Take a Lemon

I’ve run into some scheduling problems… the story will, I hope, resume Monday morning.

I remembered after lunch that I had made a promise to meet Dirk for ice cream, to “talk about our relationship.” After what had happened with Jeremy, though, it didn’t seem fair to him to go through with it, especially if he expected to pay for me. I therefore excused myself from the table to call him.

I found his number in the history on my phone. “Hey, Mel,” he said, answering on the second ring. “What’s up?”

“I just wanted to be honest with you,” I explained. “My date last night went really well, and I’m seeing him again tonight, so…”

“Oh.” I could hear the disappointment in his voice, and I could almost feel sorry for him. I don’t remember him having had a lot of dating success, and losing one of the few girls who had actually wanted to be with him must hurt.

“So I just wanted to be fair,” I concluded.

“You know, Mel,” he persisted. “I still value you as a friend. We’ve barely spoken since we broke up…”

“Since you dumped me,” I corrected him, remembering what Tina and Chad had said.

“Uh, yeah. I’m going to have to keep apologizing for that. Still, it’s been about nine months, and I’d still like to meet up, just to talk. Is that all right?”

I figured I could give him that, at least, so I said, “Sure. Just to talk? That’ll be fine. See you then.”

It wasn’t until we’d hung up that I remembered that with my lack of memory of Marsha’s life, I wasn’t going to be able to reminisce along with him. Maybe I could just say that I didn’t really want to talk about the past? Calling back at this point to change my mind didn’t seem fair, so I decided that I would just have to bluff my way through it.

I borrowed the car to head back to the Mall, arriving a bit early. Walking through the crowds without any urgent need to get anywhere, I realized one interesting benefit of my starting to get comfortable being attracted to boys – I could boy-watch! It wasn’t quite the same as my old pastime of girl watching; for one thing, I didn’t know the rules. I definitely didn’t want to be caught looking and have some guy think I was flirting with him. Not only that, but I seemed to be more selective now. It used to be that I could find well over half of girls attractive, although of course I had focused on the most beautiful. With boys, though, it seemed as though no more than about one in ten was worth looking at, at all.

I got to the Hägen Daz early, and didn’t see Dirk, so grabbed a small table to wait. There was only one boy there really worth looking at, and he was with a girl, and the way the two of them were looking at each other, I was pretty sure that it would not do to have her catch me looking. I shrugged and pulled out a book to read while I was waiting. It was one of Marsha’s romances, and I was prepared to hate it, but I found it surprisingly engrossing – so much so that I didn’t notice when a boy sat down opposite me.

“Hey, Melanie! How long have you been here?”

I looked up and gasped. “Dirk?!” He was gorgeous. That’s not Dirk! I thought, but who else would have called me, “Melanie”?

“Um, yeah. Is something wrong?” he asked.

“Um… no…” I choked out. “I’d just… forgotten how… I mean… you startled me.”

I couldn’t help staring. Looking closely, I could see a family resemblance, ruling out the likelihood that this was just a different boy with the same first name. They’d changed him, too! “Um… I… uh… d-did… did you sign up for a time travel experiment at school?”

“Did I what?!”

“J-just… I… never mind… I’m just a little bit…”

“Time travel? What? Did you say, ‘time travel’?”

“I’m just a little… you know what? Forget it. I was just reading, um…” I hurriedly jammed the book into my purse so that he wouldn’t see that it wasn’t science fiction.

“OK…”

“You know… I think I need some fresh air,” I suggested. I was definitely having some trouble breathing. I could see why Marsha had dated him; I was attracted to him, despite my memories of the old Dirk.

“OK, we’ll take a walk. Um, if we’re going outside, you’re probably not going to want ice cream. Why don’t I get us some hot chocolate, instead?”

As I waited, something else occurred to me. Dirk and Marsha had dated for two years. It had not hit me until now what that implied. Dirk seemed extremely comfortable talking to me, probably because he thought I was the girl he had known so well and so long. There was none of the first date nervousness that I had felt from Jeremy. Plus, Marsha had been seriously interested in Dirk, and whatever part of her remained in me seemed to be feeling the pull, and I didn’t like it.

I thanked Dirk when he handed me my drink, and walked alongside of him. Hormones. It had to be hormones. I had been in denial, and now I was finding myself attracted to whatever guys Marsha would have liked. She’d definitely liked Phil and Dirk, and Tina had picked out Jeremy, not for me, but for her. It was bad enough that I was in her life, why couldn’t I at least have my own preference for what boys I liked?

“That came out pretty weird, didn’t it? I mean… what would you say if I actually had meant to ask you if you’d done an experiment like that?”

“I’d tell you that you were talking to somebody in the wrong department. If anybody ever comes up with a serious time travel experiment it would be some in physics, not chemistry. Or…” he added, nodding at me, “biology.”

“Yeah,” I answered, still a bit shaky. “And probably wouldn’t be an undergrad, either.”

“Yeah… take your time,” Dirk encouraged me. “You really do look a bit out of it.”

“Uh huh. Thanks.”

We walked a bit in silence before he decided to try restarting the conversation. “So… what have you been up to? Aside from dating this new guy, just when I’m trying to get back together with you…?”

“Well, you know, theater stuff. I had the lead in a school production of Mousetrap.”

“Mmhmm?”

“And, um… I did a small role in Come Blow Your Horn last spring, or did I tell you about that one?”

He nodded. “You were rehearsing for that when we… well, I don’t know how many more times I can apologize, but I will, if it will help.”

“Forget it,” I said magnanimously. He held the outside door open for me, and then followed me outside. “So, what have you been up to?” I asked.

It turned out that he was at Penn, planning to major in chemistry, and that he was into fencing, although not good enough for the team. I had never known this about him, had never really cared to know. I wondered if these had all been true in the previous timeline as well. If not, the change seemed to have done him a fair bit of good. And… I had to admit, he did seem to be a pretty nice guy. Chad’s assessment had been accurate. If I ever got things back the way they had been, I promised myself, I would make a point of looking Dirk up. It appeared that I was the one who would really need to apologize.

He didn’t push me to reminisce about what had been, so I didn’t have to explain away gaps in my knowledge, nor did he press me on the reason for my idiotic-sounding question. Obviously, he hadn’t been listening to the radio show that had joked about the experiment.

He wound up walking me to my car, and was surprisingly decent about the whole situation. But he’d left me with an interesting mystery. Vicky was probably in the best position to help me think about it, so I called her on the way home.

She seemed a bit surprised to hear from me, and a bit nervous. “You’re… not calling me for dating advice or something like that, are you?”

I laughed. “No, actually I had some news for you. Eric called. He says he thinks he’s found the lab.” I explained about the grad student and the mis-delivered package.

“Marsh, that’s fantastic! And here I was thinking you’d given up!”

“Well, I can’t take the credit. This is Eric’s doing, but it looks as though we actually have something to work on when we get back to school.”

“You have just made my day, Marsh. We’re going to get this taken care of, I just know it!”

“And I have some other news for you, Vixy,” I added. “Take a look at this picture I’m sending you.” I’d taken the picture of Dirk before saying good-bye. He’d been surprised that I wanted it, and had taken one of me in return.

“Oooh, he’s really…” she started, then cut herself of, suspicious. “Wait a minute. Who is this?”

“Marsha’s ex-boyfriend, actually. He wanted to talk to me about ‘getting back together.’”

I could hear the tension in her voice. “And you told him…?”

“I told him I wasn’t interested.”

She let out a breath. “Whew! I guess if you could say no to a guy like this, maybe you’re not as interested in boys as I was afraid you might be.”

I thought it better not to explain why I’d said no. Why spoil her break? “That’s not the point, Vicky. Do you remember when you stayed here last summer, and we went out with a group of my friends?”

“Yeah…?”

“Do you remember a guy named Dirk Simon?”

“Um, wait… nerdy guy, showed up out of nowhere when we were at the Mall? I seem to remember you being particular annoyed about that.”

“Right. That’s him.”

“What?” she gasped. “Marsh, there’s no way I’d forget meeting a guy who looked like this. I mean I was crazy about you, but I’d still have noticed.”

“That’s him now,” I explained.

It only took her a moment to get it. “You mean he was changed. He doesn’t go to Piques, does he?”

“No, and he has no recollection of doing an experiment anything like ours.”

“Then how… somebody else doing the same experiment, only without keeping his memory?”

“Maybe,” I conceded. I hadn’t actually thought of that possibility. “Or somehow the same people who changed us got him, too. I mean, with my cousin, I thought I could concoct an explanation. Maybe me being a boy rather than a girl made my aunt and uncle decide for some reason to have another child; it’s a stretch, but at least I can imagine a way for it to happen. But this? Dirk’s the same age as or older than all the victims we know about, and his parents didn’t even live in town when he was born.”

“This sounds like a problem,” she said, slowly. “If they could have changed people who didn’t even volunteer…”

“Exactly. Can you try looking really closely at all the people you know at home and see if anybody else was changed? The more information we can get, the better.”

She promised to look around and we hung up. She also promised to ‘reconsider something’ but wouldn’t explain what it was, only that I would understand next year.

Understand, huh? That was something that I was having a lot of trouble doing right now. I felt like one of those split-personality folks. When I talked about tracking down Professor Davis and company, I felt like my old male self, but… when I got home and headed back to my bedroom, and saw the outfit I had picked out for tonight’s movie date, the girl in me came out again, and I started really looking forward to seeing Jeremy. That was something I was really not ready to share with Vicky, even though I had warned her about it before exams.

The movie was fantastic, and I cannot honestly say how much of it was the movie and how much was spending three hours with Jeremy’s arm around me. He took me out for coffee afterwards, just so we could talk – and have an excuse to spend more time together.

“So,” he said, setting a mocha latte in front of me. “Phyllis says that you were excessively modest when you told me that your sister was the singer in the family.”

How had he remembered that? Of course, I had been talking about my old self, and before I had learned of Marsha’s singing prowess. “Well, she is doing more singing than I am these days. I’m not even in a choir at school,” I told him.

He nodded. “And… will I have a chance to hear you sing this semester?”

His eagerness both pleased and embarrassed me. “I’m going to audition for Sweeney Todd,” I told him, “but I’m probably just going to be in the chorus.

In his place, I would probably have suggested something like a private recital, next. I waited in vain for him to say it. He even opened his mouth as though he was on the verge on asking, but closed it without saying anything, to my disappointment.

“I don’t know what else to tell you,” I finally said. “I told you I was pre-med, right?” He nodded. “And you know about my acting, and… I do some sewing, too. You know, to help pay for college.”

“That’s unusual, isn’t it? I mean, not a lot of girls do it… um, do they?” He seemed so nervous! I found it kind of cute that he was having trouble talking to me.

“I don’t think a lot of girls do,” I responded, “but I know at least one other on campus. There are probably more. It’s a pretty useful skill to know, but I probably couldn’t make too much if everybody… did it.” I tried to make those last words suggestive and to my delight, he actually blushed slightly in response.

After a moment, I asked, “What about you? I know that you’re an electrical engineer, and Tina says you’re into geology?”

He nodded. “It’s my minor. It started as a hobby; I mean, every little boy likes rocks, right?” He grinned, and I melted. I had to find a way to get him to smile at me like that a lot more. “When I was younger, I got into rock polishing as a hobby. Did you know that there are some very attractive semi-precious stones found in this area?”

Talking about his hobby made him sound a lot more comfortable and confident – and charming. He told me that he’d tried to make jewelry for his mother and his sister from his polished rocks, and how his mother had pretended to be pleased. At some point, I stopped paying careful attention to his words and just enjoyed looking at him and hearing him talk. I think he mentioned a part-time job off campus, although I didn’t catch what he was doing.

He took me home and this time he didn’t hesitate in kissing me good night, and it was a lot better than our first time, but still not what I thought it could be. It didn’t really matter, though. I was definitely in love.

I waited in my room while Mom spoke with Dad when he got back from taking Tina to choir. Boy, had I messed up now. I had blabbed, and things were no longer in my hands. If my parents made the wrong decision, my life could be over – and they would think they were doing it ‘for my own good.’

I called the only person that I thought would understand.

“Hello?” Nikki said.

“Hi, Nikki. Got a few minutes?”

“Marsh! You sound terrible! What’s wrong?”

“I think I just messed up badly,” I admitted. “Um… I told Mom the truth, and now she’s telling Dad.”

“And… didn’t we discuss this? I thought you had agreed that you should tell them.”

“I suppose… but Nikki, what if they don’t believe me? When I told Tina, she really freaked out. Chad at least seemed really surprised. Mom seemed to think I was overworked or something. I played something for her, and that impressed her, but… I can’t tell what she’s decided happened. And now she’s talking to Dad, and… I don’t know what they’re going to do. I’m really worried that they won’t let me go back to Piques.”

“If they decide you’re overworked and overstressed, you mean?”

“Exactly.” She’d gone right to the heart of it. “If Dad thinks this is all the product of stress, he’ll think that a semester off, where the family can keep an eye on me, could be just what I need.”

“Well…” she said thoughtfully, “that might not be the worst of things. You’ve got Eric looking for the lab; he’ll still be here. And maybe it will give you a chance to, you know, get used to your new body without the pressure of school.”

“But he found the lab!” I exclaimed. I wasn’t explaining this well. “Or rather a grad student did and told him about it. He just called and Mom overheard me, and that’s why I told her. It was either that or lie.”

“He found it? That’s great!”

“Yeah, not so great if I’m still here when he gets to see it. And what good would it do me if they can fix things and I’m still here? And this is Jeremy’s last year and I won’t get to see him all year, and – oh, I forgot to tell you, he took me dancing last night and we’re going to a movie tonight. Or we were supposed to…”

“Wait. Wait. Wait. Jeremy? The boy you were crying about? And why are you…? Marsh, back up a bit. Are you planning to be a boy again or a girl?”

“I…” It was as though I hadn’t really thought it through. No, I hadn’t at all, actually. This had all happened too fast. “I definitely want to be a boy again. I do. Only…”

“Yes?” she prompted when I hesitated?

“Jeremy and I got talking and it turned out that he didn’t actually have a girlfriend and he really liked me, and…

“And as a boy, that disgusts you and you don’t want to have anything to do with him.”

“Right. No! I mean… I don’t know… I mean…”

“You sound really confused, Marsh. Let’s take this one step at a time. You said he took you dancing?”

So I explained one more time about the arranged date and our soap-opera-like conversation in the car, and the good night kiss, and agreeing to another date tonight.

“So, you really like this guy?” she observed when I had finished.

“A lot,” I agreed. “Like with weak knees and floating on the ceiling and all. I haven’t felt like this in… well, a long time.”

“MmmHmm. Sounds to me as if somebody’s in love again. From what you’ve told me, that seems to be a pattern with you. Do you think you’re in love with him, or with the idea of being in love?”

“What? It’s not love. We’ve only had one date!”

“And now that you think you can be a boy again, you’re going to call the whole thing off, right? Cancel your date tonight?”

I felt my chest constrict. “Um… I don’t know. Do you think I need to?”

She laughed. “No, I’m not making that decision for you. I just wanted to see how you would react to the idea. You are one confused little puppy, aren’t you, Marsh?”

“Seriously,” I admitted. “I guess what I want is to change back… but maybe not just quite yet. I mean, I really like Jeremy a lot, and I know he likes me, and that will have to end if I… I mean, when I change back – if I can. I’m just not ready to give him up just yet.”

“And what happens when you do?”

“Oh, man. Well, he won’t remember having met me, and… I guess the best thing for him will be to find another girl… only I’ll remember and probably still be a little bit in love with him, even though I won’t be attracted to him any more. At least I hope I won’t. So it’ll be almost like with Vicky, where I can remember loving her, but I’m definitely not interested in her right now.”

“And I think you were jealous of the guy she is dating now?”

I sighed “Yeah, and I’ll probably be jealous of his new girlfriend, too, only it won’t be quite the same. With Vicky… I know that she wants me back and I want to be her boyfriend again, and…”

“Still? After all the fights you’ve had?”

“Yeah. There’s just something between us. So the real difference will be that if I see him again afterwards, it’ll hurt me, but not him, and I’ll just have to live with it.”

“It’ll hurt even worse if you keep going out with him, you know.”

“I know. But it’s going to hurt even more if I just stop now, and… well, I still don’t know that I can change back.”

“So what do you want to do?”

“I guess… I want to go out with him again, and see… and then I’ll worry about it after I change back, if I can change back, and that depends on whether Mom and Dad let me go back to school.”

“Which you don’t think you can control.”

“I can’t! If they decide that I’m inventing the whole thing, they’ll decide that I need to be under a doctor’s care – Mom already suggested that – or that I need to stay home and rest.”

“That would really suck.”

“Yeah. Mom promised that they wouldn’t do anything that made me uncomfortable, so maybe I’m just worrying for nothing.”

“Will your Dad go along with that?”

“I have no idea. I don’t remember her saying anything… Oh, I have to go. I hear them coming.”

“Talk to you later, Marsh. Let me know what happens.”

“I will. Thanks!” And I hung up, about ten seconds before I heard them knock at my door.

“Marsh?” called Dad. “May we come in?”

“Come in!” I called, sitting up on my bed. At some point in the telephone conversation, I seem to have lain down on it.”

The door opened and my parents came in, first Dad, looking at me as though I were a stranger, then Mom, looking very worried. I think Dad’s expression hurt more. There was none of the fondness I was used to, and depended on. I had been afraid that this would happen if he ever found out, and now here it was.

Mom took the desk chair, the only chair in the room, and Dad stood halfway from the door to the bed. “So,” he said. “I assume this is the truth that we weren’t supposed to believe?”

“I know it’s hard to believe,” I told them quietly, “but it’s the truth. It’s not a hoax, Daddy. They really did change us.”

“Well, your mother seemed pretty impressed with your guitar playing, and I admit that I don’t have a good explanation for how you might have learned to play as well as she claims, nor would I be able to judge just how good you are. So I have to admit that there is something going on here. But… I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a story of people going back in time just to change other people. Usually there’s something else they’re trying to do, and then people wind up changed as a result. Going back in time only to make other people miserable seems gratuitously cruel.”

“I don’t know, Daddy. I didn’t pay as much attention to the details as I probably should have. They asked a bunch of questions about our family, though, and said that we should imagine how small changes could lead to big changes.”

“Now, on Thanksgiving, you made a lot of claims, which you later agreed were lies. How many of them are you now saying are true?”

“I… don’t remember everything I said, then. I was pretty upset.”

“About this cousin.”

“Tyler. Yes.”

“So that’s one of the things you say was not part of the hoax.”

I sighed in frustration. “It’s not…” I took a breath. “Tyler did exist. His disappearance was one of the changes as a result of the experiment.”

“Which means that it was not only the volunteers who were changed; supposedly a lot of people were changed.”

I nodded.

“So why did Bob Peterson say it was a hoax?”

“The Strangers in the Mirror say that it’s a cover-up; for some reason the College doesn’t want people to know about it.”

“And neither did you, apparently. So if it’s a cover-up, you went along with it.”

“I did tell you at Thanksgiving,” I pointed out.

“Yes, but you also said you were a boy. I saw you last night, Princess. That was not the reaction of a boy.”

I turned red. “I… It was a very nice date.”

“And you reacted just the way I’d seen you react on dates with your last boyfriend.” He sat next to me on the bed and put his arm around me. “Marsh, I realize that somebody must have happened, and I promise that I’m going to do whatever it takes to fix this and make whoever did this to you, pay. But it seems to me that we have an awful lot of questions and not very many answers. We have a few clues: your claims and those of your friends, this lab that your friend found, and the insistence by Piques College that it’s a hoax.”

“How is that last a clue?”

“Well, let’s take stipulate that there really was an experiment. It was clearly conducted with school approval, right? I mean, you didn’t hear about it through some back channels?”

“No, they posted an ad on the school’s internal website.”

“And now they’re denying that it even happened. I don’t suppose the ad’s still around? Or that anybody made a copy of it?”

I shook my head. “They only usually run for a couple of weeks.”

“The fact that they are claiming it’s a hoax suggests that something went wrong. That it didn’t work the way the College expected. So talking to the people who did it might be useful.”

“If we could find them. We’ve been looking for a long time.”

“But now your friend knows where the lab is, right, Honey?” Mom put in.

“We think so,” I said, although I wasn’t quite as excited about it as I had been.

“So we need to see that lab,” Dad concluded. “And we need somebody who will understand what we’re seeing. That means that we need a physicist, right? One who is not connected with Piques College. I’m going to have to ask around to see who might owe me a favor.”

“Isn’t Sylvia Shimmer’s husband a physicist?” Mom asked.

“I don’t know,” Dad responded. “Ask her. Just don’t get too specific yet about why. We might also need to see if there is a legal angle here; if we can get in touch with the parents of the other victims, maybe a class action lawsuit will work. Marsh, do you have a way to reach the others?”

“Um… I’m not sure. And I’m pretty sure that most of them won’t be willing. They’re pretty frightened of even being found out.” And I had already lost control. I really wasn’t too crazy about the way Dad was taking over. This was my life we were talking about. I should have just come up with an excuse for Mom.

“Well, work on them. Call them and try to make them see reason. I’m sure they’ll make the right decision.” I shivered. That was too much like the way Dean Peterson had spoken.

“Marsha, what’s wrong?” Mom asked. It was as though she could read my mind.

“It’s just… It feels like Daddy’s trying to bring in all the big guns and it’s going to bring all kinds of attention on us, and… it makes me wish I hadn’t told you.”

Mom and Dad looked at each other. “OK, Princess,” Dad said after a moment. “We don’t have to do it that way. What did you have in mind?”

“I guess…” I squirmed a bit. “I sort of thought we could start by seeing what’s in the lab and go from there.”

“And maybe, Art, what she really needs now is support, not solutions,” Mom explained. And then she came over and set on my other side and put her arms around me.

“OK. OK,” Dad said, watching me rest my head on Mom’s shoulder. “I just… feel like I want to do something about this. If what you’re saying is true, Marsh, that means that you and all of your friends… had their lives violated. I’m your father, Princess. Nobody should be able to do that to my little girl and get away with it.”

“Let us know what you want from us, Honey,” Mom said. “If you want lawyers, we’ll get lawyers. If you want scientists or commandos, or whatever, we’ll figure out a way.”

“Commandos?” I asked, picking up my head.

She grinned. “I’m just being dramatic. The point is, while this is very strange for us, you are our daughter and we are on your side.”

I nodded.

“Seriously strange,” Dad agreed. “Um… I can’t help feeling as though this is just a dream or something.”

“It’s been a nightmare for me,” I said.

“I get that, and I’m going to try not to ‘take over.’ But I do hate feeling as though I can’t do anything.”

“I’ll let you know, Daddy,” I said, and I kissed him on the cheek.

Then he stood up and pulled Mom and me to our feet. “OK. So if we can’t solve this, can we solve something else? Why don’t we all pick up Tina and then go out to lunch? Sort of just to celebrate Marsh being home – whichever version of her she happens to be.”

“You found it?” I gasped. “Where? I searched all over the physics building!”

“You remember I told you I was making a game of the time travel thing?” Eric asked. “Well, I got a bunch of grad students thinking I was a bit loopy.”

I winced. “I’m really sorry about that.”

“It’s not a problem. I don’t mind being seen as a bit of clown; I’m not going to be here next year anyway, after all. Anyway, I just got a call from a grad student in the gravity group – a guy who’s studying under Morton Davis. And he says that one of the locked and seemingly unused labs seems to belong – or else used to belong – to our mysterious missing Professor Davis.”

“Really!”

“Yup! This is just great. So he’s cleaning up his advisor’s lab before going home for break, and he comes across this package that hadn’t been opened, so of course he opens it and starts unpacking it to put into the lab inventory, only he doesn’t recognize any of the stuff inside. It’s all this electronics gizmos that they don’t use, so he double-checks the label. And guess what?”

“What?”

“It’s not supposed to be there; the package was addressed to Professor James Davis, and there’s a room number. So he packs it all back up and goes along to deliver it to the right place, only the lab is locked and there’s no name on the door. And he checks the department list, and there is no Professor James Davis. So he starts thinking, and remembers that news story and the claims of a missing professor, and then thinks of my little game…”

“And he decided you might be interested.”

“Exactly. He says he’ll show it to us when we get back in January, but I thought you’d want to know.”

“I sure did,” I told him. “Thank you very much, Eric!”

“No problem. I told Allie, of course, and she’s going to let the Strangers know, but you seemed to be the one who’s worried about this most. Anyway, take care, and I’ll see you in January.”

“See you then!” I hung up, ecstatic. We’ve found the lab! It was the first step. Even if it was really abandoned, it should at least be a clue; this was definitive evidence we’d found yet that Davis and his experiment still existed. Maybe changing back was going to be possible after all… and then I remembered what I’d done the night before.

I went on a date with a boy, I remembered, and I kissed him. And what’s more, I’d made a date with him for tonight… and, I realized, swallowing hard, that I really wanted to go out with him again. What was I doing?!

“Found what, Marsh?” Mom asked from behind me.

I spun… and realized that, surprised by Eric’s news, I’d never actually left the kitchen. Mom had heard the whole thing. I tried to answer. I moved my mouth, but no sound came out.

“You seemed excited by the news,” she continued, putting her arms around me, “but now you look panicky. What’s wrong?”

“Uh…” was about all I could manage. Now what was I supposed to do? My mind raced, looking for a why to keep my secret without actually lying.

“What did they find, Honey? And why does it have you upset?”

Bolstered by the comfort of her arms around me, I decided to risk it. “The… they found the… the lab.”

Mom held me away far enough that she could look at my face. With narrowed eyes, she asked, “What lab, Baby?”

My heart was hammering. What would happen if she knew the truth? “Ah… the…” I swallowed hard. “The lab where they did the…” I turned my face away, unable to meet her glance. “The time travel experiment.”

I heard her sigh as she held me out to arms’ length. “The one you’ve already admitted was a hoax?” she asked, quietly. “Oh, Marsh, what are you doing?” She pulled me back into an embrace. “Marsh, whenever you get upset now, you go to this story. Why can’t you tell me what’s wrong? Why don’t you confide in me any more? Have I done something to make you not trust me?”

“No, Mom!” I hurriedly answered, mortified at the suggestion. “You’ve been great. I just… This whole thing…” I took a breath to calm myself. “It’s not a hoax, Mom.”

“Marsh, your father spoke with Bob Peterson, and–”

“Dean Peterson is a liar!” I snapped. “He knows perfectly well that it’s not a hoax and he’s trying to cover it up! They changed us, Mom! You said it yourself – you said I’m ‘in a strange mood’ and that I don’t talk to you the way I used to. That’s just it, Mom. I’m changed. I’ve been doing the best I can, but I don’t know how Marsha is supposed to act. I don’t remember her life. I don’t remember dating Dirk or hanging out with her girlfriends! I don’t…”

I trailed off, because Mom’s arms had suddenly loosened around me, and she’d stepped back. I wish I could forget the look of horror and fear in her eyes.

“You don’t remember… Marsha’s life…?”

I might have gone a bit too far. “Um… no,” I said, in a small voice. “I… think of myself as ‘Marsh’ to distinguish between us…”

“Honey, I think we need to take you to the doctor. Please sit down.” She put the back of her hand against my forehead. “You don’t have a fever, but you’re clearly delirious.”

I sat back and rested my hand against my eyes in frustrated resignation. “I’m not delirious, Mom,” I said as calmly and quietly as I could. “Tina knows. She’s been helping me fit into this life; this life that I don’t remember at all. Chad knows. That’s why he yelled at me; he’s convinced that I’ve given up, that I’m not even trying to change back any more.”

She pulled over a chair so that she could sit facing me, and just sat there for a moment, just staring at me. Finally, she said, “OK… Marsha… Oh, I’m sorry, do you prefer ‘Marsh’ now?”

“Either one,” I said, glumly, waving my hand to show that it didn’t matter. What mattered was that I had told her, and I couldn’t undo that, now.

“OK, Marsh. Let’s assume that I believe you. That there was an experiment that changed you and the College is trying to hush it up. Why…?” she shook her head. “I have a lot of questions, here. Let’s start with, ‘how have you managed to keep this from me?’ I wouldn’t have expected a stranger to fit in with our family.”

“I’m not a stranger, Mom. I grew up in this house; it’s just that some things happened differently, is all. My life turned out differently. There’s a lot that’s the same. You’re the same; Dad’s the same, Tina’s the same. Most of the family is just as I remember. I’m the one who’s different.”

“And this imaginary cousin?”

So she hadn’t forgotten that. “In the old… the other timeline, Aunt Jackie had a third child. In this one she didn’t. So that’s different. Um… some people at school are a bit different, although not so most people would notice. My girlfriend Vicky is changed so slightly that only somebody who knew her as well as I do could even tell. I mean, you don’t look all that closely at most people. I remember a guy last year who had a moustache and when he shaved it off, people knew that there was something different about him, but it took them a long time to realize what.”

“OK… and why does Chad want you to ‘change back’?”

“Well… I told him I really needed to, only I couldn’t find the lab, and he’s been helping me try to figure out where it was… and when I told him I had a date with Jeremy, he got mad at me and said I was giving up and I should have just told him I didn’t care and not made him work so hard to help me if I wasn’t going to follow through.”

Mom closed her eyes and put hand to her head. I could see that she was really upset. Then she looked back up. “I’m very worried about you, Marsha. I wonder if the pressure of school has gotten to you. I know that being a pre-med student can be very stressful, and I know that you’ve been lonely. I had hoped that landing that role would lift your spirits; I know that you were excited about it, and you did it marvelously, but maybe… maybe it was too much pressure at once. Maybe you should take the next semester off.”

“No!” I leaped to my feet. “You can’t do that! Eric is expecting to see me in January to show me the lab, and…” I compressed my lips, uncomfortable under her gaze, trying to think of arguments in my favor.

“I… I’m comfortable at school. I’m getting along with my new roommates and my new friends, and… I even talk with some of my old friends, although most of them don’t remember me. Vicky is the only one who does, but that’s because she did the experiment, too.” And Jeremy will be there, too, came unbidden into my head.

“I don’t know, Honey. I need to talk this over with your father.”

“Don’t do that, Mom, please? Don’t tell Dad about it.”

“Why in the world would I keep this from your father?” she asked me, astonished.

“Well…” Putting it into words wasn’t all that easy. “When I told you, you sort of flinched away from me. I don’t… I don’t want Daddy to look at me like I’m a stranger, or crazy, or anything.”

“Marsha, this is not like you.”

“Oh course it’s not like me!” I howled. “Or not like Marsha, I should say. That’s what I’m telling you, Mom. I’m not me. I mean, I’m not Marsha. I’m not the girl you remember. I’m the child you might have had if things went differently, when they did go differently.

“Look,” I said, lowering my voice. “Marsh doesn’t play the guitar, does she?” When Mom shook her head, I continued, “But I do. Not as well as I used to, because I don’t have the muscle memory, but I already play a lot better than you’d expect for somebody who’d only been practicing for a couple of months. Let me get the guitar I borrowed and show you.”

Without waiting for her assent, I ran to my room and grabbed the guitar and ran back. As I tuned it, I explained. “This actually belongs to the brother of a close friend, but he did the experiment, too, and in his other life he never learned how to play it, so he doesn’t even want to see it.” I finished and played a few test chords. “Now remember, I don’t have the muscle memory I had, so this won’t be great, but it should make my point. And I launched into All My Loving, the same song on which I had failed so spectacularly in Nikki’s room. It wasn’t up to my old standards, but I thought it would pass.

When I finished, I look at Mom for a reaction and was surprised to see her crying. “I… I don’t know how you did that, Honey, but that was beautiful. Grandpa used to play that all the time, and you did it with his little flairs and touches. How in the world…?”

“Grandpa taught me a bit before he died, Mom,” I explained. “And I used to listen to recordings he’d made when I was learning. I guess… I’d never really thought about it, but I suppose I did copy some of his style. I’ve been playing for years, Mom, and I always hoped he would have been proud of me. There’s no way Marsha could have done this, could she?”

“I don’t know… I don’t…” She kept shaking her head. “I don’t know if you’re going crazy, or I am, or… I don’t see how what you’re telling me could be true, but I don’t see how you could play as well as you just did, either.”

“It’s not much,” I pointed out. “I only have a repertoire of like three songs, at this point. I’m having to relearn everything I used to know.”

“That’s still rather… amazing,” she commented. She took the guitar out of my hands and put it down carefully on the counter before hugging me. “Baby, I don’t what’s going on, I can’t think of you as a stranger, but clearly something’s happened to you. I’m very hurt that you confided in your sister and Chad, but not your father and me.”

“I was afraid…” I explained in a small voice. “You just threatened to keep me home from school, and to take me to a doctor. I didn’t want that to happen, so I didn’t tell you. I was afraid that if you knew I wasn’t the daughter you remembered, that you’d be afraid of me, or not… well, not comfortable with me. I need you, Mom. I wasn’t going to tell you, but you overheard a conversation and I didn’t want to lie.”

“You didn’t want to lie?” I shook my head. “But you told me it was a hoax, didn’t you? So you have lied, one way or the other.”

I squirmed uncomfortably. “I’m sorry, Mom. I didn’t know what to do.”

“Well, teenagers do keep secrets for stupid reasons. I’m not so old that I don’t remember being afraid to tell everything that happened to me. I’m going to have to think about things, Marsh.” Then, releasing me, she looked me in the eye. “Do you not want me to call you Marsha any more?”

“I don’t want anybody to treat me any differently. I don’t want people to think I’m a freak, or anything.”

With a slight smile, Mom said, “Well, I certainly remember that feeling. OK, Honey. I am going to have to discuss this with your father, but,” she held up a hand when I started to object, “I think you underestimate him. I promise that we won’t force you to do anything you’re uncomfortable with.”

I nodded, but I couldn’t help remembering that he had called Dean Peterson on me. What if he did something like that again?

As we pulled up to the restaurant, I started getting self-conscious. I had no idea how I looked, now. Surely I owed it Jeremy to put at least some makeup on, didn’t I? It would have been so much easier if I had just done it from the start, where Mom and Tina could have commented. This whole makeup thing was such a pain! I was starting to appreciate how much better I looked with it, but I wished there was an easier way. As soon as we got to the restaurant, I excused myself to run to the ladies’ room to see what a mess I had made of myself, and what I could to fix it.

The first person I noticed in the bathroom was Maddy, who was at the mirror, fixing her own makeup. She automatically turned to see when I opened the door and did a double take when she saw me.

“Marsh! Are you here with Dirk?”

“Um, no,” I said. “I’m… here with another boy.”

“Marsh is here?” I heard from one of the stalls. Then the toilet flushed, and Cherise came out. “Hey, Marsh.”

“Another boy?” Maddy echoed, ignoring the other girl. “You said you weren’t dating anybody.”

“And what happened to your makeup?” Cherise asked.

“One thing at a time, Cherise,” Maddy snapped. “What about it, Marsh? Why did you lie to me?”

“I didn’t! Go ask Jeremy; this is our first date, and he asked me after I spoke to you.”

“That’s some coincidence; Dirk said when he called, you already had a date. So he just happened to call you in between you talking to me and Dirk calling?”

“And why aren’t you wearing makeup?” Cherise repeated.

“Cherise!”

“This is important, Maddy. Have you ever seen Marsh without makeup? On a date?”

The two of them turned to me. “That is a good point,” Maddy conceded. “What about it, Marsh?”

Oh boy.

“Well… I was upset at Tina and I didn’t think it was a real date and I was really starting to feel sorry for myself, and…” and I had had that fight with Chad, but after Mom’s reaction, that didn’t seem sensible to mention.

They shared glances and then Maddy pressed me again, “You’re going to have to explain that one.”

So I explained how Tina had set it up, and how I’d been feeling bad about it and how it turned out that Jeremy and I had really liked each other and didn’t know it. By the time I was done, they were laughing. Laughing!

“Marsh, you are incredible,” snickered Cherise. “How do you get yourself into these situations? All you had to do was ask your sister to ask her friend who Janine was.”

“And how do you go from a boy who is too aggressive for you, even after two years, to one who’s afraid to ask you out?” Maddy asked.

“I didn’t say he was afraid…” I protested, feeling I needed to defend him from my friends.

“Marsh, you said his sister had to hit him to make him ask.”

“He was… shy.”

“As opposed to you?”

“Do you guys even talk to each other when you’re alone? Or is it all, ‘er,’ ‘um…’”

I felt my face growing hot, and I didn’t even have the protection of foundation to conceal the redness of my cheeks. That reminded me why I had come into the ladies’ room in the first place. Besides it served to change the subject.

“I look kind of pale, don’t I?” I said, staring in the mirror.

“Seriously,” Cherise said. “What do you have with you?”

“Um…” I opened my purse. “Lipstick, pencil, eyeliner, blush, and powder,” I said, taking them out. That’s just going to have to do.”

With the two of them offering advice, I managed to do something I thought sensible; remembering how Lee Ann had put power on my face without foundation, I did the same now, since it was all I had. I added lipstick, blush, and liner, and thought the effect reasonable, under the circumstances.

And Jeremy didn’t even notice! Not that I’m saying it was my main focus, but given how foreign all of this was to me, and how much of an effort I was putting in to be a girl on a date with him, it would have been nice if he’d found a way to compliment me.

Cherise and Maddy had insisted on meeting him, so I pulled him away from the table he had found for the two of us, and dragged him over to meet the girls and their dates. And then of course, we had to sit with them.

Jeremy was really a good sport, considering that he had obviously expected to be alone with me. He didn’t say a lot at the table, but he made up for it on the dance floor. In the first place, he had been modest about his abilities – he was a wonderful dancer, and I actually felt comfortable with his arms around me. Well, not just comfortable; I was definitely a little bit turned on by dancing with him; if I had had music, I might well have started singing – if I’d known what to sing. But I definitely felt like a heroine in a romantic musical.

And… I got my good night kiss. Jeremy walked me to my door, as I tried to remember all the strategies I’d known about walking a girl home – and then tried to reverse them. So I took my keys out of my purse, and said, “Thank you for a wonderful evening, Jeremy.”

“Yeah, you, too,” he said, and he gave me one of his incredible smiles, but he didn’t kiss me. I was about to give up, when he said, “I’m sorry we didn’t get to see Avatar. Would you like to go see it tomorrow?”

I was so surprised, that it took me a moment to respond. “Tomorrow?” I said or, I guess, squealed – another first for me.

“Well, I did promise you a movie,” he said.

“And I made you take me to a restaurant, and you had to pay a cover charge, and you wound up spending more already than you had planned. I’m really sorry.”

He laughed. “I’m not. I figure we’ve got about two months to catch up on. Um…”

“Yes?”

“I feel like you’re so easy to talk to. Most girls make me nervous, but you don’t talk like most girls. You… I’m saying this badly and I don’t want to insult you, but sometimes when I talk with you, it feels like I’m talking to a friend, only,” he added hurriedly, “a friend I really like a lot more than… well… I’m saying this all wrong.”

“You’re doing great,” I told him, my heart pounding.

“Um, and…” I saw him take a deep breath. This is it, I thought, he’s going to kiss me now.

“Um,” he said again. “You know, when we get back to school…”

I stared at him, starting to get a bit annoyed. When you consider yourself to be really good at something, it can be painful to watch somebody do it ineptly. I think I’d been on nearly two dozen first dates, and had never failed to kiss the girl good night. Jeremy was on the verge on failing badly, and with a girl who had tried to make it obvious that she wanted to be kissed. I jingled my keys a little, hoping that he might have seen Hitch, in which the title character explains how to tell when a girl is expecting a good night kiss. It at least drew his attention, and from the slight look of panic in his eyes, I could tell that he really did want to kiss me, but wasn’t sure how to go about it.

I watched closely as he pressed his lips together in determination. Then he gently placed his right hand on my shoulder and leaned in. In The Princess Bride, the narrator talks about great kisses and how the one between Westley and Buttercup surpassed them all. Now, this kiss… well, it wasn’t even close. At least he hit my lips, I’ll give him that.

Not that it really mattered. I didn’t need to judge his technique; besides, it looked as though we were going to have more than a few dates to work on things, and I had never minded practicing kissing somebody I liked. Plus, I was flying, just being with him. I did reach up to put my hands on his shoulders for a second attempt, and that was somewhat better.

At least it affected him, as well, and his, “good night” was a bit shaky. I reached behind me and let myself in, and then closed the door and hissed a triumphant, “yes!” at the ceiling.

“Good date?”

I jumped. “Daddy!” I exclaimed, turning to see him sitting on a chair in the hallway, “I… didn’t expect you to be there!”

He got up and put down his book. “Well, I just wanted to be sure you were OK.” He kissed me on the forehead and added, “I’m pretty sure your sister is still up, too, so why don’t you go check on her? You can tell your mother all about it in the morning.”

The light was on under Tina’s door, so I knocked lightly and heard a whispered, “Marsh? Come in.”

“I’m here, Teen,” I whispered back, coming and sitting on the edge of her bed.

She looked as if she had fallen asleep sitting up, but she struggled awake and asked, “How did it go?”

“Very, very well,” I answered, only just starting to come down from my high.

“Enough to make you forget about what’s-his-name at school?”

“Oh, Tina,” I laughed, hugging her. “Jeremy is the boy I had a crush on at school.

“What? I’m pretty sure he doesn’t have a girlfriend,” she said, sounding confused, but no longer sleepy.

“He doesn’t,” I told her, shaking my head. “It was just a total misunderstanding on my part.”

“Oh… good, then. So everything’s all right now?”

“Well,” I said, “It’s really good; but it’s almost as though I have this little voice in the back of my head from the part of me that’s still Marshall, telling me that I really shouldn’t be dating boys at all.”

She sat all the way up, indignant. “Well you tell Marshall to shut up! This is your life and you’re a girl, now! He has no right to tell you how to live your life!”

“Well, he’s…” I waved off my own objection. “It’s not like I hear it all the time, Teen, and certainly not when I’m with… Jeremy. It just seems as though it’s too good to be true. I was alone for so long, and now… I’m not. We’re going out again tomorrow!”

“Two nights in a row? Wow. I guess Phyllis and I were right, weren’t we?”

“You certainly were. Anyway, we both need our sleep, and I’ll talk to you in the morning. Good night, Teen, and thank you very much!”

“Good night…”

The next morning, after Dad left to take Tina to rehearsal, Mom pulled me aside. “Now that we’re alone, you can tell me about last night. Your father said only that you returned later than expected and in a very good mood.”

“I sure did,” I grinned. “The girlfriend turned out to be just a friend, the boy turned out to have wanted to ask me out for a while, we went dancing, and we’re going out again tonight!”

“So you two got along well?”

“Very well. He’s a wonderful dancer, and very easy to talk to, and…”

“And good-looking?”

“Um… yeah,” I said unable to keep myself from blushing.

“What did you talk about?”

“Well…” What had we talked about? I don’t think I remember too many specifics. I think we talked about school, and… ” I shrugged.

Mom smiled. “So you’ve got that much of a crush on him, I take it.”

“I guess so.”

“And all that hysteria was unnecessary.”

“Yes, I guess so,” I admitted. “But I didn’t know that, then.”

“I’m still a little foggy on what happened before the date, though.”

“Um, before the date?” I echoed, my heart leaping into my throat.

“Well, you said that you’d had a fight with Chad, and then you decided not to wear makeup on a date. Neither one of these is like you, Marsh.”

I tensed as she continued, “Honey, you’ve been in a strange mood for some time; I’m just trying to understand why. You stopped really talking to me for while, and then even when you started again, I’ve had the sense that you’re not telling me as much as you used to.”

“I… Mom, I just…” I started. Fortunately, my cell phone rang just then. It had the standard ring, so it wasn’t one of my friends, but it was a good excuse to interrupt the conversation. “Just a second, Mom,” I said. “This could be important.”

I stood up, pulled the phone out of my purse and flipped it open, gesturing to Mom that I was going to take it in the next room. “Hello?” I said as I turned to leave.

“Marsh, this is Eric. I think we’ve found the lab.”

When the doorbell rang, Mom, Tina, and I looked at each other and then Tina shouted, “I’ll get it!” and ran for the door. I couldn’t move. It had just hit me that Jeremy was here. Jeremy! And I had made myself look ridiculous.

“What do I do, Mom?” I asked, desperately.

“Isn’t this what you wanted, Marsh? You said it wasn’t an important date because he has a girlfriend, right?”

“Well… yeah, but…” I looked around, but we don’t have any mirrors in living room. I quickly rubbed at the hair horn I had created, hoping at least to make it less noticeable.

“Let me, Hon,” Mom said, taking my hand away. She moistened her own hands with spit and did something to the mess I’d made of my hair, but stopped when we heard Tina coming back – with him.

“Jeremy, this is our mother,” Tina said as they walked in from the hallway, “and you remember Marsh.”

“Jeremy!” Mom said, moving to greet him, and give me maybe a few extra seconds to pull myself together. “So nice to meet you.” My heart was now pounding insanely, whether because Jeremy was here in my house, or because I was horribly embarrassed or nervous or something.

“Um… pleased to meet you, Mrs. Steen,” Jeremy said, taking the hand she had extended to him. “uh… hi, Marsh. You look… really nice.” So he was a liar; maybe I could use that to start not liking him so much.

“Hi,” I said in a voice that sounded more like a croak than anything Marsha’s voice should have produced. I did not put out my hand; it would have trembled way too visibly.

“Ready to go?” he asked. At my nod, he led the way to the front door, the three us following him. It took him two tries to get it open. I didn’t blame him for being nervous; I knew how awkward this whole thing was for him. Having Mom and Tina watching so closely couldn’t have made it easy. I was so glad that Dad wasn’t there to make it even worse.

When we reached his car, a green Honda Civic in fairly good condition, he held open the passenger side door for me, handed me the seat belt when I sat down, and then closed the door when I had buckled. I had, of course, done the same with my own dates, but it really drove home for me just how different this was. He was in charge of the car and paying for the date; I wasn’t in control at all. It was a bit uncomfortable, but then, this whole date was uncomfortable. Why had I let Tina talk me into this?

I noticed after a few minutes that he wasn’t talking, and my heart went out to him; whatever pressure his sister had brought to bear on him, he didn’t deserve my making it worse by letting the ride be totally silent. So I turned to him and asked, “So how was the second night of House Parties for you?” I’d seem him enjoying himself, so that would at least have positive associations for him.

“Oh!” he said, sounding a bit surprised. “It was great. Janine loves to dance, and she’s really good at it.

And so are you, I thought, remembering. Then I felt a bit guilty. Had it really been kind to remind him of the girl he was cheating on?

“How long have you two known each other?” I asked next. Maybe it was better for him to focus on her tonight. Or maybe I was just angry in general; I hoped I wasn’t deliberately taking it on him.

I needn’t have worried. It seemed a very comfortable subject for him, unfortunately.

“Oh, we met at the beginning of freshman year,” he said. “I knew right away I wanted to ask her out, but somehow I just didn’t have the nerve. She’d told me that she was going to be studying in the library, so I went over, you know, hoping to ‘accidentally’ run into her, but I couldn’t find her. I didn’t figure out until later that there was more than one library on campus.”

So he’d been a bit inept with girls, his freshman year. They’d still had three-and-half years to get to know each other. I listened with half an ear as he kept on going, talking about the two of them. Inwardly, though, I was raging at Chad. Why couldn’t he have had some sympathy for my position? Look at me, here I was, sitting with my crush, who was taken; back at school was a guy who wanted me, but whom I could only see as a friend. I’d never had these problems as a guy.

“It seemed that every time we did go out, though, she was always just getting over a breakup with somebody else,” Jeremy was saying. I noticed his nervousness seemed to be gone. Apparently, this was a very comfortable subject for him. Terrific. “So I guess I was a really safe ‘rebound’ date.”

I tuned him out again. It’s not as if I’m giving up, Chad, I imagined myself telling him. This body has its own wants. It’s just simple biology, and I can’t fight it. It’s not my fault.

“… but we were great friends,” Jeremy was saying, “and agreed to be each other’s emergency dates; you know, if there was something we really wanted to go to, but we didn’t have a date. And meanwhile, we started fixing each other up…”

I nodded to myself. I knew the story – it was like the movie, When Harry met Sally. And eventually, they had finally figured out that they were so comfortable together, that everything else just worked. Do you think I would have chosen this, Chad? I continued. I don’t know just about any of the things about dating that a girl my age is supposed to know. When I was a guy it was so much easier. I knew all of the moves; I usually knew when a girl was interested. Of course I still want to change back. But I have to be ready if I can’t.

Then I heard a word that pulled my full attention back to Jeremy. “Excuse me?” I asked. “Did you say fiancée?”

“Mmmhmm. Carl was a year ahead of us, and I met him in a geology course I took for my minor. I figured he and Janine would be great together and I was right. They’re getting married right after she graduates.”

“Wait… wait,” I said, struggling to change mental gears. “If she’s… if she… fiancé… why was she with you?”

“Oh, his company picked that weekend to send him to a conference; would you believe it? And he couldn’t get out of it. Apparently, ‘I want to go to a school dance with my fiancée’ doesn’t count as a good excuse. So he came up the weekend before to see her, but that meant she didn’t have a date for House Parties, and as I said, she really likes to dance. Well, I didn’t have a date either, so, we went together.”

“You… didn’t have a date?” I echoed.

“No, and let me tell you, Janine really let me have it after I walked her home that night when I told her about running into you.” He laughed as he described what happened. “She said, ‘Jeremy you idiot! You’ve been mooning over this girl for two mon–’”

Suddenly, his eyes went wide and his face turned bright red. As I stared, with my jaw on the floor, he clamped his mouth shut as if he had only just realized what he was saying, and to whom.

My mind was in a whirl. What?! He’s been mooning over me? Everything I had assumed about his behavior was wrong. He hadn’t been nervous because he was cheating on Janine; he was nervous because he was asking out a girl he really liked, and he probably still wasn’t very adept at talking to them. To us. Whatever.

And to make matters worse, from his perspective, he had just admitted to this girl he really liked, to me, how he felt. On the first date! He probably thought he’d just blown it.

He wasn’t talking; he looked as though he didn’t expect ever to be able to talk, even to look at me, ever again. That meant that, as the person with probably a lot more dating experience and expertise, I had to do something about it. But what? I couldn’t just say something like, “but I like you too!” He probably wouldn’t believe it, and would think I was just being kind. I needed to tell him something believable, and probably a bit embarrassing.

It took me a moment to come up with something that I thought might work. “Jeremy,” I said, “did you see the on-campus production of The Mousetrap?”

“Um, no,” he said. It sounded like a change of subject, so I had been pretty sure he could be comfortable with it, but he still wasn’t looking at me. “I thought about going, but I didn’t want to go alone and Janine was busy and I didn’t have a da–” He cut himself off again, evidently finding that subject too awkward. No matter, I wasn’t done.

“I had the lead,” I told him.

That got him to look at me, and he looked stricken now, rather than embarrassed. “Oh, Marsh, I’m so sorry. I wish I’d known.”

“I played a newlywed,” I continued. “There was scene where I had to kiss the boy playing my ‘husband’ and I couldn’t do it properly, and the directory said to pretend I was kissing a boy a really liked, and…” Now I choked off. I hadn’t realized how hard this was going to be to say to him. Carefully watching his face, I forced myself to finish. “So I pretended I was kissing you.”

I saw his eyes flicker in surprise. “Y-you…?” he stammered.

I nodded. “Mmhmm.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

He sat back. “I don’t believe this.”

“You don’t? I was beside myself over the idea that you were dating Janine.”

“Janine? You thought I was dating Janine?”

“Uh huh. I saw you two dancing at Blair and I got really upset and had to leave.”

“You were at Blair? I wish I’d seen you. We could have…”

“Yeah…” I would much rather have been dancing with him than Geoff. Janine had clearly been enjoying herself. When might I have a chance to…?

“Is something wrong?” he asked.

“No, I just wish we could go dancing. You looked really good at it.”

“Oh,” he laughed. “I’m not that good. What you saw was mostly Janine, I think. Besides, there’s nowhere around here to go dancing, is there?”

“Um, well, actually… a friend told me that the Country Inn on Old Mill Road has dancing every other Friday night, including tonight.”

“Every other Friday? Then we could go… in two weeks, which is after school starts again… Oh.”

“Yeah…” I said, disappointed.

“So, if we wanted to go it would have to be tonight? Do you want to do that instead of the movie?” he asked.

“Please.”

“OK. Fine. Just tell me how to get there.”

At my direction, we turned around, and I started getting really excited about the whole evening, but I start wondering about how we wound up like this. Why did it take him all this time to call me? So I asked him, “If you’ve… liked me all this time, why didn’t you ever call me? Or were you hoping to ‘just accidentally run into me’?”

He looked embarrassed. “Well, I was actually going to ask you out the day we first met, and I asked Phyllis for your phone number, but she and Tina had just had this fight, and she wouldn’t tell me.”

“I remember the fight,” I said. Wow. Had he asked me out that day I would have said no, and I wouldn’t be here now, on a date with somebody that I liked a lot and who liked me. I remember desperately wishing I could be male again; just now, it was really hard to remember why. In fact, it was hard to think clearly about anything but Jeremy right now. My heart seemed to be competing with the engine for loudness and intensity, and I was feeling ever more conscious of my appearance. A guy usually expects a girl to look her best on a date, and I had practically done the opposite. Would he be offended?

“And then it just didn’t occur to me to ask her after I got back to the school,” he continued, “since I thought there was no way I’d have a chance to see you until winter break. I freaked when I saw you on campus; I figured I’d missed my chance and you were there with some other guy. And afterwards I tried to look you up, but you don’t seem to be in the school directory.”

“I am, actually. My first name is Jennifer.” This used to happen all the time when I was a guy, too, since I had been listed as Dwight M. Steen. My friends had known how to reach me, of course. It had sort of a filtering effect, so I hadn’t bothered asking the school to change my listing; obviously, neither had Marsha, and for the first time, I regretted it. I would have much happier if Jeremy had called me before exams started. But it had all worked out, anyway. It was really lucky that we both happened to be there that day… “Wait a minute,” I said, struck by a sudden suspicion. “Why were you there at the music school in the first place? Did Phyllis ask you to drive her?”

“Yes. Why?”

“That’s what I thought; Tina asked me, too. We were set up! They intended us to meet!”

The next morning, as Mom and I were cleaning up after breakfast, she asked, “So are you bored enough, yet?”

“Hmm?”

“Well, I didn’t want to bother you when you just got back from school, but if you’d like to sit with me while I’m working, I’d love to talk with you.”

“Oh! Sure,” I said. “I was going to do some chord practice, but I can spend time with you instead.”

So we finished in the kitchen and moved to the bedroom Mom had turned into a sewing room. It was, of course, a lot larger than my work area or even Nikki’s, with four clothing racks, a three-way mirror for her client, and an iron and ironing board in addition to her sewing machine. I took a spare chair as she pulled a garment off the rack and started work.

“What’s going on with this date?” she asked. “You don’t sound very excited. Do you not like the boy?”

“I like him very much,” I admitted. “Don’t tell Tina, but he’s the boy I told you I had a crush on.”

“The one who has a girlfriend? Oh…” She looked at me out of the corner of her eyes. “Then why did he ask you out?”

“Well, it seems to have been his sister and Tina’s idea. I’m guessing that Phyllis doesn’t like his girlfriend very much.”

“Oh, Honey, that’s terrible.”

“And Daddy wants to meet him, and I thought about canceling, but Tina was so proud of herself for setting this up.”

“What a mess,” she said. “Here, why don’t you move the buttons on this blouse. They’re marked.” As I started hunting for the right color thread, she continued, “Well, he’s obviously not averse to the date.”

“His sister was standing next to him when he called, and I think she hit him when he didn’t ask me quickly enough.”

As I started cutting off the buttons, she shook her head. “How do you feel about all of this?”

“I feel horrible, of course. I don’t like the way he’s being treated, and he’s probably going to have this really negative association towards me now. On the other hand,” I said, as I started sewing the buttons at their new location. “I’m probably going to enjoy being with him, only he’ll be feeling guilty, and I’m going to feel guilty about that. I’d just cancel the whole thing, only I don’t know what’s going on between him and his sister, and Tina will be really mad at me, so just going on the date seems to be least bad thing to do.” I looked up and saw her staring at my hands. “Is something wrong?”

“No, I’ve just never seen you start your threads like that before.”

I looked at my hands, and then remembered. Nikki had said that she hadn’t noticed the way Marsha did it, so she had taught me her own way. Apparently, it wasn’t the way Mom had taught her daughters.

“Oh, this is the way my friend does it, and I just picked it up, I guess.”

“Oh! Well let me see that again.” She watched as I started the thread for the third button. “Hmm. Do you find that easier than my way?”

“Uh… I don’t know. I just got used to it.”

“Hmm… I can deal with your father. What time is Jeremy picking you up?”

“Seven o’clock.”

“I’ll make sure he’s not there; that will at least save you the embarrassment of having him questioning this boy. But otherwise, you’re pretty much on your own.” She stopped the machine, took the skirt out of my hands and inspected it. “Good job as always, Honey.” Then she hugged me. “I’m so sorry about the way this date worked out. Just be kind to the boy, and don’t push him to do something that will get him into trouble with his girlfriend.” I thought guiltily about my hopes for a goodnight kiss. “I’ll try to keep your sister from interfering in your love life in the future.”

She sat back down at the machine and started working again. “Do you have any prospects back at school?” Apparently Tina hadn’t mentioned Dirk, at least.

“Not really,” I told her. “There is a boy who seems to really like me, and is probably going to ask me out, but I’m not all that attracted to him.”

“But you’ll go out with him once, at least. You never know how things will work out.”

“I suppose. And Lee Ann is intent on fixing me up with somebody; she knows this boy, so I suppose that means only after he has his chance.”

She nodded, and we chatted about school in general, and Tina’s play, and my schedule for next semester. It’s probably a good thing she only had the one sewing machine. The only things she asked me to do were handwork: buttons, and ripping seams, and the like, all of which I felt competent at. I had gotten pretty good with the sewing machine, but watching her now showed me how much I didn’t know, and I wasn’t sure how good Marsha was supposed to be. At some point, I was probably going to have to have an explanation of why my skills had slipped, but as long as I had the hope that this wasn’t permanent, I wasn’t ready to deal with the issue.

I went back to my room after a couple of hours and worked on my chord progressions. I felt that I was getting reasonably competent there, although I still wasn’t ready to play in public. Developing the muscle memory and skills takes a long time, and I had years of practice to catch up on, but at least it felt good to see some progress.

My phone rang a bit after lunch, and the display told me that it was from Dinah.

“Hello?” I said, a bit uncertain.

“I hear you spoke with Maddy,” said a soprano voice.

“Um, yes, I did. Hi, Dinah. Um… I’m sorry for not talking with you all this time.”

“Yeah, well, I’m sorry for lying to George about you.”

George was presumably the boy that Maddy had mentioned. I didn’t know him at all, and certainly wasn’t interested in him, so why did I feel angry when she said that? I forced myself to be calm and simply said, “Don’t worry about it. It’s in the past.”

“But it still hurts?”

“No, not really.”

I heard her sigh. “Geez, Marsh, you’ve gotten boring in your old age.” Uhhh… an in joke, probably.

“Anyway,” she continued. “You’re coming to the New Year’s Eve party, right?”

“Uh… sure.” A lot of my old crowd would be there, and I was probably going to have to deal with them eventually, anyway. Besides, just staying home would have been boring.

“And will you be coming with Dirk?”

“I… don’t know,” I said, hesitantly. “We’re going to talk on Saturday. I’m inclined to doubt it, though.”

“Really? You know a lot of us are rooting for you two to get back together.”

“I appreciate that,” I said. “We’ll see.” It hadn’t occurred to me just how much of a challenge this break could be. Maybe there was a better way for me to handle it than just pretending I was Marsha?

“So what have you been up to, lately?”

“Well, I played Mollie in a production of The Mousetrap.”

“Uh huh…”

“And my classes are going well…”

“C’mon, Marsh. I mean, what have you been doing? OK, Maddy says you’re not actually seeing anybody, but if you’re not into getting back together with Dirk, there must be somebody else you have your eye on. Spill!”

Spill? Was I supposed to admit to a crush? Or talk about my thoughts on dating when I got back to school? “Um… well… there’s a boy that I like but he’s taken, does that count?”

“Taken? Marsh, you know better than that. What are you doing to yourself?”

Aside from talking about things I don’t want to discuss with a girl I don’t know very well? I really wasn’t sure how this was supposed to work. “I didn’t know about her when I met him, is all. There’s a boy at school who likes me, though, but I’m not so sure how I feel about him.”

“So why don’t you want to get back with Dirk?”

“I’m just not sure we belong together. Besides, I think I’d rather be with somebody at school. My roommate has an off-campus boyfriend and she hardly ever sees him.”

“Yeah, that’s not so good.”

Talking about my love life or potential love life when I really didn’t know what I was doing was awkward. Dinah sure seemed to be nosy, considering that she hadn’t even spoken with Marsha probably since the summer. Then I had a brainwave.

“What about you? What’s happening with your love life?”

“Oh, well, wait until I tell you,” she started, and told me. And told me. I didn’t have to say anything more about myself, just react.

When she finally ran down, she asked, “so can you come over on Sunday to help plan this thing? If you’re back into the group, I’d really like you to make those things you made last year. Everybody loved them.”

“Oh… “ What things? “Let me see if I can find the recipe again.” Maybe Tina will know.

“OK, great! Sunday about one, then. See you, Marsh!”

Tina’s last day of school for the year was Friday, the afternoon of my date, and she had scheduled me to get my hair “done.” This turned out to be way more complex than the haircuts I had been used to, and I really wasn’t sure what was going on, only Tina and the lady doing my hair kept chattering on, while I just closed my eyes and pretended I was somewhere else. Why exactly this made me feel out of place in ways that other female-only venues hadn’t, I wasn’t sure, but I was certainly not an active participant in whatever was being done to me, nor did I particularly want to be.

When we got home, I pulled into the driveway and pushed the garage door opener. While we were waiting for the door to open, I heard a sharp rap on my window and looked up to see Chad. In the light from the garage, I could see a very surprised expression on his face. I rolled down my window.

“Hi, Chad,” I said, as casually as I could.

“How long have you been home?” he demanded.

“Can I put the car in the garage, first?” I asked. “It’s kind of cold out here.”

Chad waited until I had stopped the car and then followed us into the garage, looking confused and – maybe it was only my imagination – a bit annoyed.

“Did you just get back from school today?” he asked, as Tina and I got out of the car.

“No,” I answered, “we just got back from the…” and then I sort of mumbled, “… beauty parlor.”

“From the what?”

“The beauty parlor, Chad,” Tina put in. “Marsh has a big date tonight.”

“Um, Tina,” I said, “could you let Chad and talk for a moment?”

The two of us watched as Tina went into the house and then Chad turned to me, clearly stunned. “You…. have a… what?”

“Um… a date?” I said, embarrassed.

“With a guy?” I nodded. “And you got your hair done for this date… with a guy.”

“Um… yeah.”

“So… all this, ‘oh I’m really a boy, Chad’ thing was just a joke? See if you can tease old Chad? I’ll bet you and Tina had a big laugh over that.”

“No,” I protested. “It’s not like that. I am really a guy… or was, anyway.”

“Really,” he said, his eyebrows raised. “You didn’t tell me the part about you being gay.”

“I’m not! I… look, this was a real surprise to me.”

“Was it? Your sister said, ‘let’s get in the car, Marsh,’ and then she wrestled you into the beauty parlor?”

“No… I mean… look, it’s getting real cold out here. Do you want to go inside to talk?”

“When you’re expecting your sweetie to come over? I don’t think that would go over very well.”

“This is important, Chad!”

“Is it? I notice you didn’t feel it important enough to tell me anything about it. Remember what I said about keeping a guy informed when he’s working on a problem with you? Oh, sorry. That’s a guy thing. Nothing to do with you.”

“Chad, that’s not fair!” I called after him as he walked out of the garage, but he didn’t turn around. I ran out of the garage after him. He completely ignored me until he reached his front door, when he suddenly turned around with the door open and froze me with a scornful glance – and then went inside and shut the door.

It was like a slap in the face. I was just doing what made sense, wasn’t I? Why hadn’t he let me explain?

“Marsh?” I turned and saw my sister calling from the opening to the garage. “You need to start getting ready.”

“Ready for what?” I asked, looking back at Chad’s door. “Oh, right. My date.”

“Marsh, what’s wrong?”

“Why am I doing this, Teen?” I asked as I followed her back into the garage. “How did things go so far? Beauty parlor? What am I doing, going to beauty parlors?”

“So you’ll look beautiful for Jeremy, Marsh. It’s a date, and Jeremy’s a really nice guy. You want him to like you, don’t you?”

“What am I doing dating boys in the first place? We have to cancel.”

“What?! Of course you’re not going to cancel. Jeremy is a nice boy and you’re going to great together.” She wasn’t listening to me, any more than Chad had.

I reached for the door to the house, but it opened suddenly, with Mom on the other side. “You look beautiful, Marsh. And don’t worry about your father. I sent him on an errand that will keep him busy until after you and your date leave.”

“Marsh, are you listening to me?” Tina hissed, following me into the house. “You can’t cancel. You promised. Remember?”

“Cancel?” asked Mom, “What are you talking about?”

“Marsh is talking about canceling her date!”

“Marsha, you can’t do that. It would be rude. You’ve accepted and he’ll be here in an hour-and-a-half and I got your father out of the house for you. Everything’s been set up. Now go shower and get dressed.”

I looked back and forth between my mother and my sister. “It… I shouldn’t be doing this. It’s all wrong.”

“This is not the time, Baby. Get in the shower and I’ll come in and talk with you while you get ready.”

“I thought I was going to–” Tina objected, but Mom cut her off.

“On the whole, Tina, I think I’d better be the one tonight. Get going, Marsha.”

Feeling that I was completely losing control of things, I tore off my clothes and stomped into the shower. The hot water usually relaxed me, but not today. Stupid girly body, I thought. Stupid Chad. Did he think I really had a choice? I was doing what I had to do.

I stayed in the shower long enough for my fingers to get all pruney. Then I toweled my hair mostly dry and wrapped a towel around myself before stomping back to my bedroom.

Stomping is a good thing to do when you’re mad. I imagined I was stomping on Chad’s face as I went. This is not my fault, I told him. I stomped on Tina’s. Why did I let you talk me into this? I stomped on Jeremy. What are you doing, cheating on your girlfriend – and with me? I stomped on Janine. Why do you have to be his girlfriend?

When I got to my room, Mom was already there, laying out the clothes Tina had picked out for me. “Oh, Marsh, you got your hair wet – and it was just styled!” She sighed. “Sit down, and let me dry it for you.”

I couldn’t figure out a way to making sitting down a stomp, but I sat, grumbling.

“Now tell me what’s ‘all wrong’ and why you were thinking of canceling the date,” Mom invited, raising her voice over the sound of the hair blower.

“I just…” Wait. I can’t tell her that. “I had a fight with Chad.”

“With Chad?” she echoed, sounding confused. “Why are you fighting with Chad?’

“Um…” Now that was a question I didn’t know how to answer. If there was any time to explain about the experiment, if I were even ready to tell her, this was not the time. “He was helping me with something… and I didn’t tell him I was home, and he really got angry at me.”

“And what does that have to do with this date?”

“Um… well… nothing, actually.”

“Then why mention it? What is the problem?” She was brushing my hair now, trying to put it back the way it had been when I got home, with limited success.

“I… I’m just feeling that this is all wrong, Mom.”

“What’s wrong, Sweetie, is promising a boy that you’ll go out with him and then canceling. The time to decide that you shouldn’t have accepted the date was when he asked you. Now, unless you have an accident or are seriously sick, it would be wrong to back out.”

“Terrific,” I muttered. It didn’t help my mood to know that she was right. Tina had really screwed things up for me. Why had I made that stupid, stupid promise?

“OK, I think that’s about as much as I can do with your hair, for now. Get your makeup on and get dressed.”

“Why?” I groused.

“Why what?”

“Why do I need to wear makeup? He won’t be.” Mom stared at me, and I stared right back.

“Well, you…” She looked at me intently. “You know what? If you really don’t want to wear make up, don’t.”

“Huh?” I hadn’t expected her to give up so easily.

“This is a boy you said you really like, and I’d have thought you’d want to look your best, but it’s up to you.”

“OK… fine, then. I won’t. I hate makeup.”

“OK.” Why wasn’t I getting a reaction? Marsha would have worn makeup, wouldn’t she?

“That’ll save you time, too. So just get dressed now, and come downstairs. I’m sure Tina wants to see how you look,” Mom said, and walked out, quietly.

I stared after her, and then looked at myself in the mirror. I don’t need makeup, I assured myself. I’m not Marsha. I put on my underwear and then came back and looked again. Ooh, I look a bit pale… No, I’m not wearing makeup tonight. Besides, we’ll be in the movie theater and it’ll be dark.

I pulled on the stockings and my dress and then looked again in the mirror. I don’t know… The next thing I knew I was forcing myself to put down the concealer. OK, get away from the mirror, Marsh.

I put on my shoes and checked my face again. This is a pity date, I reminded myself. No need to look nice. Just to make the point, I took a section of my hair and twisted it until it stuck out like a horn. There. Take that, Tina.

When I came downstairs, Tina opened her mouth as though she was going to say something, but looked at Mom and seemed to change her mind. Mom must have prepared her for what I was going to do, although she couldn’t have anticipated my little hairstyle change.

“You look… nice,” she managed to say, and I could almost have laughed. Then the doorbell rang.

I hesitated, my hand halfway to the phone. Dirk, I thought, It must be Dirk. How did I get myself into this? But then I remembered that Chad had said that the Dirk he knew in this timeline was a nice guy, and Nikki had reminded me that it was just a date. Taking a breath and letting it out, I took the phone and answered, “Hello, this is Marsh.”

“Um, hi, Marsh,” said a familiar, but uncertain-sounding voice. “It’s Jeremy Barker.”

“What?!” I gasped, looking at Tina in surprise.

“Jeremy Barker,” he repeated. “We met at the music school and again at Piques? It was… um… a surprise, running into you there,” he continued. “But I guess if I had been thinking, I might have realized that you could be there.” He laughed nervously. “I mean, we obviously had midterm break at the same time, right? Um… well, you know it’s kind of surprising, seeing somebody at school that you only met near home, right?”

What was going on, here? He seemed really uncomfortable about something. Tina clearly thought that he was going to ask me out, but he was just rambling.

But he kept on. “And I really wasn’t sure it was even–”

Suddenly he yelped. “Hey, cut it out! I’m going to ask her! Um, so, uh, Marsh, would you like to go to see a movie with me Friday night?”

The first part was obviously not addressed to me, and as I looked at Tina’s eager expression, everything clicked into place. His sister and Tina were both in the choir, and knew each other. Tina had probably asked Jeremy’s sister to get him to ask me out, and she was essentially pressuring him to cheat on Janine. I had no idea what hold she had on him, but I knew that little sisters had a way of finding out things their brothers would prefer they didn’t. That was why he sounded so nervous. I was being asked on a “pity date.”

“Friday night?” I echoed, my heart sinking, and saw Tina nod urgently. “Sure.” As disappointing as the idea of a pity date was, I wasn’t too proud to accept. It was just a date, after all, and a movie date at that. Janine had nothing to worry about. Besides, this meant that I could turn Dirk down when he called if I wanted to, since my promise had only included the first time I was asked.

“Ok, great,” he said. “Um, is Avatar OK? I haven’t seen it yet.”

“Neither have I,” I told him. “That’ll be fine.”

“Ok. I’ll pick you up at about seven o’clock, OK?”

“Sure.”

“Ok, bye.” And I could almost feel his relief as he hung up.

“Do you remember him, Marsh?” Tina asked eagerly. “Phyllis – that’s his sister – says that she saw you two talking when you took me to choir practice. I think you’ll like him; he’s really nice. And he goes to Piques!”

She obviously didn’t know about Janine, and I saw no reason to disillusion her. “I remember him,” I acknowledged. “He is nice.”

“So this will be your first date as a girl. Where’s he taking you?”

“To see Avatar on Friday.”

“Oooh, nice! That’s a long movie, and the two of you will be in the dark together. Lots of possibilities there!”

I’d obviously never shared my philosophy of dating with my sister; or rather, Marsha hadn’t, and I wasn’t going to do anything to burst her bubble. So I just smiled and said, “I’m looking forward to it.”

“I need to get back to my homework, Marsh, but we need to plan this out after dinner. I have some ideas of just the right outfit for you to wear to knock him dead!”

After she left, I tried to analyze what I was feeling. Sure, it wasn’t a real date; we wouldn’t be getting to know each other better to see if we could move into a relationship. But at the same time, I would be spending the evening with Jeremy, and he’d at least have to talk to me in the car. And maybe, I thought, starting to like the idea, if I played my cards right, I could get a goodnight kiss out of it. Now that would be something. But was I really ready to kiss a boy for real? Even this boy? Just the thought was turning me on a bit.

The more I thought about it, the more I started thinking of reasons to look forward to the date. I had been nervous about a boy trying to be too intimate with me, too soon, but with Jeremy having a serious girlfriend, that shouldn’t be a problem. I did want to see the movie, and now I could; plus, I’d find just being near Jeremy exciting, and I wouldn’t have any more expectations that he could dash. On the whole, it would be a safe and enjoyable first date. My ‘take a lemon’ promise would be fulfilled, and then… well, I could worry about what happens next, later.

Tina was really excited about this; more than I was, in fact, and she’d obviously told Mom and Dad, because one of the first things Dad said when we sat down to dinner that night was, “So, I hear you have a date this weekend, Princess.”

I nodded. “We’re going to see a movie.”

“And how do you know this boy?”

I looked at Tina. “We met over midterm break, when I took Tina to choir practice. I don’t really know him all that well; I think Tina does, though.”

That was all the encouragement she needed. “Jeremy is Phyllis Barker’s brother,” she gushed, which elicited a nod from Mom. “He’s into music theory and engineering and geology and he’s really a nice guy, and I think he and Marsh will be great together.”

“That sounds promising,” Mom said, and I had to agree. Why did Tina have to play him up so much? It already hurt that he wasn’t available.

“Well, I’d like to meet him when he comes to pick you up,” Dad said, and that just made me feel even worse. The whole thing was a sham; I knew it and Jeremy knew it, and now Dad would… what? I’d experienced the ‘meeting the Dad’ thing with I think one girl I dated. It hadn’t been comfortable at all, but I’d put up with it because I really wanted to take the girl out. It wasn’t fair for Jeremy to have to go through this for a pity date.

“I’m sure he’ll be happy to meet you, Daddy,” I said, being polite. Maybe it would be best if I called Jeremy back and let him off the hook. Getting out of an unwanted date with Dirk didn’t justify making Jeremy uncomfortable.

What I didn’t understand was, why hadn’t Phyllis just been honest with Tina? I thought of what had happened to Geoff, and how Chandra had insisted on him chasing after Lee Ann, despite her boyfriend. Maybe Phyllis just didn’t like Janine? And she was trying to break them up? Calling it off was definitely sounding like the right thing to do.

After dinner, Tina and I cleared the table and then she almost dragged me to my bedroom. “Phyllis says that Jeremy’s favorite color is green, and you’ve got this green dress that will perfect!” she said, opening my closet door. “Here, hold it up.”

“You know, Teen,” I said, complying, “I’m starting to have second thoughts about–”

“No!” she said sternly. You promised. The first boy who asked you on a date, and Jeremy asked…”

“With Phyllis’s and your prodding,” I suggested.

“Boys don’t always know what’s good for them,” she said, dismissively. “Yeah, that’s going to work. We’ll have to do something with your hair, though. When was the last time you had it cut?”

“I…”

“Well, call for an appointment. Hmm, maybe I should go with you. I’ll call, just to make sure I can make it. And let’s see what kind of stockings will work,” she added, searching through my dresser drawers.”

“What am I, a Barbie doll?” I muttered. I was a bit relieved when my cell phone rang.

I put the dress on my bed and looked at my phone, not recognizing the number. “Hello?” I said, answering it.

A confident male voice answered. “Hey, Melanie, how are you?”

“Sorry, you’ve got the wrong number,” I said, snapping the phone closed.

“I hate it when that happens,” Tina agreed, pulling out two pairs of stockings. “Let’s see how these look.”

The phone rang again, and it was the same number. “Look, pal,” I said, “there’s nobody named Melanie here. You’ve got the wrong number,” and I hung up once again.

When I turned back to Tina, though, she was staring at me, open-mouthed. “That… that was Dirk,” she stammered.

“Dirk?” I asked, surprised.

“That’s his pet name for you. You know, Marsh, marshmallow, Mel, Melanie…?”

“Marshmallow?” I echoed, incredulous, and looked at myself in the full-length mirror as the phone rang again. That’s not fair. I’m not that fat. I answered the phone again, a bit annoyed. “Hello!”

“Marsh, what the Hell?” he asked, and this time I did sort of recognize his voice.

“I… didn’t realize it was you,” I said, feeling extremely awkward. I had been thinking of the Dirk that I knew, but it had just hit me that this guy was somebody who had had a close relationship with Marsha, maybe closer than just about anybody else.

“Who else calls you Melanie?” he demanded.

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking.”

“Are you still mad at me?”

“Should I be?” I asked, bouncing the conversation back to him.

“I apologized, didn’t I? Look, I’ll say it again. I was a jerk. I’m sorry. I… I wasn’t thinking enough about what you wanted. I want to give ‘us’ another chance, and I promise not to pressure you again, OK?”

This was way beyond my comfort point, and I was at a loss. I looked at Tina for help, but she just looked confused. “Let me think about it, OK?” I finally said.

“OK, fine. But in the meantime, you remember that restaurant on Old Mill Road? The Country Inn?”

“Um, yeah…” I’d taken dates there a few times.

“They’ve started having swing dancing there on every other Friday night. Would you like to go?”

“I’m sorry, Dirk, I have plans for this Friday,” I answered, relieved to have an excuse.

“Plans? Oh come on, Mel, don’t be that way.”

“I’m not ‘being’ any way,” I said. “I have a date. I’m going to a movie with somebody.”

“Maddy said you weren’t seeing anybody.”

“I’m… he just asked me a few hours ago.”

“Marsha!” he complained, “Come on! What do you want me to do, get on my hands and knees and beg?”

“I’m serious,” I assured him. “I met this boy over midterm break and he just called and asked me out.”

“Oh,” he said, sounding surprised. “OK, I see. Um… so how do you want to do this?”

“Do what?”

He sighed, and I grinned a bit to myself. It was a bit mean, but in some way it was kind of fun to annoy him like this.

“I guess we need to talk a bit. Saturday afternoon around 3? We can meet for ice cream and just catch up.”

Again, I looked at Tina, but of course she didn’t know what was going on.

“Ice cream sounds OK,” I said, hoping I wasn’t making a mistake.

“Great! I’ll see you there. Bye”

He hung up, and I stared at the phone. “Where?”

“Where what?” Tina asked.

“I just agreed to meet Dirk for ice cream on Saturday to talk, but he didn’t tell me where,” I explained. “Did Dirk and Marsha have a usual place where they got ice cream?”

“That place at the mall, but why are you seeing Dirk? You’ve got a date with Jeremy!”

“Well he asked me, you know, just to talk. It’s not an actual date or anything.”

“And what are you going to talk about?” she demanded. “How are you going to make him believe that you’re Marsha? You didn’t even know his pet name for her. He’s going to know something’s wrong. Forget about him, OK? Go out with Jeremy first. If things don’t work out, I’ll find you somebody else. But unless you’re planning on telling Dirk everything, I don’t see how you’re going to do this.”

“And if I do tell him, he’ll think I’m crazy, or just still angry at him or something.” That made any possibility of a real date with Dirk impossible, and actually made me a feel a lot better. “So I just need to find some way to tell Dirk that I’m not interested without him thinking that I’m just playing hard to get. Got any ideas?”

“Stand him up?”

“Tina!”

“You should have told him you were busy.”

“Well, I didn’t. I could call him back, I guess. Or I could just talk to him and be reasonably honest. I’ll say that our relationship is history and I’m not interested in starting up again.”

“If you’re sure…?”

“I think it’s the best thing to do,” I said firmly.

“OK, then let’s get back to your date. I think these shoes…”

I sighed and just let her have her way. She’d put so much effort into setting this up, that I might as well let her enjoy herself. The question was, could I?

Exam period was, well, exam period. I studied, I reviewed, I took tests. Geoff and I worked together on Orgo, along with a few others, firing questions back and forth at each other. It seemed to pay off; at least, I felt very confident after each of my exams.

I did manage to squeeze in a makeup lesson from Nikki. She had noticed that I didn’t know what I was doing, but had chosen not to point it out. She said that she hadn’t wanted to add to what I was going through.

Lee Ann kept dropping hints about Geoff, suggesting that I might be missing a great opportunity. It was easier not to fight her; in any event, I wasn’t going to do anything about it until January, so it didn’t really matter, just then – or so I thought.

She knew my exam schedule, of course, and knew when I was heading for the train, and must have called Geoff to tip him off, because just as I started struggling with my suitcase – and Ben’s guitar, which I had decided not to leave in the dorm over break – he showed up at our door and offered to carry the suitcase for me. Of course, I accepted.

“I really appreciate this, Geoff,” I said, as we started down the steps. Carrying just the guitar in its case was much easier than struggling with both it and the suitcase.

“My pleasure,” he grinned at me. “You have any special plans for break?”

“Not really,” I admitted. “I guess I’m just boring.”

“I don’t find you boring.”

“Thank you,” I said, embarrassed. I really wasn’t used to having somebody hitting on me like this. It wasn’t completely unpleasant, but I would have preferred him just to go back to treating me as a friend. I couldn’t help remembering those girls he had had in his bed without actually dating. Was this how he had come on to them?

“Would it be OK if I called you over break?” he asked.

“Uh…” What was I supposed to say? “I think… you might… um… I guess so…?”

He laughed. “I’m really making you nervous, aren’t I?”

“Mm hmm,” I squeaked.

“Would you rather I didn’t call?”

“Um…”

“OK, I get it. I’m coming on too strong. Tell you what. Why don’t I give you my number, and if you feel like talking, you can call me. I think my parents have a little ski trip planned, but you’ll probably be able to reach me in the evenings.”

“I… I can do that,” I said, and we stopped for a moment so that he could punch his number into my cell phone.

“Do you ski?” he asked, once we started walking again.

“I’ve… never tried,” I told him.

“I could ask my parents to invite you…”

“N-no. Thank you, Geoff, but… I’m just going to spend time with my family.”

“Oh well,” he grinned.

Despite the cold, I was starting to sweat; he was really putting pressure on me. My promise to Tina had been to accept a date invitation, not something like this. How could he even expect it, given that we hadn’t even kissed? I couldn’t figure out his approach. I’d generally asked for a date straight out, figuring that if a girl said no, I would just move on to another. He seemed to be asking things that he could be sure I’d say no to, but which wouldn’t close the door to something else. Maybe the idea was that he would wear me down, so that a mere date wouldn’t seem a big deal by comparison, and if I did say yes, that would work for him, too?

“I told you I was boring,” I said, trying to put him off without seeming to.

He laughed again. It was a nice laugh; not as nice as Jeremy’s, maybe, but still nice. If I’d been attracted to him, if I didn’t have those memories of being his male friend, I was sure that I would want to get closer. And if I didn’t keep thinking about a guy I couldn’t have.

Finally we reached the shuttle to the train, and Geoff loaded my suitcase into the back.

“Thank you, Geoff,” I said.

He stared into my eyes for a moment, which made me a bit uncomfortable, but didn’t try for a kiss. “Have a good vacation, Marsh,” he said. “See you next year.”

“Yeah, see you.”

I had time to think on the way home; I just didn’t like what I was thinking. I kept on shaking my head. Dating boys, huh? Over and over and over I thought about it, both afraid and intensely curious. What would it feel like? Would I actually get to like it? To want to natter on about boys the way my friends did? And I did, what would be left of the part of me that was still Marshall?

The thoughts wouldn’t leave me, and what was worse, made me very reluctant to talk to Chad, despite his insistence on calling him with any updates. After making a big deal of not really being a girl, how was I supposed to explain that I was seriously considering dating boys? I had an idea of what he would say, and I wasn’t ready to hear it just now. Tina had a few more days of school, and Mom was busy with her sewing, so I found myself with little to do during the day. I had gotten used to talking things out, though, and even in the evenings, the only one I could discuss some subjects with was Nikki.

“So how much does your mother know, at this point?” she asked, when we were chatting a couple of days after I got home.

“I’ve been talking with her pretty regularly,” I explained, “So she knows about Jeremy and Phil and Geoff. She’s a little too interested in Geoff, I think.”

“And you’re not?”

“Well, the whole situation is a bit weird for me.”

“Being attracted to boys, you mean?”

“That, plus the fact that I knew Geoff before. I’m used to him seeing me as a buddy, not as a girl he wants to be with – the way he treats me now is just really, really different.”

Nikki laughed, “I can imagine.”

“Plus, there’s this whole thing with Mom and Tina and what I can tell them. I’m still not ready to tell Mom about me, and Tina was so upset before about the chance that I might change back, that I haven’t told her anything about Eric and what he’s trying to find out. But that also means that I can’t talk to either one of them about Vicky.”

“And that bothers you?”

“Well, yeah. I’m getting really used to talking things out with both of them, and here’s something that’s bothering me a lot, and you’re the only one I can talk to about it.”

“What would happen if you told your mother?”

“After Thanksgiving? She’d think I was lying and get super upset with me. And even if she did believe me… I don’t want her to treat me any differently. If I’m stuck as a girl, it will be just easier if she thinks that’s the way I’ve always been. If I tell her I’m not the daughter she remembers, she might start thinking of me as a stranger, an intruder into her household that she doesn’t know, and I just couldn’t handle that.”

“And lying to your family is easier?”

I squirmed. “It’s not exactly lying, is it? I mean, in this time line, I am a girl, and always was. The fact that I remember the original time line doesn’t change that. Besides, I’m not actually saying anything that’s a lie…”

“You’re just not telling them the whole truth.”

“Yeah, and it’s getting less and less comfortable, doing that,” I admitted.

“I don’t know what I can suggest.”

“That’s why I try not to think about it.”

“OK, let’s talk about something else. You’ve said that you’re going to start dating boys next month, right?”

“If somebody asks me,” I pointed out.

“And do you really think Geoff isn’t going to? He’s already asked you to go skiing with him.”

“No, he offered to have his parents invite me; he didn’t actually ask me out himself.”

“I think you’re parsing words, Marsh. He’s made his interest very clear.”

“I suppose so.”

“So what’s the problem? He sounds like a known quantity, he understands the meaning of ‘no’ and he’s clearly interested. Sounds like a pretty good bet, to me.”

“Yeah, but I’m not attracted to him,” I objected.

“Marsh,” she said patiently. “We’re talking about a date, not a wedding. If you were almost about to kiss him, you are attracted at some level. So go out with him once. If you have fun, and he asks you again, go with him again. If not, you’ll have a chance to try another boy.”

“I guess… I’m just a bit nervous. I mean, I’ve gone on lots of dates as a boy with a girl. This will be the first time as a girl with a boy, and I’m not used to it.”

“Understandable. But you’re looking forward to it, aren’t you? On at least some level?”

“Well…”

“And can call me afterwards and tell me how it went, or you can call your sister or talk to your roommates. Sometimes talking it over afterwards is as much fun as the date.” She laughed. “If things don’t go well, the talk afterward can be the best part!”

“OK…”

“So what are your plans for this afternoon?” she asked.

“Shopping.”

“Shopping? I approve.”

“Yeah, I need to buy presents for my family. Thanks to you, I actually made enough that I have some left over, and so… I get to go shopping.”

“OK, have fun!”

After we hung up, I got Mom’s permission to borrow the car and drove over to the Mall. Dad was easy. He loved to read, and a careful examination of his bookshelf turned up three books by the author Malcolm Gladwell. A web search showed that a fourth book had recently been published, so I dropped into the bookstore and picked it up for him.

Tina had been talking about me taking her clothing shopping; I’m not sure whether I was just transportation or she was thinking of shopping trips she’d taken with Marsha, but a gift certificate to a Mall boutique, along with a promise of my time, seemed suitable.

Mom was tougher. I wasn’t sure exactly what she would like, so I sort of just wandered the Mall for a bit, hoping for inspiration. What I found was something else entirely.

Ever since she had cheated on me in high school, Maddy and I had done this sort of hesitation-dance every time we saw each other. We’d both stop, back up, and turn and head off in a different direction. So when I saw her in the Mall, my reaction was automatic: I backed up and started down a different aisle.

A few steps later, though, I realized that something was wrong. I was remembering the wrong time line; in this one we’d never dated. So why had she backed away, too?

I turned around and walked quickly after her. “Maddy?” I called.

She stopped and looked at me, very cautiously. “Yes?”

“How are you?”

She gave me a long look before answering. “Are you expecting an apology?”

My eyes bulged. Apology? “Um, if you think that would be appropriate,” I temporized.

“You were just as much at fault as we were, you know.”

Now I just had to know what was going on. “Would you like to talk about it? We could get some ice cream.”

She stared at me, a bit suspicious. “Are you seeing somebody?”

What does that have to do with anything? “Um, no, not right now.”

“OK.”

She led the way to the Hägen Daz, where the two of us used to eat all the time. It seemed so normal to see her order her usual Rum Raisin cone, and I had to remind myself not to offer to pay for it. I ordered a Mint Chip cone and joined her at a small table.

“Maddy,” I said, sitting down, “I’m sorry. I used poor judgment.” That was general purpose enough, I figured. Whatever Marsha did, I had no problems apologizing for it.

“’Used poor judgment’?” she sneered. “That’s one way of putting it. How about, ‘overreacted,’ or ‘got your priorities wrong’? OK, I’ll admit, we didn’t exactly cover ourselves with glory, but I think we were at least trying to do the right thing. You haven’t spoken to us in four months. And you think you can just apologize now and it’ll all be OK?”

I cringed. What exactly did you do, Marsha?, I wondered. For half a second I thought about just walking away. Maddy and whomever she was including in ‘we’ had been Marsha’s friends, and I didn’t know them very well. Maybe I was better off just leaving the friendship broken and just making my own friends at home? But that would be wrong. Marsha had committed some offense, and as the current inhabitant of her life, I had an obligation to try to fix things.

I looked down, miserably. “Maddy, tell me what to do, then. I’m… not the same person I was, back then. I want to fix this.”

“And you’re really not seeing anybody? This isn’t a ‘Oh, I have a boyfriend now so I’m happy’ thing?”

“I promise you, I’m not seeing anybody. I’ve sort of been occupied with other things.” If she only knew… “But I should have called.” And Chad and Tina had told me Marsha’s friends’ names, and I could have called on my own. It sounds as though it would have been really uncomfortable, but her friends deserved better.

She gave me another long look. “Then I’m sorry, too. It was a dirty trick. If it’s any consolation, the guy turned out to be a jerk, and he dumped Cherise a couple of months ago.”

This had been about a boy?! “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Yeah. So in a way, we sort of saved you, right?”

“Sounds like it.” I couldn’t help smiling. Had they not done whatever they did, I might have woken up over break and had to deal with a boyfriend.

“And I think you really should have been giving Dirk another chance, anyway. He’s grown a lot since you guys broke up, and you two were so great together in high school.”

My stomach did a flip. Dirk? I had mostly forgotten about him. Marsha had liked him enough to date him for two years, but the idea of going out with him revolted me. I murmured something non-committal.

“But if you’re not seeing anybody, this could be good timing. I know he’s single, too. I’ll have to check with the others, but we’re having a New Year’s Eve party at Dina’s house, and if they’re OK with it, you could come and bring him, if you like.”

I tried to respond, but I couldn’t manage anything more than a squeak. It didn’t stop her, though.

“You know, maybe I’ll just pass on the word to his friends that you’re back and not seeing anybody. This could work out really well. I am so glad we ran into each other, Marsh!” And, having finished her cone, she gave me a quick hug and ran off, leaving me with my mouth hanging open.

Suddenly, Geoff was looking very attractive. I tried to put Dirk out of my mind while shopping and while wrapping presents when I got home, so I didn’t mention him to Tina when she got back from school, and after a brief conversation, she an off to do homework at the kitchen table.

About an hour before dinner, I heard Tina in the hallway, apparently talking on the phone. “Yeah, she’s in her room. Just a second,” and she knocked on my door. When I opened it, she held out the portable phone and, grinning impishly, said, “It’s a boy calling.”

The House Parties’ organizers had illuminated the paths between the dance locales by lining them with fat candles in white paper bags, using sand to both keep candle and bag in place. The overall effect was somewhat ethereal, and Jackie had commented the year before that it gave a romantic air to the night. For my purposes, it simply showed that the path in front of Danby Hall led to dances in both directions. To my annoyance, Geoff started down the path that led back to Blair without asking me. I caught up with him and grabbed his bicep. “If you’re going to walk with me, Geoff, at least let me decide where,” I demanded. “I want to walk and clear my head, not talk with people.

“We’re going to find people in both directions,” he pointed out. “Does it really matter which way we go?”

As if to prove him right, two couples passed us, heading for Danby, and at about the same time, three girls left Danby and took the path towards Holder.

“It’s the principle of the thing,” I retorted, using his arm to urge him after the couples now ahead of us. They moved to the right to allow another group to pass them, going the other way. To my surprise, it was Lee Ann and the gang, who quickly spotted us, with me still hanging on Geoff’s arm.

“Are you guys leaving already?” Lee Ann asked.

“Marsh wanted to take a walk,” he replied. I glared at him for answering on my behalf as though we were a couple. Then I realized that my hand on his arm reinforced that impression, so I grabbed it back.

“So you’ll be coming back?” Lee Ann continued.

This time I answered before Geoff could. “Maybe, but probably not.” I could imagine what Lee Ann was thinking, and couldn’t meet her eye.

She gave me a hug and whispered in my ear, “Be careful. I approve, but take things slowly.” If I hadn’t already been bristling, that would have sealed the deal, and I seethed inwardly as our friends passed us, some looking at Geoff and me curiously, and a few smiling at us. Possibly the worst were Susie, who shot me a smile that I read as triumphant, and Phil, who looked surprised, and – if my imagination wasn’t play tricks on me – almost a bit hurt.

“OK, Let’s go,” I said, hurrying him along the path once they had gone. I grabbed his bicep again, just because it seemed the most practical way to get him moving. He didn’t resist, which was fortunate, considering that he probably had about eighty pounds on me.

“Are we going any place in particular?” he asked.

“We’re just walking, remember?” I snapped. Then we came to a tee, and I hurried us down the unlit path.

“Ah, we’re going for a moonlight walk, then?” he commented, brightly. “How romantic!”

I stopped. Testily, I said, “Geoff. You know my mood. I’m trying to avoid crowds, which we would certainly run into on the lighted paths tonight. You suggested that we talk a walk and said that I didn’t need to engage in conversation. Why are you joking around? Should I just leave you here and walk by myself?”

“Sorry,” he said, sounding maybe a bit contrite. “I’ll be good.”

Yeah, right, I thought. I should have known better; Geoff cannot stand silence – he just has to fill it.

“You know there are going to be people on these paths, too, right?” he continued, proving me right. “Coming from the dorms, going back to the dorms… mostly back, this late, probably.”

I sighed in exasperation. “I know,” I snapped. “Let’s go down here,” I said, taking another path as I spotted some more students passing us on our current one.

“Do you think we can avoid everybody? There are a lot of students walking around tonight.”

“I’m going to try,” I muttered.

“Well then, we’d better go back the way we came, because here come a whole bunch of people.”

I looked, and he was right; there were several couples heading our way, so we back-tracked and returned to our previous path.

“No good,” he said, “Here come some more. We’d better cut across the quad.” And he took my hand and pulled across the grass.

“Wait, Geoff,” I protested. “I think you’re getting a little–”

“Uh Oh,” he said about a minute later. “I hear somebody over there, too. Let’s duck behind this tree!”

“OK,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Now you’re getting a bit ridiculous.”

“Whoops!” he exclaimed. “There’s squirrels in the tree. Their chittering is bound to disturb you.”

“Squirrels?!” I said, trying to keep from smiling at his antics. “Now that’s–”

“Look out! A bat! How can you unwind with all that squeaking?”

“Stop it!” I yelped, starting to laugh.

“Oh, you’re in a good mood, now!” He said, sounding very pleased with himself.

“I am not!” I insisted, trying to force a serious expression back on to my face.

“But you’re smiling.”

“No, I’m not!”

“I can see you…”

“No, you can’t! It’s too dark.”

“But I can see you when I put my face close to yours,” he said, his actions matching his words.

Suddenly it got a bit hard to breathe, and I was starting to lift my face to his when I realized what I was doing. I put my hand on his chest and pushed him away. “No, Geoff,” I told him, “I think we…” I clamped my mouth shut as I realized what I had been about to say: Let’s just be friends. It was such a stereotypical girl thing to say, and every guy I knew hated that line. So I amended it to, “I’m really confused about a lot of things, and this is a bad idea. I mean… I’m not thinking straight. I just found out about Jeremy this morning, and… I mean, I don’t want to give you the wrong idea about anything.”

“Going after Lee Ann was a mistake,” he said, his face still uncomfortably close to mine. “I see that now. I should have paid more attention to you from the start.”

I backed up. “Geoff, I don’t want to give you any false hopes. This is not… I mean, I don’t know what I want right now. I’m not ready. I’m still… really upset about… well, Jeremy. I need to work through this first. I need to think about things, and you’re not making it easy for me.” It was all happening way too fast. I had only discovered that I could be attracted to boys for the first time, about twelve hours earlier. Actually trying some kind of relationship with a boy, well with a boy I wasn’t attracted to, anyway, was still way too disturbing to contemplate.

He stopped. “I guess I’m better as the goofy friend, huh?” he asked, now resembling a scolded puppy.

“Your timing is off. That’s all I’m saying for now.”

“Alright,” he said, his shoulders sagging. “Do you want to go back to Danby now?”

“No… I think I’m just going to call it a night. It’s been a really emotional evening for me, and… I think I’m done.”

“OK, I’ll walk you home.”

“No!” I said a bit more forcefully than I needed to. “No. You go back to Danby and hang out with the gang. I’m just going to walk back alone. Really. It’s better that way.”

As he stared at me, I added. “And thanks for the walk, and for making me laugh. It really did take some of the edge off of my feelings. I appreciate it.”

“OK… I mean, no problem. You’re sure…?”

“I’m sure. Good night.”

“Good night.”

When I looked back, after reaching the nearest path, he hadn’t moved. He was still standing near the tree that supposedly had squirrels, and I didn’t see him move until I could no longer see the tree.

Getting to sleep that night wasn’t easy. After two months as a girl, I thought I would have been getting used to feeling more and more, but today had just outdone everything else. My world had been turned inside out once again. I couldn’t believe that I was now crushing on a guy, attracted to another, and had almost kissed a third. I had also made a ‘take a lemon’ promise to go out with the next one who asked me, a promise that seemed dumber and dumber every time I thought about it.

But what had happened with Geoff? Had I actually been giving out ‘kiss me’ vibes? To be sure, his persistence with Lee Ann suggested that he wasn’t all that great at reading girls, so maybe it hadn’t been my fault at all.

But dating boys? Is that really what I wanted? Having a boy kiss me, fondle me? I shivered – but with anticipation or fear, I wasn’t really sure. My brain said that it was a sensible thing to do, a logical step in this new life I was living. My heart was anything but certain it agreed. I think I must have fallen asleep through shear exhaustion, because I certainly never felt the calm that sleep usually required.

I woke up the next morning, determined to put all this guy-girl romance stuff out of my head for now. I had to focus on my exams, and as a pre-med student, my grades were critical. Fortunately, I was current with all my reading, and I had been keeping good notes, so I started by recopying my notebooks once more. I told my roommates to tell anybody looking for repairs or alterations that I might not be able to get anything done before January. I hated to give up the work, but I couldn’t afford the distractions.

My roommates drilled me before breakfast about what had happened with Geoff, but I just told them the truth – that I hadn’t felt ready, that I was still too upset about Jeremy. Lee Ann shook her head, but our agreement about me dating boys had been for next year, so she backed off.

The first distraction I could not put off, though, came about an hour before lunch in the form of a phone call from Vicky.

“Marsh, could I talk to you?” she asked, her voice sounding as though she had been crying for some time.

“Of course, Vicky,” I assured her. I wasn’t about to cut her off now, not after all we had meant to each other, but I considered her to be on probation just now.

“I don’t think you realize just how different–” she started, but I cut her off.

“Vicky,” I said firmly. “If you’re planning on telling me how you’re right and I’m wrong, this is going to be a really short conversation, because I’m just going to hang up on you.”

I heard nothing but silence for a few seconds, while she must have been trying to decide if I was serious. “May I tell you how I feel, then?” she asked.

That seemed safe enough, so I said, “Go ahead.”

“I’m afraid, Marsh. I’m afraid of losing you.”

“So you decided to cheat on me with Kevin?”

“I… that’s not fair!”

She was right, it wasn’t. It was a measure of my lingering anger with her, though, that I didn’t let it go so easily. “Don’t you think it hurts me? Knowing that he’s with you? Flaunting him in front of me? Making it really clear that you’re sleeping with him? Do you think I have no feelings?”

“But… if you change back, it won’t have happened. You and I will have been together the whole time, so it doesn’t really count.”

“Well, it still hurts! And if it doesn’t count, why should you care if I find a relationship of my own? As you say, if I change back, I certainly wouldn’t have been dating a guy!”

“But…”

“But what?” I pressed her.

“It’s not the same,” she whined.

“Why not? Why is it any different?”

“Because… look, when you wanted to go after Lee Ann, I backed off. It hurt me, but I thought that I didn’t really have a chance to keep you then, and I hoped that maybe one day you might get tired of her and come back to me.”

“And…?”

“My being with Kevin is sort of the same thing. You know that if you can become Marshall again, he won’t even be in the picture.”

“Go on…”

“But if you find… if you start dating boys, what if you fall in love with a boy? What if you decide to stay a girl? Then we’ll never be together. Never!”

“But why would…?”

“Don’t you see? If you change back, it won’t matter if I was dating another boy. But if you date a boy, you might not change back at all! Then where will I be?”

“With Kevin, probably,” I pointed out, sourly.

“Which is not as good as being with you, just better than nothing.”

“But… what if I can’t change back, Vixy? What if I’m stuck? So far, it really looks that way, doesn’t it?”

“I don’t know… I don’t want to think about that.”

“But I have to, don’t you see? I can’t imagine not wanting to change back, but shouldn’t I try to live this life as a girl as best as I can, just in case?”

“You’ll never be a proper girl, Marsh,” she snapped. “You don’t have the feel for it. I mean, seriously! Do you realize that you were wearing daytime makeup last night? You looked ridiculous!”

“Well… maybe you could teach me? Show me how I should be wearing my makeup for something like that?”

“I am not doing anything that might make you more comfortable as a girl, Marsh. I want you to want to change back, remember.”

“OK…” I made a mental note to ask Nikki, instead. “But think about this, Vix. If I’m supposed to want to be a guy again to be with you, shouldn’t you be nicer to me, so that I’ll want to be with you?”

She didn’t answer right away. “OK,” she finally said. “Maybe I have been a bit bitchier than I needed to be. I’m just… really scared, Marsh. I feel like I have no control, and… I don’t want to lose you.”

“Maybe you just need to trust me a bit more, Vixy. This is hard for me, and you’re the only person who even remembers the old me. I need you to keep reminding me who I really am. Don’t push me away, Vixy.”

She sighed. “OK… OK, you’re right. I’ll do better.”

“And you won’t give me grief if I decide to… explore my feminine side?”

She laughed. “If you ask me, you’re doing that a bit too much now, but… OK, I’ll try. I can’t promise anything. Um… so you’re going to be dating Geoff, now? Your friends said that you left together.”

“And he tried to kiss me, but no, I’m not attracted to Geoff at all. At least right now.”

“Then, is there somebody else? I mean, besides the guy who… and really, this is hard for me to say… the guy who have a crush on?”

“Not yet. But I figure it’s going to happen, and I don’t mind telling you I’m nervous. I don’t think most girls realize what guys are thinking when they’re with a girl. I do, and I’m scared stiff.”

Vicky laughed again. “Maybe this will be good for you, then, Marsh! Just… I don’t know, I feel really uncomfortable giving you advice on dating boys.”

“I understand.”

We talked for a while after that; I knew we were far from repairing our relationship, and we had a ways to go on figuring out what kind of relationship we should have now, but we seemed to have made a start. And that was worth a lot.