“I’m sorry, Grandma Tess,” I say. I look down at my feet with shame. “I’ve been naughty.”
“Don’t think anything of it.”
I retrieve the pink monkey from the bin. I hug it tight to my chest. “I like it,” I say. “It’s so soft.”
“Thank you, dear.”
Maddy picks out a pink bunny rabbit. She calls it Mrs. Hoppy after a similarly pink rabbit that used to be her favorite toy. I remember that Mrs. Hoppy because I bought it for her in the hospital gift shop the night she was born. The original is probably still in a box somewhere, in a storage unit or in a closet of Debbie’s condo.
With a tired sigh, Tess says, “Well, I guess it’s time for us to get moving.”
***
Of course things can’t be that simple. While Maddy and I study the candy bars in the checkout lane, I hear a woman’s voice call Tess’s name. My first thought is it’s an employee to complain about the swath of destruction we’ve left in our wake across the store.
It’s a lot worse than that. It’s a hunchbacked old woman with glasses even thicker than mine. Her name is Minnie and she’s the biggest gossip at Tess’s church. I remember the first service I attended, how the old woman came up to Tess and Jake and asked, “And who is this?”
She does the same thing now after she exchanges pleasantries with Tess. “Are these adorable little girls yours?”
“For the moment,” Tess says. Though Tess smiles, I can see the way her hands tighten around the handlebar of the cart. She probably hoped out here we wouldn’t bump into anyone familiar. “This is Stacey and Madison.”
“Stacey? Like the young woman who used to be staying with you?”
“Yes. One Stacey vanishes and another one falls into our laps,” Tess says. “The Lord works in mysterious ways.”
“I was so sorry to hear about that poor girl. Have they ever found her?”
“No, not yet. Jacob says the department is still looking, but there aren’t any leads.”
“Well, I’ll keep praying for her.”
“Thank you.”
“So how did you happen to end up with these two cuties?”
“Oh, well, their parents died and there was no one to take care of them. Jacob and I couldn’t bear the thought of them going to one of those dreadful group homes. We volunteered to take care of them until the state can find a good foster home. It helps fill the void with the other Stacey missing.”
“I’m sure it does. You’re such a generous woman. That’s what I keep telling everyone: there’s no one in the congregation more generous than Teresa Madigan.”
“I’m nothing special. Just following what the Good Book says.”
“Yes, of course. So will you be bringing Stacey and—”
“Madison.”
“Stacey and Madison to services on Sunday? They are Christian, aren’t they?”
“They are, but Jacob and I aren’t sure they’re ready for that yet. They only moved in a couple of days ago. It’s been hectic for all of us.”
“I imagine it would be.”
An old bearded man who uses his cart like a walker shows up behind Minnie. He clears his throat. “Well, we’ve got to be off. It’s good to see you, Teresa. And your two delightful new charges.” The old woman waves to us. “I’m sure I’ll see you both soon.”
“I can hardly wait,” I grumble after Minnie has toddled off with her husband.
“Who was that old witch?” Maddy asks.
“Never mind, dear. Are you all set to check out?”
“Yes,” we say in unison.
“Good,” Tess says. I couldn’t agree more.
***
After our epic trip to Wal-Mart, there’s nothing I’d rather do than collapse on my bed and sleep. There’s just one problem: my bed is gone. I trudge up the stairs to find Jake in the bedroom, as he puts the finishing touches on a set of twin bunk beds. The lower bed is shaped like a race car while the rails for the upper one are metal the same red as my glasses.
“What’s all this?” I ask. I drop my bags of clothes to the floor.
Jake turns and grins. “Ta-da,” he says. “You remember Bob Wertz?”
“Young guy? Works in forensics?”
“That’s right. We got talking and he mentioned he had these beds his kids weren’t using anymore. I thought you two might like them so you won’t have to share.”
“But they’re for boys,” I say.
“You’d rather keep sleeping with Madison?”
“I don’t know.”
“Just try it for a couple of nights.” He pats the ladder to the top bunk. “Go on, try it out. But no jumping around.”
“I know. I’m not stupid.”
As I climb up, Jake asks, “Tess get you two haircuts?”
“Yes. You like it?”
“It looks nice.”
I swing myself onto the top bunk. From there I feel tall again. I look down at Jake. “You like the bangs?” I ask. I run a hand through them.
“Sure. You like the bed?”
“It’s all right.”
Tess leads Maddy into the room then. Maddy’s reaction is the same as mine. “That’s a boy’s bed,” she says with obvious revulsion.
“We could always repaint it,” Jake says.
Maddy shrugs at this suggestion. Then she crawls onto the bed. As she does, I hear plastic crinkle. That’s the other reason Jake brought the beds home, so Maddy’s accidents won’t ruin the other bed. I brace myself for Maddy to throw another tantrum at this. She doesn’t. She doesn’t say anything. I slide beneath the rails, out enough to see underneath my new bed. Maddy’s fallen asleep. It’s no surprise after the day we’ve had.
“I guess she likes it,” Jake says.
“I guess so,” I say and then I slide behind the rail again to take a little nap myself.
Chapter 22
For our big meeting with Dr. Macintosh, Tess has us in our best clothes, the ones we’ll wear for church. Maddy’s dress is pink with puffy sleeves while mine is dark blue with a white belt. We had to take another bath too, though this time when Tess combed my hair it didn’t hurt so much. Maddy didn’t complain either when Tess put her hair into cute little pigtails. She behaved herself all during the ride into the city too, which I take as a hopeful sign.
As we ride the elevator up, I don’t realize my nervousness about meeting Dr. Macintosh is evident until Tess rubs my back. “Don’t worry, dear. It won’t be too bad. He just wants to talk.”
“I know.”
We get off on the fifth floor for his office. The last time I opened the door I could do it all by myself. I had been a grown woman back then with a job, friends, and perhaps a new career. It wasn’t such a bad life. I didn’t think so at the time, but now I’d give anything for that life back.
This time Jake holds open the door while Tess ushers me inside. Maddy clings to her koala-style; she’s far more nervous than I am. I hope she doesn’t throw a tantrum in the doctor’s office. I don’t think I could handle the embarrassment of it.
There are a bunch of kids and their parents in the waiting room, just like last time. I don’t feel out of place among the kids, not now that I’m one of them. I don’t want to get too close to them though, so I sit at the end, in a corner. Tess sits down next to me while Jake deals with the receptionist.
There’s one person who looks out of place. He’s a boy probably no more than the age Maddy used to be. With his longish brown hair and goatee, he looks more like he should be behind the counter of the Kozee Koffee. Is he another of Dr. Macintosh’s special patients?
Next to him is the girl in the school uniform I saw the first time I came to this office. Like that first time, she plays with her phone. But before I can turn away, she looks up at me and smiles. I turn my gaze back to my feet, but it’s too late. From the corner of my eye, I can see her come towards me.
She jiggles her phone. “Want to play?”
I force myself to look up at her. “Play what?�
�
“Angry Birds.”
“Oh, no, that’s OK.”
Tess pats my arm. “It’s all right, Stacey. Go play Angry Birds.”
“I don’t know. They might call our names—”
“Don’t be shy,” Tess says. “Play with your new friend.”
I give Tess a look to plead with her, but she doesn’t bail me out. The girl sits next to me. “I’m Stacey,” I say.
“Jamie,” she says. She points to the boy who was next to her. “That’s my brother Caleb. And Travis. He’s our babysitter.”
“That’s interesting.”
She hands the phone to me. I stare at the screen, but have no idea what to do. I only ever used my cell phone to call Grace or Maddy, or to reply to their text messages. When it comes to all this new technology, I’m still an old man about it. “Um—”
“You haven’t played Angry Birds before?”
“No. What do I do?”
“I’ll show you.” Jamie takes the phone back. I watch as she rams cartoon birds into various objects to kill pigs. It seems like a pretty stupid game to me. “Now you try.”
My first attempts go pretty bad. My birds bypass everything to crash harmlessly into the ground. “Start them off a little higher,” Jamie suggests.
I do that and have more success. I even get through the first two levels. As I play, Jamie asks, “Do you go to school around here?”
“Um, no. I just moved here.”
“Me too. Our dad got a new job. He’s a lawyer.”
“My dad was a soldier,” I say. I have to make up more of my cover story on the fly. “He died in Afghanistan.”
“That sucks.”
“I know. So I’m staying with my grandpa and grandma for a while.”
We’re interrupted by the receptionist when she calls Maddy’s name. Tess goes with her, which leaves me with Jamie. As we continue to play, Jamie says, “You don’t talk a lot, do you?”
“Not really.”
“That’s OK. I’m not all that chatty either.”
She could have fooled me, but I say, “I guess we have a lot in common then.”
“I guess so.” We play for a while in silence. When I get stuck on a level, Jamie takes the phone from me to show me how to beat it. I look up at the clock; Maddy and Tess have been in there for a half-hour. At least there haven’t been any screams from Dr. Macintosh’s office.
“So what do you do when you aren’t hanging around a shrink’s office?” Jamie asks.
“Watch TV and stuff.”
“Me too.” She lists a bunch of shows I’ve never heard of.
“Yeah, those are pretty good,” I say.
Jamie starts to talk about some cute boy in some show. I don’t pay much attention since I’m still trying to destroy things on the screen with my angry birds. It makes me wonder how old Jamie is. She must be older than me if she’s that interested in boys.
After an hour, Tess emerges from the room; she holds Maddy’s hand. Maddy looks down at the floor; I’m not sure if she’s crying or not. Tess stops for a moment to whisper something to Jake and then hustles Maddy out of the office. I hope Maddy just has to use the potty and nothing more serious.
“Stacey?” the receptionist says.
I hand the phone back to Jamie. “Thanks for letting me play.”
“I’ll call you later.”
“OK.”
“We can talk about the new iCarly.”
“OK,” I say again. I wonder what the hell an iCarly is.
Then I’m on my own.
***
Dr. Macintosh is already in one of the armchairs. He probably didn’t get up from after Maddy and Tess left. He motions to the seat across from him. “Have a seat, Stacey,” he says.
The office looks so much bigger now that I’m a foot-and-a-half shorter. My steps are tentative as I approach Dr. Macintosh. I want to turn and run away, back to Tess. I want to jump into her lap and cry while she comforts me, tells me everything will be all right—
No. That’s what a scared ten-year-old girl would do. Maybe not even a ten-year-old. That’s more what a toddler like Maddy would do. A big girl would sit down across from Dr. Macintosh. So that’s what I force myself to do.
I throw myself onto the seat. My feet can’t touch the floor now. I look down at them and study my shiny black shoes as if for the first time. I’m sure Dr. Macintosh already has a lot of material to write down in his notebook.
“Thank you, Stacey. Is that what you still want to be called? Would you prefer it if I called you Steve?”
“No. Jake is the only one who still calls me that.”
“Jake is the man taking care of you?”
“Yes.”
“He and his wife have been taking care of you for the last year?”
“Yes. But only for a few days like this.”
“How long ago did this change happen?”
“A couple of months ago. It’s hard to know exactly when. We didn’t have a calendar in there.”
“There being a converted school?”
“Yes. An elementary school. I guess he was being ironic or something.”
“How long did it take you to become this age?”
“About five minutes.” My eyes start to water as I remember the pain when I watched Maddy go through her change. “Five very long minutes.”
“I see.”
I look up at him for the first time. He’s so damnably calm as he scribbles notes in his notebook. I want to punch him, not that it’d do anything but break my tiny fist. “No you don’t! You don’t have any idea what it was like!”
“Why don’t you tell me?”
“You’ve seen a car crusher, right?”
“On television. Not in person.”
“Imagine if you were the car, what that would feel like.”
“It wouldn’t be very pleasant, I imagine.”
“Damned right.” I put a hand to my mouth. “Sorry.”
“It’s all right. You can swear if you want. I want you to feel comfortable. Or as comfortable as you can under the circumstances.”
“Thanks.” I look back down at my feet. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Go ahead.”
“Are you mad at me?”
“Do I seem mad at you?”
“Yes.”
“Really?”
I make myself look up again, to meet his eyes. “You’re acting too calm. Like you’re trying to show you aren’t mad at me. Which means you are mad at me.” That’s something I learned in my first career as a police officer. You have to be able to read people to break someone in interrogation.
“I’ll admit I am a little miffed at you. I don’t like when my patients lie to me. It’s hard for therapy to succeed when the patient isn’t being fully honest with her therapist.” Dr. Macintosh smiles and then adds, “But I suppose it’s like Clarita said: if you did tell me the truth I would have sent you to the psych ward for evaluation.”
“You aren’t now, though?”
“No. I wouldn’t have believed something so crazy unless Clarita told me. She would never lie to me.”
“Are you and Dr. Palmer—?” My voice trails off as I’m not sure how a ten-year-old would say fucking.
“An item? That’s a little personal, don’t you think?”
“That must be yes then.”
Dr. Macintosh smiles again. “No. We had a fling when we worked at the same hospital when I was an intern. We decided to remain friends.”
“Friends with benefits?”
“I see this hasn’t changed your personality much.”
“Meaning I’m still a pain?”
“That’s one way to say it. I might have said, ‘combative.’”
“I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to be sorry. It’s who you are. There’s nothing wrong with it.”
“Some people would disagree.”
The doctor nods. Then he puts down his pen. “Tell me Stacey, did you ever get to
try the mirror exercise?”
“Once or twice.”
“What did you come up with?”
“Not much.”
He produces the hand mirror from between his side and the inside of the chair. He hands the mirror to me. “Go ahead and try it now. Describe what you see.”
I hold the mirror up to my new face. I stare at the pudgy cheeks, tiny nose, thick bangs, and of course the slanted eyes behind the bright red glasses. My lower lip trembles a little. “A scared little girl.”
“Is that how you see yourself? As a scared little girl?”
“Right now I do.”
“What are you scared of?”
“That I’ll have to stay like this. That I’ll have to grow up again. That Maddy—” my voice chokes up. I put down the mirror and then try again. “That Maddy will forget about me.”
“By ‘me’ you mean her father?”
“Yes.”
“You still think you are her father?”
“I’ll always be her father. No matter what I look like.”
“Why do you think she’ll forget about you?”
“Because she’s regressing.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’re the doctor.”
“I suppose I am. And I could give you some medical definitions and textbook cases and whatnot. That’s not what you’re interested in, though. To put it simply, you think her old life—as your daughter—is becoming like a dream to her. When she finally wakes up, it’s all going to evaporate the way our dreams usually do.”
“Yes. That’s why Dr. Palmer wanted us to see you.”
“That’s one of the reasons.”
“What other reason is there?”
Dr. Macintosh picks up his pen again. He flips back a few pages. “Your ‘grandmother’ Mrs. Madigan says Madison has been acting out. She’s been throwing tantrums when she doesn’t get her way. Clarita suggested the same thing. Would you say that’s accurate?”
“Yes.”
“So she’s acting like a normal five-year-old?”
“Yes.”
“And you think that’s a bad thing?”
“It is when she’s really twenty-three.”
“There we are.” Dr. Macintosh smiles at me. He leans forward in his chair; I lean back in mine as far as I can. “The other thing I want to help Madison with is to make the adjustment to this new life.”
Chances Are Omnibus (Gender Swap Fiction) Page 39