my sneaky sister, “girls our age almost never go out in public without a bit of makeup. Not around here, anyway.”

“I’m from Iowa.” I put in quickly.

They both looked at me.

“I’m just a visiting relative and fifteen-year-old girls do not wear makeup in Iowa,” I said.

That made Mom laugh. “How would you know? You’ve never been to Iowa.”

“I bet no one we’re likely to meet has either,” I pointed out.

“Let’s go to the concessions before it gets completely dark,” Donna suggested after Dad had parked the Momwagon at the drive-in.

“Maybe I don’t want to go to concessions until it’s dark,” I objected.

Donna made a face. “No one is going to recognize you, if that’s what you’re afraid of,” she offered. “I’ll say you’re my cousin from Orange County if we meet anyone we know.”

While we were discussing this, Linda did an end run around us. “Daddy,” she asked our father in her sweetest voice, “can I have some money for kongcinamanations?” Dad, of course, forked over some cash.

“I can’t go just by myself,” Donna countered my objections to going at all. “I’ll need help carrying stuff back.”

“Okay, okay,” I gave in.

“Let’s go!” shouted Linda, squirming across Mom’s lap to exit her privileged position in the front seat.

“What makes you think you’re going, Squidgy?” Donna asked her.

Linda played her trump card. “‘Cause I gots the money!”

#

We followed our conniving little sister toward the orange building in the middle of the big parking area, laughing a little at being outplayed by a kindergartener. It wasn’t that unusual, to be honest; Linda had learned how to manipulate grownups before she stopped talking around her fooler.

Half of the building served as a concession stand, while the other half held projection equipment and supplies. You would get yelled at if you walked through the beams pointed at the screen on that side, but there were already lines at the windows on the other side. It was partly enclosed to keep the weather off if it sprinkled. They’d close the theater if it rained hard.

Three lines snaked out from under the awning. One line was for orders like hot dogs, hamburgers and pizza. The other two were just for candy, popcorn and drinks, which was all we wanted, so Donna and I each staked out a spot in one of the faster-moving lines. This confused Linda.

“We only gots one money,” she pointed out.

“Is this your little sister?” someone in the slow lane asked Donna. “She’s too cute!”

I looked in that direction, then turned away. Annalisa Fremont, a cheerleader-type from our school, had asked the question. She was in line with Rod Pick, and I didn’t want him to see me.

From the corner of my eye, I could see him past Donna and Linda in the middle lane. Annalisa must be his date. I didn’t think I’d ever liked her.

But Rod was looking right at me. I tried not to meet his gaze, but he seemed distracted anyway. It took a moment for me to realize I was standing in profile to him, and he was looking at my chest.

So, he probably isn’t going to recognize me, I decided, and that ought to have made me feel better, but it didn’t. Something seemed stuck in my throat, and I wasn’t hungry for popcorn or red vines anymore.

“Who’s the redhead?” I heard him ask Donna. “Is she with you? You’re dressed alike.”

But it was Linda who answered. “That’s our other sister, Joni!” she squealed, and for icing on the cake, she pointed at me.

---

Chapter 22.1 - preview on Patreon

Joni has a lot to learn, but she's very...talented.

Rod Pick stared. Linda had pointed me out and called me her sister Joni, but it didn’t seem to have registered. He kept staring at my chest.

I’d been worried he would recognize me, but it now appeared he was honestly just interested in two things. Annalisa poked him to move with the flow of the line they were in.

I didn’t know whether to be annoyed or amused. He actually startled when she poked him, as if he had completely forgotten she was there. Was this going to be an easy masquerade after all?

My line moved fastest, and I reached the window first, so Donna and Linda joined me. We ordered tons of “pogey-bait” as Dad called it, for some reason. Candy, popcorn, and sodas were loaded into two cardboard cartons, and Linda was rewarded with a sno-cone of her own to carry.

I glanced toward where Rod and his date had just reached the hot food window and were placing their orders for pizza and dogs. They must be with someone else to order so much.

Donna nudged me carefully to indicate we should leave, so I turned, and we followed Linda back toward the Mom-wagon. Donna had a grin half a yard wide and giggled when I looked at her.

“Toldjaso,” she crowed.

I had to smile at her triumph, and I guess I even giggled.

“‘Dja see Annalise’s face when she realized where he was looking?”

“I didn’t notice,” I said as convincingly as I could, then we both giggled.

Why did I not feel offended by where he had been staring? I couldn’t make sense of that, but truthfully, I had enjoyed it. I looked sideways at Donna.

She was still grinning. “Rod is a moron,” she announced. More giggles.

A loud, “Whoa!” from the bed of a pick-up parked backward in the space by the speakers attracted our attention. We looked in that direction and saw five teenage boys sprawled on the tailgate and fenders. They were grinning at us.

One of them remarked, “Big sister, little sister,” and they all laughed. They didn’t mean Linda, who had skipped on ahead of us and was almost back to the Mom-mobile.

Donna frowned and bumped me with a hip, and our audience laughed again. “Kyerful, don’t spill nothin’ on yer shirt,” one of them drawled in a cartoony voice.

Another asked, “You girls are sisters, aincha?”

I turned a bit to face them, Spocking an eyebrow. “She is, I’m not,“ I said cryptically, provoking a snort from Donna. They didn’t understand that, but they snickered anyway.

The September night sky above us showed bright little stars in a deep gray velvet, but a few clouds glowed much brighter with reflected light from the city. It still wasn’t dark enough that we couldn’t see faces. I didn’t recognize any of them, but I knew they could see us as well as we could them.

I didn’t intend to do or say anything else, and Donna murmured to me, “Let’s go.” For some reason, I didn’t step up my pace, but slowed a bit and winked at the boys in the truck.

They reacted like the truck had suddenly been electrified, actually causing the springs of the old beast to squeak and groan.

I did a bump with each shoulder in their direction, careful not to spill anything in the tray I carried. I knew exactly what that looked like since I had tried it in the bathroom mirror at home.

Donna had gotten a step or two ahead of me and didn’t see what I had done, but she did hear the howls and barking the boys began. She looked back at me with a bit of alarm, and I did hurry to catch up.

Dad came along to meet us after Linda showed up at the car alone. By that time, both Donna and I were fizzing and hiccoughing from laughing.

We didn’t realize two of the boys had followed us until Dad spoke to them over our heads. “You fellas ever have a good reason to be somewhere else, now’s a good time to use it,” he sort of drawled in that Arizona ranch voice he uses sometimes. “Don’t turn around,” he said to us when we started to do just that.

He took the tray from me, smiling. “What did you do?” he asked.

“Me?” I squeaked.

“She sort of flirted with them,” Donna suggested.

“I did not!”

“And you flirted with Rod Pick at the concessions.”

“That’s a fib,” I told Dad. “I hardly even looked at him!”

“Yeah, and his date noticed that, too. Joni’s a flirt and pretty good at it.”

I couldn’t deal. Donna was smirking, and Dad looked like he believed every word. I didn’t know if I was going to laugh or cry when I opened my mouth. But what I said was an exasperated, “Daddy!”

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