Chapter 3

Let's stay together

"BLOODY-HELL!" she exclaimed and threw her arms round me. "You look... Blimey... What's... ? Come in... holy shit!"

"Mandy! Mind your language!" said a voice from another room.

"Sorry dad!"

Giggling, we piled up to her room.

I felt elation that I had not felt in a long time, finding that Mandy was not responsible for putting me in that God-awful position with Greg Bridger at the Cordoba; it was just a complete misunderstanding. I guess it was just a lack of understanding and patience, typical of a bunch of hormone-driven teenagers.

Mandy was looking at me kind of strange a lot of the time.

Was it wonder or something else?

Look at me. I was back with someone who I suppose could be best described as my best friend and there I was trying to find fault with everything she did. Mind you, after having put up with the back-stabbing at home, the name-calling, bullying and everything else at school, it's not surprising. Not only that, but I had just turned up in a dress for God's sake, I had to expect some strange looks, even from Mandy.

We chatted like nothing had happened and I was so pleased that Lily had brought me here although I felt a little odd not having the others here too. Perhaps that rift could be fixed as well, I mean, I thought I had burnt my bridges with Mandy yet here I was.

"Hey, I got that new Blancmange album last week. Wanna hear it?"

"Go for it!" I said and as it played, we went through Mandy's magazines, looking at pictures of Bowie, David Sylvian, Steve Strange and bands such as Soft Cell, Thompson Twins, Yazoo (the Alison Moyet version) and were comparing fashions and so forth.

It wasn't long after that the makeup came out and I was back in my element. While I applied the makeup, I recounted what had happened, bringing Mandy right bang up to date with the ongoing saga of Paul/Suzanne.

"You left home? Cool!"

"It's not like that." I said. "I got so much stick after you lot made me over last time that I decided I didn't belong there. Mum said to Lily and Ray that if they wanted me, they could have me." I tried to sound off-hand about it, but it still caught in my throat.

"You're kidding."

"No. Poor Lily was in tears. I don't think she likes my mum. Don't think she ever has. She certainly doesn't now anyway. They've just been SO nice. I don't think I'll ever be able to repay them." I could feel that lump in my throat getting bigger and I tried to blink away the tears that were threatening to blast forth and ruin my makeup (don't worry, I'm slowly getting used to it).

"I really missed you all." I said, trying to deflect the emotional avalanche that was happening.

"Me too." she said taking my hand and squeezing it.

"Are you going to have a sex change?" Mandy asked. Straight to the point; that's my Mandy! It got my mind off of the emotional rollercoaster anyway.

"Honestly? I don't know. If you'd have said to me a month ago that I would be standing here now, in a dress, heels and doing your makeup, I'd have laughed at you first, then shit myself, but here I am and it doesn't feel odd, in fact, quite the reverse. It's only when I think about it that I start to get cold feet."

"I can understand that." she said. "What about boyfriends?"

Boys?

Hmm. I didn't think that'd work.

I had been accused of 'looking' at the other boys in the changing rooms, but it wasn't true, well not in that way anyway. Being near to boys was for me, a threatening experience. Not one other than Ray had been nice and thanks to Mr Georgeson, it felt like even the older ones, the ones that had 'grown up' so to speak, appeared to be as duplicitous and untrustworthy as the kids I had been forced to associate with.

About eighteen months or two years before this, boys in my year started to develop hairy armpits and legs, muscles, facial hair and 'pubes' and were generally getting bigger. Many of them had had their voices change, but not me.

I HAD looked at the other boys, but it wasn't 'checking them out', it was because they had sprouted and I hadn't, so I was making comparisons. I was trying to figure when this was going to happen to me, why was my Willy so much smaller than theirs, would mine get like that, would I look like that too and why didn't I already?

I spoke to mum about this and all she could say was "don't worry it'll happen to you sooner or later". In the meantime of course it had happened or was happening to the other kids and I was getting left behind. Thankfully, I wasn't alone, but by the time I had reached the last year of school, I was the only one whose voice hadn't broken or who hadn't developed physically and I was understandably worried, because suddenly I wasn't the same as the others and wasn't getting treated the same either.

It had been a painful period and I really couldn't see myself getting romantically involved with one of those very people who had made the last two years of my life hell and turned me into a nervous wreck.

"I don't think so." I said finally, grimacing at the thought. "I'm really into Lisa and I thought she was into me too, but I haven't seen her since that day."

"Lisa?! I didn't think she was into girls."

"Lisa? Into girls? I'm not a girl."

"Aren't you? You look pretty girly from where I'm sitting. Hmm. Let me see, dress, high heels — nice, makeup; definitely girl. Even when you weren't dressed this way, I thought you were really a girl, leastways, more girl than boy."

I sat down. I was too wasn't I; more girl than boy?

This was something I hadn't thought about.

If I was supposed to be a girl and I felt that was the probably truth of the matter, was I supposed to be into guys? Wasn't that a prerequisite for being a girl?

I certainly hoped not!

I mean I still dreamt of Lisa, the only girl I have ever kissed and straight away, into my head came the memory of her; the softness of her touch, her scent and well I didn't know what it was about her or any other woman, but to forego that for a spiky-faced, hairy, inconsiderate MAN?

I didn't think so.

I really couldn't reconcile the concept of changing what appealed to me. If Lisa and I were not destined to be anything other than friends then I could imagine other women appealing to me, but not men (as girly as some of them looked at the moment and I was thinking of Marylyn and Boy George et al).

Not exactly my cup of tea.

I felt odd. It was one thing to show myself to others as a girl, to behave like a girl (which frankly I seemed to have been anyway), but quite another if it meant I had to include male partners or a husband figure. If that was the case then the deal was off.

It was late by the time we finished and Mandy's mum let me phone Lily. I hoped I wasn't being too much of a nuisance by asking her to come and get me, but somehow, I didn't feel particularly safe walking back at this time of night.

"How did it go?" asked Lily.

"Alright. I'm surprised that she seems to have accepted it so readily. Even I can't quite get to grips with it and there are some things that scare me."

"Such as?"

"Boys for one." I said.

"That's something you'll have to talk to the good doctor about, but if it's any consolation, you completely fooled her."

"Is that good?"

"I think so. She said she could spot someone with transgender issues from about half a mile. She didn't see YOU coming at all." she said chuckling.

"Transgender?" I asked.

"Yes. It's where someone crosses the line between one gender and the other."

I'd crossed the line alright. Most boys would find it hard to even touch women's underwear (unless there was actually a girl inside it) under most circumstances and there I was finding it hard to not to.

"What happens now then?"

"That depends largely on you; whether you want to stay as Suzie or Paul."

"Yeah, but it's a one way ticket isn't it?"

"Eventually, yes, but that part of things is a long way off yet. You really are going to have to give this some thought before you go ahead with anything. You'll be expected to live as a girl for a period of time before you can consider that as an option."

"Yes, but I will have to won't I?"

"Not all do. Some live on the outside as a girl and still retain the male sex organs."

"They do?" I asked, wondering why anyone would want that. Either they were a girl or a boy weren't they?

I had so much to think about, but it looked as though going ahead with Suzie was the best thing. I felt a lot more comfortable as Suzie than I did as Paul, but then that wasn't difficult.

School's out FOR EVER! (I know, but it's a perennial and seems to pop up every year)

The last week at school was much less fraught than I had expected, the bonus being that I didn't have to be there anymore after my last exam. That meant I had Friday off and fortunately, so did Mandy.

I spent that day as Suzie and Mandy and I went round the shops of Brighton We got eyed up by boys, which surprisingly I found thrilling. Being close to them wasn't quite so much fun though and I confess I had my eye on more than one of the girls, not the boys.

They're so different. I didn't realise how big a gulf there was between me and the boy I thought I was supposed to be until that moment and although Mandy was in her element, I must have come across a bit standoffish for which Mandy was peeved to say the least.

We ended up having a sandwich in a crowded little café and were chatting away when I saw someone go past the window.

Lisa.

I got up and charged as fast as my heels would allow, outside and up the street, leaving Mandy staring after me, mouth open full of cheese and pickle.

"Lisa!" I shouted and the figure stopped, looked round, but looked right through me. She was with her parents I think (who didn't stop) and when I caught up with her, she was shocked.

"Er, oh, it's you!" she said.

The response was not what I had expected, nor what I had hoped for.

I was hoping for a fifties film type thing where the star-crossed lovers see each other across a crowded railway station platform and run to each other in slow motion while dramatic music builds up in the background. Finally they fight through the crowds and catch each other in a passionate embrace.

You get the picture?

Suffice it to say "er, oh, it's you" didn't really have the same impact.

"You're looking well." I said and tried to retain some semblance of enthusiasm even though it was obvious that things were not as I hoped they would be. It seemed that she had had more of an affect on me than I had had on her.

"Yeah, you too. How have you been?" she asked, looking a little uncomfortable.

"It would take too long to tell you, but I don't live at home anymore and things are much better now thanks."

"You look er, good." she said and I tried to see whether that was saying that I looked well presented or I looked GOOD (nudge, nudge), but couldn't tell. "What are you doing down here?"

"Mandy and I are just window shopping. I was kind of hoping we could get together, you know like we used to round at Mandy's? You, me, Mandy, Julie and Caroline; just like old times."

"Maybe. Gotta go." she said and looked round to see her parents half way up the street and waving with a look on her face that I couldn't read, she ran off after them. "See ya!"

To say I felt deflated would be a very conservative way of describing what I really felt as I plodded back to the café. I could see Mandy standing outside the door looking up the road towards me.

"Lisa?" she asked.

"Yeah."

"How is she?"

"Fine I suppose."

"It's not the same anymore is it?"

"No." I said, and I couldn't help it, I was starting to cry.

Can't get used to losing you

That feeling of rejection after the indifference of Lisa's response didn't go away. I was, I suppose, the epitome of a hopeless romantic (although I preferred "new romantic" as the term then was), offering more melodrama than a Bette Davis movie and moping round the house like a fart in a trance.

I questioned being Suzanne at all. After all, it was Lisa's affirmation of liking what she saw on the day of the Cordoba that made me go along with it all in the first place. The kiss in the toilets just made me feel if that was what being a girl was going to be like then I didn't ever want to change, a fact that was strengthened by the kiss when she left me at mum's.

The trouble was of course, it didn't last.

I didn't know whether Suzanne was the real me or whether she was just an excuse to hold on to the memory of those two kisses; the only emotional releases I had had in my relatively short life that had truly made my toes curl.

I reverted to dressing as Paul and Lily didn't say anything, but I could tell she was disappointed even concerned. Even Mandy, who didn't seem to express a preference one way or the other, appeared to be more than a little reticent around me and that just served to confuse me more.

"Right young lady." said Lily after the third day. "Come here this minute. We have some things to talk about."

Young Lady?

Did she just call me Young Lady? I was Paul wasn't I?

Regardless of the mode of address, I went obediently and sat as once again, Lily took out her pad.

"What is it?" she asked. I didn't know what she meant. What was what?

"What is it that's eating you?"

Ah!

It didn't take long before I was blurting everything out in one huge great gush of words, sniffs, sobs and gesticulations. Lily's eyes went wide as this torrent of "stuff" just poured out, crashing through the space between us and bombarding her senses.