Amber Smith             by: Rocketman

 

I came to know Amber while I was sitting out on the porch trying to figure out a way to get back into my house. A bit of an accident.

It was one of those hot days in August when the only thing that gets you through is knowing that this is the worst it’ll get.

She walked down the sidewalk, drawing the attention of a few passerbys with her small, blue-lycra dress which showed enough cleavage to get your mind going without being indecent exposure.

Her black heels sounded against the sizzling cement. A pair of darkly-tinted sunglasses covered her eyes. Long blond, shimmering hair fell naturally on her shoulders. The chest of her skimpy dress bulged to occupy a set of womanly breasts, with the faint suggestion of a bra underneath.

Her face shone brilliantly under the rays of the morning sun. She didn’t seem all that well tanned. Probably of Swedish descent. Like all blondes.

She had a slight frame, probably about sixty-four inches tall and not much more than a hundred pounds.

One of those girls you see around every so often. The kind common to your high school years.

She carried with her a brown briefcase not at all that different than the kind I owned.

I suppose you’re wondering wherein the accident lies.

Well, you see, I’d locked my keys in my house.

I went out to get the paper, still in a haze due to the early hour, and was astonished by how hot it was outside. Blinking a few times, I closed the door behind me without thinking and reached down for the paper, not realizing what I had just done for a few moments.

By then, I had already skimmed through three headline articles.

Getting back in wasn’t impossible by any means, I could just toss a rock through one of my windows and clamber back inside. It just wasn’t a very smart thing to do.

So, there I sat, trying to conjure up a way of getting back inside without much harm being done to my humble abode.

She came near my position and looked me over for a moment.

I expected her to have her look and then be gone.

"Is something wrong?"

I glanced up at her. Those green eyes of hers seemed sincere.

"Yes, I’m locked out."

She looked down at the sidewalk a moment, then over at me on my porch.

"Why are you just sitting there?"

"Trying to figure out a way to get back in."

She chuckled a moment, "What have you come up with so far?"

"A brick, perhaps."

"Do you have one?"

"Not on hand."

She smiled, "May I offer a suggestion?"

"Go ahead."

Amber walked over to where I was sitting, "Stop thinking and try one of your ideas."

"Such as?"

"Well, I don’t know if you’ve thought of this, but you can jimmy the lock on your door with a small piece of metal."

"If I had one."

She set her briefcase down and looked around.

"I’m sure we can find something that will work."

After a bit of looking, she found a paper clip on the ground.

"This should work, just bend it straight and try it in the lock. I suggest the back door, if that’s at all possible."

"Thank you so much."

She didn’t say anything in response, she just picked up her case and followed me as I walked around the house.

"What are you doing?"

"I have to see that this works for you."

"It’s all right. I have it pretty well in hand."

"You can’t just shrug me off, I’m deep into this."

"You are?"

"Sure."

"All right."

I tried the paper clip on the backdoor and after a few different configurations, it unlocked the door. Immediate relief filled me.

"This is so great, thank you."

She chuckled, "I’m the one who should be thanking you."

"What do you mean?"

She looked through the door.

"Looks like a nice house."

"Please, come in."

I guided her into the living room and offered her a seat by the couch.

"Can you stay long?"

"I’ll stay a while."

"Can I get you anything?"

"Breakfast."

"Seems like a lot."

"I got you back into your house."

I paused a moment.

"True. What would you like?"

"I would love to have a pair of eggs, over-easy with hashbrowns, toast, and juice."

Just what I liked for breakfast.

"Sure thing, but one question first. I feel really silly asking it now. But, what is your name?"

She set her briefcase next to the couch and stood up. "Amber Smith. Yours?"

"Samuel Anderson. Call me Sam."

"Call me Amber."

"Ok." We stared at one another for a moment. Then as though suddenly remembering, I went over to the kitchen. She followed me.

My phone rang. Being closer, Amber answered it.

"Hello?"

She listened a moment, looked over at me and sighed. "Yes."

Then she hung up.

"What?! Was it for me?"

She nodded, "It was Jennifer."

"Jennifer?"

"Jennifer Harris."

"What did she want?"

"She was just calling to confirm and that you would know for what."

"Jennifer…." I thought about the name a moment as though it were a remnant from a waking dream. And just like a dream I had a vague recollection of the name but no way to attach it to anything.

"Did she sound friendly to you?"

"Indeed, quite pleasant."

"That’s good, I suppose."

She nodded.

"I’m sorry, of course, breakfast," I reminded myself.

She smiled and sat at the kitchen table. Before I turned my attention to cooking breakfast for her, I noticed she was inspecting her hands with their trim nails.

Contrary to the stereotypical woman, she seemed not to care for length. In a fingernail sense.

I took out the frying pan from the cupboard and inspected my own nails a moment. The pan was beginning to show its age but my nails were as well-groomed as ever.

Opening the fridge, I took out two eggs, the orange juice container and a loaf of bread. I worked in silence, and Amber chose not to address me during this time.

Things went smoothly. I got a potato from the basement and sliced it up with a hasher.

When I was done, I presented the meal to her, gave her a napkin and smiled.

She looked it over a moment, then glanced up at me.

"What about you?"

"I’m fine, I can wait."

"How about we share?"

"You think there’s enough?"

"I won’t take much."

"If that’s all right with you."

"I’d be more concerned that it were right with you."

"I’m fine with that arrangement."

"Good."

I pulled an extra utensil out of the drawer, moved a chair next to her and sat down.

"How will we divvy things up?"

She shrugged.

We ended up splitting the meal down the middle.

Amber graciously volunteered to take care of the dish.

"Where were you headed?" I asked her.

She stuck the plate in the dish rack and turned to face me, wiping her hands with a dish towel.

"Home."

"Where do you live?"

"On Fifth Avenue."

"This street?"

"Yes."

"Do you have to be back soon?"

She didn’t answer at first. Setting the dish towel on the rack, she sat back down in the seat next to me.

"Do you have to leave?" I asked.

"No."

"Would you like to sit in the living room?"

"I would."

We walked over to the living room and sat together in the brown couch next to the front window. She glanced through the window a moment.

"Why do you live alone?"

"How do you know that I live alone?"

She did not respond back.

I asked again.

"I know, okay."

"What’s it to you?"

"You seem like you could use some company."

"Do you mean yourself?"

"Oh, much more."

"What do you recommend?"

She leaned closer. I restrained myself from looking down the front of her blouse.

"I met a pleasant young woman at the supermarket who invited me to come to a woman’s club meeting."

"I don’t think I can go to that."

"Why?"

"It’s a woman’s club!"

"Oh come on, it’ll be fun."

"When is it?"

"Tonight at seven."

"I’m free at seven."

"Then why don’t you come to it?"

"I wouldn’t feel right."

"Don’t worry about that, I’ll be there."

"You will?"

"Of course." I felt a little bit better, even a bit excited to be going to a woman’s club. "What about that Jennifer Harris on the phone?"

"She said that it would be tomorrow."

"For what?"

"I figured you knew."

"No."

"Don’t you know? She said you would know."

"No."

"An appointment."

"For what?"

She didn’t say anything for a moment, she just looked at me skeptically, as though I was losing my mind. Perhaps I was. I couldn’t even remember making an appointment for something.

I asked her again.

"Jennifer’s Salon."

"Salon?"

"Yes."

"That’s not possible, why would I go to a salon? If I need a trim or something I go to a barber’s shop, not a salon. Women go to salons."

"Well then maybe I could go? I’ve been thinking of trying a new style."

"Sure, go ahead."

She smiled.

"That’s sure a nice dress you have on."

"I like wearing them. Men think that women wear nice dresses for attention. Sure, but that’s only half of it. When you put on a dress, whether it’s skimpy or flowing, it has to be good with you first, otherwise there’s no point in wearing it."

She seemed to jump a bit over the normal response when she answered me, as though she knew something.

"It’s been nice spending time with you, but I have to work."

"Perhaps I can help you?" She’d jumped again. How did she know that I worked at home.

I tried lying, "I drive to work."

"Really? No car and you drive?"

She’d noticed. Well, she had been all the way around my house.

"Ok, so I don’t drive. I just don’t think you could help me."

"Maybe I could."

"I write for a living, essays for magazines and occasionally novels."

"Then I can help."

"What’s your line of work?"

"I’m a writer too."

"Why the briefcase?"

She stood up, opened the briefcase and presented its contents to me. I saw brad-bound thick prose and thinner, stapled essays. Rather like mine.

"You didn’t steal this case from me, did you? Because it looks just like mine."

"I would never steal."

Perusing the essays and works though revealed a notable difference. I’d never seen any of these before, nor would I feel prompted to write anything like them.

"The Ascendance of the Soccer Mom" for an essay, and a manuscript entitled, "The Unrepentant Love." A mix of weepy sentimental romanticism and empowering feminism, it would seem.

This lady was something else.

"I doubt that you could be of much help to me."

"Listen, just try writing with me one time."

I was still hesitant, but took her up on her offer.

We went up the stairs to my work room. She crouched behind me and watched as I turned on the computer.

I went straight into one of my newest works. As soon as I began typing, she halted me with a "Wait a minute."

"What?"

"That is such a dry sentence. Add some emotion to it, some feeling."

"This is my work."

"Let me try something with it a moment." I glared at her, fearful she might destroy what I was trying to achieve. Still, for some reason, I relented my seat.

She took over the chair and worked furiously at the board, clicking swiftly. I could never seem to manage much more than a few hen pecks every so often, building to a fury, before subsiding to a more relaxed pace and then a few hen pecks. Where upon I started the whole cycle all over again.

But not her, her fingers seemed build for overdrive. Or were they? They didn’t seem all that dissimilar from mine. Maybe it was just her mind pushing them past the mediocrity of hen pecks with ideas?

I stood behind her and watched curiously as she paused for a moment, stretched her neck and sighed.

Then, without missing a beat, she went back to typing at the same speed she’d been going a moment ago. I was truly in awe.

Crouching behind the chair, just as she had done, I watched her hands fly across the keyboard constructing prose. Quite a while passed before she finally took a break from it and by that time she had filled up at least ten pages, a feat that often took me a whole day to match.

But would the prose be comparable in quality to mine? Speed and quality can almost never be achieved.

She seemed to be quite close to almost. I spotted a few easily remedied typos here and there, but all in all the sentence structure was exquisite.

"How did you learn to do this?"

"I didn’t."

"You just knew how to type like this from birth?"

"Not from birth. It wasn’t all that long ago I began typing like this."

"Did you take a course in speed typing?"

"Nope."

"Then how did you get so good at it."

"Something about me changed."

"What do you mean?"

She stood up from the seat and announced, "I’m going to stay here."

"What?"

"I’m staying with you."

"You’re moving in? But I hardly know you."

"Then you should get better acquainted with me."

She wrapped her hand around my wrist and dragged me to one of the other rooms. My bedroom. We’d passed it on the way up.

It had my bed, a few dressers filled with clothes, a shelf of books, paintings and a full-length mirror set into the wall. Amber sighed and looked into the mirror.

I faced her as best I could from this position.

"What are you doing?"

She lowered the straps of her dress and slid it down to the floor.

"Why are you undressing?"

Still no words from her as she stood there in a bra and panties.

She unclasped the bra and slid it off. My eyes widened a moment as I thought about the improbability of all this.

Her breasts shifted down against her chest due to the force of gravity. She had really nice looking nipples on them. They looked like they needed to be touched.

The panties came next, exposing a triangle of blond pubic hair with a pussy poking through.

I looked up and down. Shifting between her breasts and womanhood.

Drawn to her nice nipples, I inched closer and reach out a hand to caress them. She did not stop me.

Flicking the nipple end with my pointer finger against my thumb, she gasped.

"That was good."

I walked behind her and brought my hands around to caress her breasts. She began panting. The nipples grew steadily harder as I worked on them.

Her hips began a sexual, seemingly unconscious thrusting.

I slid my hands down her front, to her warm sex.

Using my fingertips, I teased her labia with a circular motion. Moisture was beginning to build up there. She staggered back and lay on the bed.

I continued my actions, working on her clitoris. She began screaming, her hips thrusting powerfully.

I worked my fingering into her opening, still teasing the area around it.

Her skin was sweaty, her screaming seemed building to a crescendo. A peak.

And the peak was reached when she came.

The neighbors probably could hear that last one. I suddenly realize what I was doing and looked down at my hands. They were slick with vaginal secretions. I pushed open the door to the bathroom and rinsed my hands off in the sink.

I used a little soap to get rid of the lingering odor and dried them.

Amber stood beside the door, naked.

"I’m gonna take a shower", she said.

I stared at her, incredulous.

"What just happened?"

"An orgasm, it’s perfectly natural."

"But I barely know you!"

"What better way to get acquainted?"

"You’re crazy!"

"Whatever, but now I must take a shower."

"Sure." I handed the bathroom over to her.

"What have I done?" I muttered to myself right after the door closed.

Listening a moment, I could hear as she walked around and hummed a little song to herself. Thinking about the melody a moment, I tried to place it.

She opened the shower door and closed it. I shut my eyes and heard the water turn on. The handle squeaked faintly. Rushing water came next.

Probably a nice suds-down first. Then maybe she’d wash her hair. I only had generic shampoo. What a pity.

Time seemed to melt away with the flow of the water. And I couldn’t help but hang on every bit of information I received.

The faint squeaking came again. She was getting out.

Had I left any towels on the rack? Hopefully I had.

The door to the bedroom opened. She walked out, naked, and checked herself out in the full-length mirror. Beads of water dripped off her body and onto the floor.

I was near hysterics. "The carpet!"

"Whoops." She rushed over and grabbed a towel from the bathroom, her breasts jostling about as she did.

Wrapping the towel around herself, she grabbed another and laid it on her blond hair, which now clung to the back of her neck.

"What are you gonna wear?" I asked, figuring she would just put on her clothes from before.

"I’ll put on what I have for now. But I really should get something else for the woman’s club, something more flowing."

What was going on here?! I should be getting rid of her!

"Perhaps you better leave."

"I’m not going to leave. I can’t leave."

"You can’t leave?"

"That’s right, I have to stay here."

"Why?"

"Because I can’t leave and you just have to deal with that."

"What?!"

"Do you think a pair of earrings would be nice?"

"Why can’t you leave?"

"Because that’s the way it is." She put on the clothes she had and smiled.

"I’ll be back in a little bit."

"How will you get back in? What if I don’t let you back in?"

She didn’t say anything, she just walked past me, out the door and downstairs. A few seconds later, the door opens and closes.

I imagined her walking down the porch in her lovely little dress, headed who-knows-where and without a care in the world. I felt frozen, perhaps by terror of what was going on and that I didn’t know where all of it was leading.

At least I took solace in the computer screen. Its effervescence reached into my mind. Drifting through the hallways, as though in a dream state, I somehow found the work room and looked it over.

The keyboard seemed so close to me that I could almost touch it without bending over. But I do not reach for it, I merely contemplate what I am going to do. A story is lurking up there in my head, fresh as a ripe apple, filled with sweet moments that will surely turn to the bitter taste of a grapefruit when they enter the realm of the page.

Release for this tale which has just entered me seemed so close, I need but to sit down. I do not. I stand for the longest time, merely thinking about it till my thoughts shift to Amber.

She entered my life just a short time ago, yet had adjusted and seemed to have taken it over. How does one adjust to entering someone’s life? How does that someone adjust? Is this the right thing for either of us to do?

How will those earrings fit her? Will they look nice? What will she wear, all-in-all? Must it simply be nice for the occasion or elegant? Where will she get it? From home? From a store? How much will it cost then? Can she afford it? How will she pay for it? How will she pay her bills? Will she have to live on the street? Does she already live on the street? Does she have a job? Does she enjoy it? Does she have friends?

Far too many questions to be addressed and reasonably answered.

What about her clothes then? Will she bring them here? Put them all in here? Where will they go? What about food? What will she eat? Will there be enough for three-square meals?

The door opened behind me.

Amber came around with a plate in her hands with a sandwich cut in half and a pickle spear. Without saying a word, she clicked off the computer. The screen went to black.

"What did you bring? Did you buy anything?"

She’s wearing the same thing from before.

"I’ll put on this nice dress in a little bit, right before it’s time to go to the woman’s club meeting."

"May I see it?"

She didn’t say anything. She just handed me half of the sandwich.

We ate together there.

When we were done, I took the dish down to the kitchen and rinsed it off. We got prepared to go.

Amber’s dress was lovely. Sharp red and made of cotton.

"Time to go", she said.

The woman’s club met at a house nearby, it turned out. A dozen or so nicely-dressed women were already there. None of them seemed to take offense to me being present.

But I was left out, chair-wise, so I was forced to sit on the floor or stand, if I wished, behind Amber most of the time. The room appeared artfully decorated, nice paintings and all the pleasant touches of a woman.

I listening in on their conversation every so often. Trading recipes, tips and stories.

As their conversations turned to local gossip, and various other matters not of interest to me, I slowly tuned them out.

This was no fun at all for me. Why had I even come? Amber was really enjoying herself though, sipping tea and giggling when the stories and gossip turned toward the humorous.

"I’m leaving." The chatting stopped. The woman all were hush.

"Umm, well, excuse me a moment", muttered nervously Amber to the befuddled women.

She hustled into the hallway. "What are you doing?" She said.

"I don’t want to be here. I don’t like it."

"Just deal with it, ok."

"No, you can stay, but I’m leaving right now."

She glared at me and walked back into the room where the others were and said, "I want to apologize for that…."

The rest of her words merged into a mumble as she moved away from me.

I stood there for quite some time, listening as the women returned to their pleasant chuckling and giggles. One of them went past me on her way to the bathroom. I received no acknowledgment from her.

After much time passed, she shuffles around and gets up, bidding adieu to one another. Amber joins me after a moment.

We walk back to my house in silence.

Darkness has come a long time ago. All is still in the night, save a lone cricket chirping in the grass. As we walk, I wonder how I got involved in all this. Surely, I’d contemplated this before, but it hadn’t yet been resolved. Why was Amber here? What did she want?

Why me?

Still unknown was how she got inside before. Did she steal my key before she left to get that dress and whatever else she got?

By the time we were home, these questions still had to be answered.

"Why me, Amber?"

She didn’t speak at first, she just paused a moment and looked toward the kitchen.

"Are you hungry?" I asked her.

She shook her head. "I just want to rest."

"Why me, Amber?"

"I can’t even think about that right now, it’s too big….please."

I felt sympathetic, but that only goes so far. What were the sleeping arrangements going to be?

"You only have one bed, right?"

"Correct."

"Then that’s what it’ll be. I’ve already taken a shower, so I’ll just change into something more comfortable and sleep."

"Okay, I guess. I like to stay up and read and write sometimes though."

"I see."

"I’ll turn the lights down."

"Okay."

Time for me to take a shower. I follow her up to the bedroom and watch as she slips off her dress, once again, right in front of me and admires herself in the mirror.

Then, to my shock, she takes a nightgown out of one of my drawers and puts it on.

"Where’s my clothes?"

I get silence.

I looked through the drawers and found blouses in place of my cotton shirts, jeans of a different cut, panties, bras, and pantyhose. All the clothes a woman could ever want, but none even resembling the ones I was used to.

"What have you done with my clothes?"

"Got rid of them."

"Why?"

"Why don’t you try these?"

"I’m not a cross-dresser!"

"It won’t be cross-dressing."

"Of course it will!"

"Don’t worry about it. You’re not putting them on for sexual enjoyment or anything like that. You’ve got nothing else to wear."

Due in large part to her meddling.

"I’m not. I’m going to sleep naked."

Her head lifted up and she hiked off her gown. Then she slipped back into the bed.

"What are you doing?"

More silence from her.

I was feeling quite perturbed by all this.

But I undressed and got into bed next to her. And quickly shut my eyes in sleep.

 

Waking from a sleep interrupted neither by dreams or terrors, I looked over at Amber. She stared right back at me.

"It’s near time for that appointment. Gotta get ready."

"Breakfast?"

"Overslept."

I checked the clock on the dresser. "What time?"

"Nine."

"Quarter till that."

"Yup." She put on her underclothes, a pair of jeans and a blouse.

"What will I wear?"

"Find something good."

"It’s all women’s clothes!"

"They’re still good clothes."

We come to an agreement that has me clothed. No time for meals though. I intend to hang behind, but Amber drags me with her.

"I need you."

"Bullcrap."

"Come on."

The salon’s not that far from the house. As we travel to it, I ponder how accepting I’ve been about this whole situation. Would a regular person respond much the same?

Jennifer’s Salon was a small place and it reeked off dyes, hair sprays, shampoos and faintly vague odors that had a feminine edge to them. Pink was the overall motif with black and white tiles on the floor, a manicure table off in one of it’s corners, a restroom and a pair of washbasins and dryers, with a couple of stylist chairs in front of the mirrors.

And with items of importance to one’s tresses set on the sides of it. Jennifer, a college-aged girl with shiny brown hair that had blond streaks, likely artificially-added, on either side of the hair above her ears.

She had on a tube top that held the post-pubescent curves of her body like shrink wrap holds a CD. Many of which where lying about nearby.

The gray skirt she wore fell to about the knee. Black sandals with interlaced, string-like fronts covered her feet.

She grinned a moment and greeted Amber. After a quick discussion, Jennifer went to work on her. I sat down in one of the chairs nearby and watched as she washed Amber’s hair.

With no magazines around to divert my attention, I listened to Amber and Jennifer chat with one another, in the hope that she would reveal something of her past to Jennifer. An opportunity at gaining information that I had squandered the night before. If only I’d paid more attention to the whole proceedings.

Amber didn’t seem all that forthcoming to Jennifer. Perhaps she just didn’t like me. Maybe it was me. Whenever a question about something personal came up, Amber diverted it by asking something about Jennifer.

Since Jennifer seemed to enjoy talking about herself, the things she’d accomplished and her esteemed background, diverting the conversation wasn’t hard.

I got nothing out of Jennifer’s questions about Amber. So I sulked my way out with her, looking back at Jennifer, who was counting the bills she’d been given.

All Amber had gotten was a bit of a trim and wash. She’d backed off from the idea of going with a new style for the time being.

"Let’s go to the mall," she said "That way we can do a little shopping and eat as well." I oddly had no problem with this. But then, come to think of it, why should I?

 

We walked back to my house, Amber holding one bag of clothes with her right hand and me holding one in my left hand. We had salad and clam chowder for lunch.

She laid the bag she was carrying on the couch and I put mine down beside it.

A rebellious idea filled me, "I’m gonna go out for a second."

"I’ll come with you."

"No, actually I’d prefer that you didn’t. I’m just gonna be gone for a few minutes. I want some private time."

She chuckled, "You don’t get it."

"Get what?"

"Okay, go ahead, leave. If that’s what you really what."

"What do you mean by that?"

"If you can’t figure it out then you must be even more diluted that you think you are."

"You’re talking nonsense."

"The only one talking nonsense is you. And thereby, me."

"I don’t follow…."

"Go ahead, go wherever you want to go, break off, but be warned. I may not be here when you get back. And you might be sorry when you find out what’s going on, when you look at the world and see it without my help, when you see things as they really are….you’ll be surprised. But go if you want to, I can’t keep you."

I had an idea as to what she was getting at, but figured it was just smoke. I walked out the door and she didn’t follow.

The air seemed a little crisper than a moment ago.

I walked down the block to the local liquor market and bought a six-pack.

The clerk, a young man of Arabian-descent smiled at me a bit too wide and asked, "Will there be anything else, ma’am?"

When you have one of those moments where reality hits you in the face and sucks all the air out of your chest, it’s never the moment of revelation that does it to you, because you’re in the denial portion of coping with that reality.

"What?!"

"Will there be anything else?"

"What did you say at the end?"

"Ma’am?"

"Yes. Why did you call me that?"

He held his hands up, "I’m sorry, miss, I meant no disrespect if I say something wrong. I’ve been here just a few month."

"Why are you calling me ‘miss’?"

For a moment, he appeared even more perplexed than I.

"Are you not…woman?"

"Do I look like a woman?!"

"Yes, indeed so."

"How can you tell?"

"Your breasts, intended most respectable, are quite…apparent."

I looked down, seeing nothing upon my chest.

Then, I looked up and noticed the security camera feed on a black and white screen. The image on it appeared reasonably like me. But after staring a moment, something happened to it.

Kinda like what they say happens when you try to focus on something in a dream, it just melts away. Well, I began to melt away in the picture, my form altering.

All this time I felt nothing, for, as I was about to realize, no actual change was occurring to me.

When the form stopped changing on the screen I realized it had taken on a familiar shape. And at the moment I connected that form with another, reality hit me. A truth that would have been impossible to my mind a few minutes ago was cascading over my neurons.

I was Amber Smith.

And an even more astounding truth followed it.

I’d been Amber for these past days.

Had I always been Amber? No, I’d changed, somehow, completely and permanently, I’d become a woman.

The rest was just fragments. Why had I not realized this before? I’d denied it. I started out my denying the reality of my new existence and to back it up, I transformed Amber into a separate personality.

And dealt with her by making her another person. But when she spoke, it was me talking.

I thought back to that day.

I was coming home with my briefcase, but couldn’t find my keys. Often as a child I talked to myself. But it became a necessity for my sanity that I talk with Amber as though she were beside me. I sat on the porch a moment and wrestled with ideas till the metal notion came to me.

I fought off my little shadow, Amber, at every turn, not realizing that she was in my skin, that she was my skin.

‘Splitting’ breakfast, like an tea party with an imaginary friend. No answers where the questions could not provide a logical answer. Masturbation. Shutting my eyes in the shower and just hearing, transferring it to ‘Sam’.

Sleeping naked, fantasizing about writing while buying clothes, tossing out the old and putting in the new. Female and male inter-conflict. My briefcase with the stories I’d done as a woman. Lashing out, blocking out and enjoying the woman’s club conversation simultaneously. Getting the salon treatment. Carrying a pair of clothes bags in either arm and finally, refusing that my female persona rule me.

I staggered back a moment and took it all in.

So much adjustment, so much to know and I rebelled against my womanly self in the end. I could have taken a gentler road with her leading me, but I chose to take it all on by myself.

Should I have done that? Probably not, but it’s better to face the truth and struggle like a newborn against the trials of reality than deny what you are and live happily in a false world.

I stepped back to the counter and reassured the clerk as to my health. With a smile, I paid for the beers and held them to my chest.

Yes, things were going to be just fine after all.

 

 

The End

Author’s Note: I hate doing endings, they always seem so cut and dry when I do them. All in all this was a great story for me to write because I like the concept. For those of you who merely SKIPPED AHEAD IN THE STORY!! Naughty naughty. Go back to where you were and read it. It’s not that long.

Now, I’m going to talk about the inspiration and I hope I’ve dispelled any people who haven’t finished the whole story yet. If there are any left, GIT!

All gone?

SPOILERS
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Ok, I think they’re all gone.

One more sentence to be sure that they can’t see.

I’m just so worried about spoiling endings. But I’m the biggest spoiler around, only when my stories are not involved though. :-)

Anyway this was taken from the thought-provoking, albeit, ultra-violent movie "Fight Club" about a normal guy who’s best friend if actually an alter-ego of himself. Of course the simplicity and ‘ahhhh’ factor of the movie surpasses what I’ve written here.

That movie, is about "multiple personalities" and "channeled aggression". My story is a little more benign in subject matter compared with the movie. I believe the themes of my story, perhaps a bit too much spelled out in the end, are "denial" and "post-traumatic stress." The sensation of Sam’s torment over being so suddenly and drastically altered, from male to female, isn’t as well expressed as I would have liked it to be, but since I said it now, people reading it again will keep those concepts in mind. And since I planned that as a resolution in the story line, the trend toward the outcome is clear, even at the beginning.

 

 

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