How I Spent My Summer Vacation

by C. Sprite

 

Chapter Twenty-One

 

By Thanksgiving I felt that I had plenty to be thankful for. I had a new name and a new life. I knew that I still faced many hurdles, but I had made my decision and I would continue down the path I had chosen.

With the onslaught of the colder whether, I had given up skirts in favor of jeans, but they always hugged my body and reinforced the image of my being a girl. I fixed my hair every morning and never wore it in a ponytail except at home. There probably wasn't any need to keep driving the point home, since everyone seemed to believe it now, but I enjoyed doing it. I still couldn't use the girl's restrooms.

With the certain knowledge that I would still look and sound like a female after school had finished for the year, I decided to line up my summer employment. The Tuesday after Thanksgiving, I called KBXF and asked to speak with Mr. Graham. When the receptionist asked who was calling I gave her my name.

"Ashley? Hi, it's Janice. How have you been?"

"Hi, Janice. I'm doing fine. How are you?"

"Great. I'm getting married in June."

"That's wonderful. Congratulations. Uh, I assume it's Dave?"

"Who else, after three years together? I finally got him to pop the question."

"I'm so happy for you. I hope that I'm invited to the wedding."

"Of course. Will you be out here?"

"I hope so. If not, I'll make a special trip."

"I'll add your name to the guest list. Are you going to ask Mr. Graham for a summer job?"

"Yes, I'm hoping that something will be available. But I'll make sure that I have your day free."

"Wonderful. I'm glad that I was here to handle your call. Hold on, I'll put you through."

A second later, Mr. Graham's secretary answered. I told her who I was.

"Miss James, it's nice to talk with you again. Did you get that job with the station in Massachusetts?"

"No, I didn't, but thank you for asking. I had too much going on so I never applied."

"That's too bad. They sent a letter thanking Mr. Graham for sending them the demo tape."

"My situation has changed again and I'm going to be available this coming summer. I was wondering if the station might have any reporter slots open for this summer?"

"It's a little early to know that, but I'm sure that Mr. Graham would like to talk to you. Hold on and I'll put you through."

A second later I heard, "Ashley?"

"Hi, Mr. Graham."

"It's wonderful to hear from you. How are you doing?"

"I'm doing fine. How's everything at the station?"

"We're doing good. Are you working?"

"No, I'm just going to school. I was wondering if you'll have any positions open this summer?"

"We'll make one for you if we don't have any vacant. Will you be able to work full time?"

"As many hours as you need me."

"Good, good. We were just talking about you last week."

"Me?"

"Yes. We were discussing starting an intern program for high school kids. As you know, we already have several intern positions for college students, so the idea is to create an available pool of younger local talent before they get enticed away by the big stations."

"That sounds wonderful, Mr. Graham."

"If it comes about, it will all be because of you. We had always ignored the local high school kids because we felt they weren't mature enough to be seriously considered for important jobs. You opened our eyes. I wish you were living out here."

"I've talked it over with my Mom a few times."

"And?"

"She's considered it, but it would be difficult, financially."

"If you'll sign a contract with the station, we'll help with your relocation. We'll help you find a new house, pay the moving company, and help you sell your old house."

"Really?"

"Really."

"How long of a contract?"

"A year and half. We wouldn't want to keep you from going to college when you graduate from high school, but we'd hope that you might want to work for the station after college."

"You'd want me to start right away?"

"As soon as you could get here."

"You have a reporter job open?"

"No, we have an anchor job opening soon."

"Who's leaving?"

"The woman who replaced you. She hasn't been happy in our little community here, and we haven't been entirely happy with her. She's asked to be released from her contract so she could pursue a job in a large metropolitan market, and we've agreed to release her as soon as we could find a replacement. That was what led to the discussion about high school interns. Mr. Pilere said it was too bad we couldn't find another Ashley James."

"So you'd want me to co-anchor the six and ten with Don?"

"Exactly. What do you think?"

"I'd love to come back. I'd be there in two days if it was up to me, but– my Mom has to make the final decision."

"Tell her that you'll resume work at your former anchorwoman salary. That should help with the expenses until she can find a job."

"Okay, Mr. Graham. I hope that I can convince her to move out there."

"Tell you what; I'm going to assume, for the time being, that you'll be coming to join us here in a couple of weeks. I'll hold the job open for you, even though we've already begun conducting interviews, so I'll need to know as soon as possible."

"I'll speak with her as soon as she comes home from work, and I'll call you tomorrow, or Thursday at the latest, if she needs to think about it for a full day."

"Ok, Ashley. I'll talk to you then."

"Good-bye, Mr. Graham. And thank you."

After I hung up the phone I felt like I was soaring in the clouds. I had missed working at the station since I had left, and now I was being offered the opportunity to return. I felt like doing handsprings, and probably would have, if I knew how. But instead I forced myself to settle down and start my homework. I wanted to have it out of the way while I worked on Mom tonight. I found it hard to concentrate, but I kept redirecting my focus back to my schoolwork.

 

I waited until we were eating dinner before I told Mom about the job offer.

"They called here?"

"No, I called them to tell them that I would be available for work in June."

"And they offered you your old job as anchor, at a salary of $5,000 a week, if you can start soon?"

"Yes, the woman who replaced me wants out of her contract."

"But wouldn't you still have the same problem? You can't take the physical for health insurance."

"You thought that Suzanne might be able to help."

"Maybe, but we can't ask her to falsify documents."

"How about if I declined the insurance?"

"Hmm, that might work. But the station might wonder why you've refused coverage."

"If we didn't have to move, I could tell them that I was covered by your policy at work."

"I'll have to quit my job, though, and the health insurance and life insurance policies will expire thirty days after I leave the company."

"What should we do, Mom?"

"Do you want this?"

"More than anything."

She took a deep breath, and then nodded. "Okay, we'll go for it and hope that we can find a way around the insurance problem."

"We might find ourselves in a strange city with you and me both out of work."

"I'm sure Aunt Sharon and Uncle Bob will help us a little, if things get too bad."

"And I have the money that I earned this summer."

"That's for your college education. I wouldn't want to touch that unless we're destitute."

 

I called Mr. Graham the next day and told him that we were coming to Illinois. He said that he was delighted with the decision and that he would immediately find a real estate agent that would help us find a house and sell our old house. He'd also have his secretary make arrangements with a moving company to pick up our household possessions and bring them out there as soon as we could fix a date.

Mom had already called Aunt Sharon and told her of the planned move. She told Mom how excited she was and that she'd start looking for homes immediately. I knew that we’d never get anything as great as their house, but in visiting a few on-line brokers, we discovered that the real estate prices in Illinois seemed to be a bit lower than the prices for homes in Massachusetts. We hoped that we might be able to trade up a bit, but our present two bedroom home was fine and we'd be happy to get something as nice.

Mom gave her two weeks notice at work, and found that with her unused vacation time and personal leave time, she'd get an extra three weeks pay after leaving. It would come in handy.

A representative from the moving company came to look at our house and estimate how much space would be required on a truck capable of carrying the contents of several homes at once. He gave us a lot of folded cartons and told us to call if we needed more.

Jennifer was extremely upset when I broke the news to her, but I asked her to come visit as soon as we were settled and she came around a little. Until I had contacted Mr. Graham, I had only worn jeans to school. I had retired my original jeans and picked up several more pair of the skin-tight type. But since making the decision to move, I had started wearing skirts most days and dressing as a girly-girl. The other kids had come around more and more, and I had begun to feel more welcome than I ever had as Jimmy. I would definitely miss the girl friends that I had grown up with, and who had been so supportive during the past month. I felt sure that they knew the truth about me, or thought that they did, but they had never questioned me.

I continued with school for the two weeks that we had left, but it seemed that whenever I wasn't in school, or sleeping, I was packing boxes. I didn't know that we had so much stuff. Mrs. Corvaar seemed happy to see me leaving, and she had smiled when I gave her the letter from Mom that announced our planned departure. She informed me that my school transcript would be forwarded when my new school requested them. She asked about our plans, but I simply told her that my Mom was being transferred.

I don't think we rested until the moving van pulled away from the house with all our worldly possessions sealed up inside, except for what we had in our suitcases or the trunk of the car. Our final evening meal in my hometown would be at Jennifer's house, so we closed up the house and drove over there. The real estate agent already had a key to the house and would begin showing it to prospective buyers as soon as tomorrow.

Jennifer welcomed us when we arrived, and invited us to come in and relax. Although the movers had done most of the heavy work, we had worked hard finishing up the final packing and were happy to sit down. Mrs. Crowley came up from her basement workshop and we talked while we waited for dinner to cook.

"I had a chance to watch the tape that you gave Jennifer," Mrs. Crowley said to me. "It was wonderful. And now you're going back to work at that same station?"

"Yes. I loved it there. I did the six o'clock and ten o'clock news programs during the week, and sometimes had other assignments on weekends, like covering parades or special events."

"That's so exciting. We'll be able to tell everyone that we knew you before you became famous."

"Too late, Mom," Jennifer said. "Michelle is already famous out where she's going. One of her new stories was even seen nationally last summer."

"Well, she'll be more famous now because she'll be doing it permanently instead of as a summer job. How will you handle your school work, Michelle?"

"I'll have to go to the station right after school each day, to prepare for the six o'clock broadcast, but once that's over I'll have plenty of time to do my homework. Unless something of unusual importance happens, the broadcast at ten is almost the same as the broadcast at six. A lot of stations in smaller markets just replay the earlier broadcast to save on staff size, but KBXF does four live news broadcasts each day."

"I wish we could pick it up here," Jennifer said.

I smiled. "If anything special happens, I'll send you a copy of the broadcast."

"When do you start?" Mrs. Crowley asked.

"On Monday the 3^rd," I said. "I'd like to start sooner, but the person I'm replacing asked to finish out the year once she'd been informed that the station had found a replacement. The extra two weeks will give us time to do some house hunting and get settled."

"You mean you don't have a place to stay yet?" Jennifer asked.

"We'll stay at my sister's house for a couple of weeks," my mom said, "until we can find a house or condo to rent while we search for a house and have the closing."

"It's nice that you'll have family close," Mrs. Crowley said.

"Yes," Mom said. "It's been lonely here since they moved away, and my mother moved to Florida. When Michelle goes off to college, it'll be nice having my sister's family nearby."

 

After dinner, we prepared to leave. Mom was going to drive as far as she could and then we'd find a motel. I had bought Christmas gifts for Mrs. Crowley and Jennifer and I gave them to them with the instructions that they weren't to open them until Christmas. I had gotten Jennifer some earrings, and a big fluffy bathrobe. Mrs. Crowley would find several beautiful scarves, and two pairs of gloves. Jennifer had helped me pick out the kind she liked. They weren't elaborate gifts, and didn't come close to repaying them for all that they had done for me, but I hoped they would be happy with the gifts.

It was mid-December, and a light snow had begun to fall while we were having dinner. The Crowleys invited us to stay over, but Mom said that we had a long way to go and she preferred to make as much progress as possible tonight, while traffic was light. We hit the road after tearful goodbyes, mine at least, and hugs.

 

Mom drove until midnight, and we had only made it as far as Utica, New York. The snowplows were keeping the highway clear, but the snow was blowing sideways by then, obscuring the road ahead. We found a motel with the vacancy light illuminated, and stopped for the night.

 

We finally made it to my aunt's house two days later. The snow had finally stopped falling by the time we reached Ohio, and we made good time after that.

As I stepped out of the car in the driveway I heard a squeal and only managed to straighten up before Suzanne and Lizbeth reached me. We hugged for a second before they broke away and went to hug my Mom. They hadn't put on their coats before running out of the house, so we quickly grabbed the suitcases from the back seat and hurried inside where Aunt Sharon was waiting.

"Hi sis," Aunt Sharon said to my mom and they shared a hug. Then Aunt Sharon turned to me, extended her arms, and said, "Welcome Michelle."

I smiled and said, "Hi, Aunt Sharon," as I walked into her waiting arms and we hugged. "I guess I should start using my first name again, since that's how everybody at the station knows me."

"Then welcome, Ashley," she said. Taking a step back she said, "Let me take a look at you."

I also took a step back to allow her to see me fully. I had put on the suede outfit this morning when we got up.

"The girls weren't exaggerating; you’re beautiful."

"Thank you, Aunt Sharon."

"Where's Bob, sis?" my mother asked.

"He's in town, but he'll be home in time for dinner. Nicole is busy with preparations for several Christmas parties. Now take your coats off and come sit down. You must be exhausted after that long trip."

Lizbeth took Mom's coat and my jacket, and, while she went to hang them up, we followed Aunt Sharon into the living room.

"I'm sorry that we weren't here when you both came this summer," Aunt Sharon said. "Bob had a major problem at the coast factory and we didn't get back until the end of September. We couldn't leave there until he was sure the new production manager he hired had things under control."

"I'm sorry we missed you also," Mom said. "Did everything work out?"

"No, not entirely. There are still problems out there. Bob would be out there now except I insisted he stay here until the holidays were over. Right after New Year's Day he's going back, so we'll have a lot of time for house hunting once things quiet down. How did the moving go?"

"We got everything loaded and sent the truck on its way," Mom said. "They should be out here in a few days. Everything will be stored at their warehouse here until we call and tell them to deliver it. We loaded up the car trunk and back seat with everything we think we'll need until then."

"Just let me know if there's anything you or Ashley need. The girls and I will help out any way we can."

"Thanks, sis," my mom said. "I was nervous about just packing up and moving, but now that we're here, I feel a lot better."

"Just think of this as your home now. Ashley, how are you doing?"

"Fine, Aunt Sharon. I'm happy to be here, although I'll miss my friends."

"Did your friends accept your– change?"

"The ones that mattered did, and that helped me get through it until the others started to come around. Most kids had started to believe that I had been a girl all along. One that had hidden the fact because of a weird name imposed on her by an even weirder father. You haven't seen me in recent years, but I'm sure that Suzanne, Nicole, and Lizbeth have told you that I never developed the male characteristics that should have appeared when I became a teenager. The other kids figured that I was just hiding my female attributes with bulky clothing."

"Looking at you now, I'd never guess that you hadn't been a girl all your life."

"That's the way that I'd like to be thought of. Jimmy is gone forever, legally. By coming out here, where Ashley was born, so to speak, I'm hoping that I can forget that part of my life."

"Are you looking forward to being back at the television station?"

"More than you can imagine."

"I'm sorry that I haven't had a chance to see any of your broadcasts."

"Mom wanted to watch all the tapes so we took them with us when we left, but I'll be back on the air in two weeks."

"Ashley is fabulous, Mom," Lizbeth said. "You won’t believe it when you see her."

"I'd never be able to sit in front of all those cameras, with thousands of people watching me, and read the news," Suzanne said.

"Sure you could," I said. "After a while you don't think about the people that are watching. You just concentrate on speaking at the cameraperson. At least that's what I did. I pretended the people in the studio were the only ones paying attention to what I was saying."

"What are the sleeping arrangements going to be, sis?" Mom asked my aunt.

"Ashley will have the room she used last time, and you'll have the one next to hers. They're almost identical in size, and were probably intended for staff, but we use them as guest bedrooms. Each has its own bathroom."

"Wonderful," Mom said. "I suppose we should get settled in before dinner. I'm sure the girls want a chance to talk."

Since we expected to be there for perhaps a month, we removed everything from the back seat and trunk of the car. I had packed whatever I expected to need for the first thirty days out here, and my closet in the guest bedroom was full when we were done. After carrying all the boxes into the house, Suzanne and Lizbeth helped me, while Aunt Sharon helped Mom.

"Ashley, are you happy?" Lizbeth had asked me while we unpacked.

"About being Ashley instead of Jimmy?"

"Um, yeah."

"Yes."

"Truly?"

"Yes, Lizbeth."

"Good. I couldn't bear it if I was responsible for ruining your entire life."

"If I didn't want this life, I could have gone back to being Jimmy when I returned home. I chose to remain Ashley because it's who I am, not just who I've become. I didn't realize that before coming out here in June, but I wouldn't change it for anything. Even with the worries and fears that I had about 'coming out', my life back home was richer in that last month and half, than it was in the five years earlier. I went shopping every weekend with my girlfriends, and I finally found acceptance from my peers. Before, I had been sort of stuck halfway between the girls and the boys, and had never really fit in. I ate lunch with the same group of girls each day, but I was sort of an honorary member of that group, and the friendship didn't really extend beyond the walls of the school. The jocks all thought I was a wuss, and shunned me, and I didn't feel any bond with the nerds, although I guess I was one myself. Nor did I fit in with the Goths or Punks. So I just stayed at home and studied, or played my video games. You know, I haven't played a video game since I was here last summer and reported on the electronics show."

"Has it been difficult?" Suzanne asked.

"Transitioning?"

She nodded.

"It hasn't been too bad, so far, because I managed to create a climate of confusion and make so many kids think I was a girl all along..."

"And they bought that?" Lizbeth asked with an incredulous look.

"They seemed to. Perhaps a lot wanted to believe it. Anyway, it helped a lot. Of course, the hard times are still ahead. I've legally changed my name, but that's only the first small step. My body is slowly adopting more of the characteristics of a woman, but I still have to face the surgery. And a lot of things, some maybe not so minor, are still ahead of me. I don't yet know what I'm going to do when I start work and they ask me to take a physical. And my sex is still listed as 'male' on my school records, so I don’t know what will happen when I enroll out here. I'd like to get a driver's license, but I didn't want one that named me as James Michael, so I delayed that process. Now I have the correct name, but it will still show an 'M' for sex." Even after surgery, it will show a 'M.'"

"It's true that some states are still stuck in the Dark Ages," Suzanne said, "and insist on showing the gender recorded at the time of your birth, even after the body has been altered. I don't know about the situation with Illinois driver licenses, but some states are finally recognizing that transsexuals should have their current gender reflected on official documents. Have you had an examination recently?"

I shook my head. "Not since this summer."

"It's been more than three months? I want you to come to the hospital tomorrow so we can give you a complete checkup."

"Okay."

"Are you still wearing a corset all the time?" Lizbeth asked.

"I wear my sleeping corset at night, and I don't think I could fall asleep without it, but I haven't been wearing one during the day unless I needed a twenty-one inch waist to fit into the clothes you altered. I don't wear it when I go clothes shopping, so all my newer clothes are for my normal twenty-two inch waist."

"I can see that you're still using the breast forms." Suzanne said.

"I haven't been using them for the past month and a half because my own breasts have been growing. But my real breasts are still comparatively small so I put on the forms this morning in case I ran into anyone that I knew. They'd expect me to still be a C cup. I have to be concerned with my image again."

"You look a lot larger than a C," she said.

"My bra is very tight. It's probably because the forms are resting atop my own breasts. I should probably get the next smaller size until my own grow larger, or I get implants."

"I'll get them for you tomorrow, when you come in for your checkup. Remove the forms in the morning and just place them in the bra cups. I'll want to examine you real breasts."

"Okay."

"Have you heard from George?" Lizbeth asked.

"Not in about a month. We were corresponding via email, but the time between his messages has been growing. I sent him a message telling him that we were moving out here, but he hasn't responded yet. He's probably been busy with exams and end of semester stuff."

"Yeah, probably," she said, as if she didn't really believe it.

"I didn't really expect him to remain interested once he got to college and was surrounded by all those pretty, freshmen girls."

"Perhaps he never expected to see you again," Suzanne said. "Massachusetts is a long way from here, and even further from California."

"I suppose. How're Larry and Kent?"

"Kent's fine," Suzanne said. "We're going out tonight. He'll be here around 7:30."

"Larry just got back home last night," Lizbeth said. "Since he's going to school at Michigan State, he can come home on weekends. It takes him less than five hours for the drive. He's coming over later tonight also, because we'll all be tied up catering parties until after New Year's."

The sound of the front door opening and closing distracted all of us for a second.

"That must be Daddy," Lizbeth said. "Come on, Ashley," she said as she moved towards the bedroom door.

I followed Lizbeth and Suzanne out towards the front entranceway.

"Daddy, they've arrived," Lizbeth said, as she led the way to her father.

"Hi, Uncle Bob," I said.

As he finished hanging up his winter coat, he turned to face us. I smiled and moved towards him to give him a hug, but he took a step backward and held both hands up in front of him, palms forward, in a gesture that told me I should stop. He slowly looked at me from my toes to the top of my head.

"It's Cousin Ashley, Daddy," Lizbeth said.

He nodded, but didn't lower his hands. "I'm doing my best to deal with this calmly and rationally," he said to me, "but I don't claim to either understand or agree with your decision to engage in this strange behavior."

"Bob!" Aunt Sharon said sharply from the hallway behind us.

"Sharon, I said that I'd tolerate this, but I didn't promise I'd agree with it. And he has a right to know how I feel."

"It's okay," I said. "I understand."

Mom moved between Uncle Bob and myself before saying, "How about a kiss for your sister-in-law?"

They embraced lightly and Uncle Bob kissed Mom's cheek.

Aunt Sharon spoke up to relieve the seconds of awkward silence that followed. "Ladies, dinner is almost ready. How about some help in the kitchen."

The six of us walked towards the kitchen while Uncle Bob turned and walked towards the living room. Over the next ten minutes we mashed the potatoes, made the gravy for the roast, and put the vegetables into serving bowls. As soon as we had set the table, and carried everything to the dining room, Aunt Sharon called Uncle Bob to the table. The awkward silence continued after we said grace, and as we quietly enjoyed dinner. Uncle Bob kept stealing glances in my direction, but I never looked at him directly.

"This is ridiculous," Aunt Sharon finally said. "I thought we had this all settled," she said to Uncle Bob.

"It's settled," he said. "Valerie and– Michelle are welcome to share our house while they locate a place of their own."

"Ashley," Lizbeth said, correcting her father. "Her name is Ashley Michelle James."

"It's changed again?"

"No," Suzanne said. "Ashley was using her middle name back home because it was confusing until they had their names legally changed. She's using Ashley now because that's the name that everyone in this part of the state knows her by."

"Everyone?"

"Everyone who watched the local television news this past summer. If you had been here, you would have seen her every night at six and ten."

"If I had been here, I would have put a stop to this masquerade before it got so far out of hand."

"If you had been alive four hundred years ago, you probably would have led the townspeople in Salem while they were hunting witches," Lizbeth said angrily.

Uncle Bob gave her a confused look. "What– is– that– supposed to mean?"

"She's saying that you're acting like we're living in another century," Aunt Sharon said, "and she's right. This is the twenty-first century."

"I know the date."

"Then you should also know that what Ashley is doing is correcting a genetic mistake from birth," Suzanne said.

"What mistake? He was born a boy and wants to pretend that he's a girl now. I spent the summer in San Francisco. I know what's going on."

"Take a good look at Ashley," Aunt Sharon said, "and tell me what you see with your own eyes."

He looked at me directly. "I see my nephew, dressed in a skirt," he said.

"You haven't seen your nephew in five years. There's nothing about Ashley that could possibly remind you of that eleven-year-old except the same facial structure that she shares with her mother. You're only seeing what you want to see."

"What makes someone a woman, in your mind, Daddy?" Suzanne asked.

"Uh, having real breasts and a vagina."

"Ashley has real breasts, and her genitals will be restructured into a vagina when she has SRS."

"But Ashley doesn't have a uterus, and is therefore unable to bear children."

"Neither can any woman who has had a hysterectomy, and there are millions of such women in the U.S."

"Look, I may not know how to define one, Suzanne, but I know a real woman when I see one."

"Than I have to repeat what Momma said, 'Take a good look at Ashley and tell us what you see with your own eyes.'"

"I saw a lot of female impersonators in San Francisco. A large bust, special clothing, makeup, and long hair doesn't make a man into a woman."

"Daddy," Lizbeth said, "have you noticed that Ashley's voice is more than a full octave higher than a male's, and her features are soft and feminine?"

Uncle Bob paused for a couple of seconds as he looked at me. "Ashley's voice will deepen in time," he said. "And all young people have soft skin."

"A boy's voice deepens when he enters puberty, Daddy," Suzanne said. "Ashley is well past puberty age now, even for a late bloomer. She'll be seventeen in a few months, and her voice won't be changing now unless she suffers an injury to her larynx. Look at Ashley's upper arms and shoulders. Do you see any evidence of the musculature that boys develop? And finally, look closely at her face. She's never had a single hair appear on her chin. These three things all occur when the body of a young adolescent male begins to produce increased quantities of testosterone. Ashley's body hasn't produced the hormones necessary for her to develop as a man, and the estrogen she's producing has kept her balanced in between the sexes."

"That still doesn't make her a woman."

"No, it doesn't." Suzanne said. "And without a little modern medical help, Ashley might forever be stuck halfway between being a male and being a female. Her only toehold in the male world was her undeveloped genitalia. You're probably unaware that during the past thirty years, a great deal of research has been done to determine the differences between male and female brains. In recent years they've researched the brains of deceased transsexuals, and they've discovered that the brains were inconsistent with the originally defined gender. The SRS surgery is only correcting a mistake made by nature when it combined the body of one gender, with the brain of the other. Ashley, by being stuck right in the middle, could choose her gender, something that's seldom available to most people, and she's chosen to have her body agree with her brain."

Pausing for a breath, Suzanne continued with, "If you look at the old movies and pictures of us when we played together as children, the only differences that you'll notice are that Nicole, Lizbeth, and I sometimes wore dresses, while Ashley wore pants. When we were all dressed in shorts, there's almost nothing that's indicates the different genders that we had been labeled with. What you have to do, Daddy, is forget those early labels, and really see Ashley for who she is now, even if it disagrees with the impression that you developed many years ago."

While Suzanne came up for air, Uncle Bob stared at me. "Okay, I'll admit that Ashley certainly looks more like a girl than most of the cross-dressers, and many of the female impersonators, that I've seen in San Francisco."

"That's because she's not impersonating a female, Daddy," Lizbeth said, "she is a female. As Suzanne said, she just needs a little more help from the medical community to solidly define her gender, for the first time in her life."

The clenched jaw look that Uncle Bob had maintained since he first saw me seemed to have softened a little, but I wasn't expecting a miracle. It would take time for him to come around, if he ever would. The onslaught by his own immediate family, as they rushed to my defense, seemed to have had a profound effect. For now it was a great relief that he wasn't glaring at me.

After dinner I helped Aunt Sharon and Mom clean up the dining room and kitchen. Suzanne and Lizbeth had gone to get ready for their dates, and while the dishwasher took care of the dishes, I walked downstairs to watch television. Mom and Aunt Sharon went into the upstairs living room to continue their visit and talk with Uncle Bob.

Larry was sent downstairs by Aunt Sharon when he arrived and we talked until Suzanne and Lizbeth came down.

"Welcome back, Ashley," Larry had said after we had hugged lightly.

"Thanks, Larry. How's college?"

"Different. I thought it would be kind of like high school, but it's totally different. Being away from home, my folks, and being on my own for the first time, is so cool."

"Have you heard from George?" I asked.

"Not in weeks. I know that he was having trouble with his computer, so maybe it finally conked out. He should be home by Wednesday, at the latest. Lizbeth told me you're returning to the television studio?"

"Yes, that was the reason for moving here. I still have a year and half of high school though."

"Hi folks," we heard from the stairs, and I turned in time to see Kent reach the bottom and walk towards us. Coming down behind him was Lizbeth, and we sat and talked until Suzanne came down. After another few minutes of discussion, both couples left me alone in the basement rec room. Lizbeth and Larry had invited me to come out with them, but I begged off with the excuse of being tired from the long trip.

 

After returning from the hospital the following afternoon I called the station and spoke with Mr. Graham, informing him I was in town. He welcomed me, and then invited me to the station's Christmas party on Thursday. He also told me that Mrs. Livingston, the woman who provides the wardrobes for the female broadcasters, had been advised that I would be returning as an anchor. He said that I should plan on visiting her boutique, once the Christmas rush was over, to pick up a wardrobe.

After a late lunch I went Christmas shopping with Mom and Aunt Sharon. Lizbeth had left early in the morning with Nicole, because they had an office Christmas party to cater. The Mall was packed and the shelves were empting quickly, but I managed to find most of the things that I was looking for. One more day of shopping would do it for me. I had already picked up Mom's gifts before we left home, and I only needed gifts for my cousins, and Aunt and Uncle. I had sent Gram's gifts off to Florida a month ago.

 

On Tuesday afternoon, Nicole, Suzanne, and Lizbeth were catering another party, so Aunt Sharon dropped me off at the station. Mom came along with us to learn the way to the station, but neither came inside. Mom told me call when I was ready to come home.

I was welcomed back warmly by many at the station's Christmas party. The Party had started in the early afternoon with the first shift, then slowed as people went home and the second shift prepared for the six o'clock broadcast. I had arrived just before the broadcast began and barely had time to say hello to a few folks before they had to leave to prepare for the broadcast. I walked to the studio so I'd have a chance to see the woman who had replaced me, Marci Clancy, in action. She seemed like an effective anchor, although a bit stiff. When Don made a few witty comments about different stories, she just ignored his comments as if he wasn't sitting next to her, and moved on to the next story.

Five minutes before the end of the broadcast, Don said, on camera, "A couple of days ago we announced that Marci would be leaving us at the end of the year, and moving to Chicago. The new co-anchor that will be taking her place is here in the studio tonight and maybe I can get her to come over to the desk."

He motioned to me and I walked over behind the broadcast desk so I'd be facing the cameras, taking a position between Don and Marci. A sound technician hurried over with an earphone and mic. I didn't have time to run the wires beneath my clothes so I just clipped the mic on my blouse and held the small transmitter box.

"Our regular viewers will recognize Ashley James," Don had said as I was receiving the sound equipment. "Ashley joined us here at the station this past summer, filling in as our weather person while Paula was on maternity leave, and then filling in as co-anchor until Marci arrived to replace Kay Peterson. She's not wearing makeup, and may appear a bit pale to our audience, but I assure that she's even more beautiful than she was last summer. When Marci announced that she would be leaving, station management tracked Ashley down and convinced her to rejoin us at the station. Welcome back, Ashley."

I smiled and said, "Thank you, Don. I'm really excited about returning to the KBXF-TV family. I've missed everyone here tremendously since returning home in September."

"And we're happy to have you back with us. This time it's not just a temporary summer position, folks. Ashley will be with us weekdays at six and ten, starting on Monday, the third of January. Have you found a place to live yet, Ashley?"

"We're staying with my aunt, uncle, and cousins while we search for a house."

"Are you looking to rent or buy?"

"Right now we're looking to rent, because we'll have to wait until we close on our old house before we can afford to buy, but once we close, we'll be in the market to buy a house here."

"There you have it, folks," Don said. "If you have a quality house available, at a reasonable price, leave a message here at KBXF for Ashley. That's the news for tonight, December 23rd. I'm Don Baden with Marci Clancy, Paula Bannister, and Ashley James, wishing you a very good night from KBXF."

The weather person, who I assumed to be Paula Bannister, joined us at the news desk and we talked among ourselves as the lights dimmed, until the control room said, "And we're off. Good job, everybody. Welcome back, Ashley."

The room lights came up and a sound tech moved in to collect all the transmitters. I was formally introduced to Marci and Paula and we talked for a few minutes before they left for makeup to get cleaned up. I spent some time talking with the technicians before walking to the newsroom, where the party was being held.

Fresh food platters and deserts had been put out and people were sitting at or on desks, or standing around, chowing down on the free food and beverages. For me, it was like going to a class reunion dinner, and I walked around renewing the friendships that I had made during the summer.

"Hello, Ashley," I heard from behind me and turned to see Mr. Graham and Mr. Pilere approaching me.

"Welcome back, Ashley," Mr. Pilere said.

"Hi, Mr. Graham. Hi, Mr. Pilere.

"All ready to start work?" Mr. Pilere asked.

"Absolutely," I said, smiling. "I'm becoming more excited with each passing day."

"Wonderful," Mr. Pilere said. "We're excited to have you back with us." Lowering his voice he said, "It will be nice to have someone with a personality in the co-anchor chair next to Don. Marci hasn't cracked a smile at any of Don's comments since she arrived here."

"I noticed that she did seem unusually focused tonight."

"Not just tonight, but every night. She prepares herself well, and does a very competent job of reading the news, but that's all she does. She doesn't convey a sense of warmth or personality to the audience. You're still the only one who has ever adlibbed a line when the smiley face appeared during their broadcast test. We've missed that spontaneity, and we're delighted to have you back."

"Thank you," I said, smiling, I could feel myself blushing slightly from the embarrassment caused by such a direct complement.

"Speak of the devil," Mr. Pilere said under his breath.

I turned and saw Don and Marci enter the newsroom, probably coming directly from makeup. They saw us and walked over to where we were standing.

Don smiled and said, "This looks like a happy group, but I don't see a single alcoholic beverage in hand."

"I have a good excuse," I said, smiling, "I'm too young."

"And we have another broadcast at ten to get through first," Mr. Graham said, with a lot of emphasis on the 'we'.

Don never missed a beat, saying, "Yeah, isn't it terrible the way work interferes with our holiday festivities and favorite pastimes." He put on a lopsided grin and drooped his eyes in imitation of a drunk that had already had a large portion from every bottle on the small bar, but I knew that he was a professional who wouldn't imbibe until his last broadcast for the day was completed.

Marci, on the other hand, looked like someone who needed a drink desperately. Not because she was experiencing the effects of detoxification, but simply because the alcohol might loosen her up and lighten her mood.

"Someone told me you're only sixteen-years-old, Ashley," Marci asked me, fixing an intense stare on me. "Is that true?"

"Yes, until April 28^th."

"Then you must still be in high school?"

"Yes, I'm in my eleventh year."

"That's amazing. You have to be one of the youngest, if not the youngest, news anchors in television broadcasting."

"We looked into it and discovered that a twelve-year-old girl is currently broadcasting the news at a small station somewhere along the Alaskan border with Canada," Mr. Pilere said.

"But their audience consists of only about a hundred families," Mr. Graham said, "and the station is in her parent's home. Her father is the entire technical staff, and her mother does everything else. Their annual station budget is less than twenty-five thousand dollars."

"I'd hardly call that twelve-year-old a news anchor," Marci said. "In fact, with an audience of just a hundred homes, she just barely qualifies as a broadcaster. Have you done any reporting, Ashley, or only been on air as a temporary fill-in for absent weather persons and news co-anchors."

I guess it was the condescending way she said it, rather than her actual words, but Mr. Pilere took exception to her statement. "Ashley covered a number of stories for us last summer," he said. "She did an excellent job on every assignment, including her two hour live coverage of the July 4^th parade from our broadcasting stand. She also did live coverage of the tanker accident on the Interstate highway that closed down the road for hours, and her reporting was picked up by our affiliates and rebroadcast around the country."

"Ashley was offered the co-anchor chair on a permanent basis, before you were hired," Don said, also taking umbrage at the tone of her comments, "but she was only here visiting, and decided to return home at the end of the summer."

"And what prompted you to move here now?" Marci asked me, apparently oblivious to the tensions she was creating.

"Mr. Graham," I said simply. "I called to let him know that I'd be available for any open positions next summer, and he informed me that you were planning to move to a larger market."

"You didn't waste any time getting here."

"I've missed the community, the station, and the job, since leaving on Labor Day, and moving during the holiday recess at school made things easier. Besides, the job is too important to remain empty for long."

"It wouldn't have been empty. I couldn't leave until my replacement arrived, or my contract expired. I wasn't really expecting to leave until February or March."

"Then you don't have another position to go to?" I asked.

"No, not yet. But I've been circulating tapes of my on air time."

"I'm sorry, Marci," Mr. Graham said, "but you requested that we terminate your contract as soon as we made arrangements for a permanent replacement, and you signed off on that contract revision. As it is, I've asked Ashley to wait an extra two weeks before she begins her job. I can't extend your position until you find a new job. It wouldn't be fair to Ashley."

"I understand. It's my own fault for not establishing a final date. Well, if you'll excuse me I have to prepare for the ten o'clock."

Marci turned on her heel and strode off towards her office. No one said a thing until she was well out of hearing range.

"I guess we're all dismissed," Don said, with a silly grin on his face.

"She'll fit right in with a very large, impersonal staff in a major market," Mr. Pilere said.

"It's too bad," Mr. Graham said. "She'd be an excellent addition to any staff, if only she had a personality to go along with her broadcast talent. Well, it's worked out well for us. We got Ashley back."

 

I stayed at the station until nine-thirty when the newsroom emptied out as everyone prepared for the ten o'clock broadcast. Mom came to get me and take me home.

"Hi, Ashley," Nicole said as we entered the house. "Welcome back." Nicole had been so busy with the catering activities that we hadn't crossed paths until then.

"Hi, Nicole," I said as we hugged. "Thanks. It's great to be back."

Mom looked a little surprised; I guess it was because I hadn't gotten along too well with Nicole since we were little.

"We saw the six o'clock news," Aunt Sharon said. "It was nice the way the male news anchor welcomed you back while they were on the air."

"Don is a sweetheart. Anyone would be lucky to work with him. I'm fortunate that he'll be my co-anchor. I think I'd hate to have to work with Marci every night. I feel sorry for Don; he's been working with her for four months."

"She's not friendly?"

Grinning, I said, "I think she sucks lemons when she's in her office."

 

The next day was busy as we decorated the house and prepared food for the Christmas dinner. The Christmas tree was set up in a corner of the basement rec room.

We stayed up late on Christmas Eve and welcomed in the holiday at midnight with Brandy Alexanders that Uncle Bob made. They were excellent, tasting like a frothy cocoa drink, but the one drink that I had hit me like a five-pound brick, and I was reminded of the time that I had too much wine. I was only allowed one drink, but I wouldn’t have taken another on a dare. I had no intention of waking up with pink hair in the morning.

We opened most of our presents before we went to bed at 3 a.m. I realized that Uncle Bob was watching me closely as I held up the clothes that I received, but I never made eye contact with him. He hadn't criticized me or confronted me since the discussion at dinner that first night, and I had already decided that if I ever needed a defender, I would want Suzanne. She had made my situation seem perfectly normal, with my choice being the only possible solution.

 

On Christmas day I was summoned to the phone when George called. We wished each other a 'Merry Christmas' and then worked our way through a couple of awkward silences.

"Larry told me you were here," he said. "I just ran into him last night."

"I guess you didn't receive my email."

"No, my computer died. My dad promised me a new laptop for Christmas, so I didn't get the old one fixed. I'll download all my email later today, once I get the software loaded in the new laptop."

"How are things at school otherwise?"

"It's a lot different from high school, as everyone told me it would be. You have to be more disciplined and focused at college. No one is going to drive you, so you have to motivate yourself. How are things going for you?"

"Great. I'll be back at the station in a week, and I'm as excited as could be. My mom and I have to begin searching for a house now that the holidays are over, so I'll be busy with that until it's time to start work."

"Maybe we can get together before I have to go back to California."

"That would be nice."

We talked for another half hour but never made any real plans for a date.

 

As soon as Christmas was over, Mom, Aunt Sharon, and I began looking in earnest for a house. It would be great if we could find a house that we wanted to purchase, one that just happened to be vacant and for which the owner would hold the mortgage until we sold ours, but that was extremely unlikely. Still, when we found a house that we rated as a "possible", we always asked if the seller would hold the paper until we received the money from our house in Massachusetts, or at least rent us the house with an option to buy. It would have improved the position of the house on our list.

The realtor, that the station had contacted, tried to show us every home in her company's files, and then started on the multiple listings. A drive by was usually sufficient to eliminate most houses from consideration. Mom had told the agent what we basically wanted, but she seemed incapable of separating the wheat from the chaff on her own.

The station forwarded all of the replies to Don's on-air appeal for a house, to me, and I called every one. Most just wanted my phone number, but a few were valid offers and we did a drive-by to see if the house held any interest for us. Only one deserved an in-house inspection; but unfortunately, severe water damage in the basement made us back off.

 

(continued)

  

  

  

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