Synopsis

Brandon is a bright boy growing up near Albuquerque, New Mexico. He likes school, soccer, computer games, and playing in the school band. Small for his age and youngest in his class, his size has made him the target of every school bully for years. Each year the verbal and physical abuse increases, finally wearing him down to the point he doesn't know if he can continue. Just as he reaches the end of his rope, he is suddenly befriended by a classmate he least expected. As their friendship grows and deepens, Brandon learns the value of a best friend and finds himself moving down a road he never expected. Over the course of the school year, his friend helps him discover and cope with his feelings, hopes, dreams - and fears.

This is the story of a young person's unusual journey to stand up to the numerous obstacles that life has dealt him - and to become the person he believes himself to be. (Part 3 of 6)

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Viewing Note: This story should be viewed with the Edwardian Script ITC font installed on your Windows platform in the c:/Windows/Fonts directory. Microsoft Word installs this font automatically.

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The Legal Stuff: Standing Up to Life  © 2008 By Tiffany Shar
 
This is a work of fiction. Names, Characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright  © 2008 By Tiffany Shar. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission.
 
 
Preface
 
 
I began this trilogy of novels last year, first publishing this book at FictionMania and Story Site in March last year. Setting out to tell a story I felt I needed to tell, I was pleased that the readers of both sites seemed to enjoy the work. A couple months after I initially posted this book at FictionMania I met a dear friend Carla Ann who offered her services as an editor. With her help I began to go back and proof this book a few months ago for publishing at Lulu.com. More than anything I liked the idea of having a hardback edition of the book for myself, but I felt that perhaps others might enjoy a copy as well.

With that information in mind I am posting a standard copy of this here at BigCloset, and announcing that I have three versions available for purchasing through My Store (www.lulu.com/tiffanyshar) at Lulu.com. There are 6x9 hardback editions and paperback editions, as well as a high quality pdf version available for download. If you enjoy this work perhaps you will consider supporting me by purchasing it from my store. I hope to have it available through Amazon.com in a couple months as well, and will offer to have Erin sell it through her Amazon page at that time.

Thank you to all of you, my amazing readers, who have enjoyed this work in the past. You will discover that this new version is much more refined than what I initially posted a year ago. I hope you all enjoy this and my other novels. I hope to have the second book, Daring to Hope, also available in this form by mid-March, and the third book will hopefully be available this summer! I will make future announcements about Book Three through my Lulu storefront as well.

I will be posting this in six segments during this week. Please enjoy, and thanks for reading!

     -Tiffany Shar

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Chapter 12
 
 
MONDAY CAME FAR too quickly that weekend. Mom dropped off my candy money with Ms. Fitzgerald at the elementary school and discovered I actually had two-hundred-and-sixty dollars extra in my account. She said that a couple corporations had given some donations that had helped. I was ecstatic when she told me that night. I’d never, ever, had that much money to spend before!

On Tuesday I went over to Amy’s house and we played Barbies some more. She made a comment during that episode that if we kept playing with them she was going to have to get me my own dolls. I couldn’t tell her, but I could think of few things that I wanted more. I was so glad that we had become such good friends. Amy had really filled a void in my life since I had never really had any real friends, let alone one like her before. We had become so close now I was sure I wouldn’t know what to do without her.

Mom had commented on my necklace that Saturday night when she had brought me home. Somehow neither of my parents had ever noticed it before. Apparently Mrs. Hancock had told her about it while they were in the car, so she had asked me if she could see it. After looking at it she had told me she couldn’t believe that Mrs. Hancock had spent so much on us.

When I had looked at her questioningly, she told me she guessed that the set must have cost at least three-hundred dollars. My mouth was open for most of the rest of the evening. I had no idea.

That Wednesday we were sitting in our English class when Mr. Tamera said, “We’re going to have a major assignment due the week after next. It’s going to serve as a major grade for this nine-week period. It’s also going to serve as half of your semester final exam grade.”

He let that sink in for a moment as we all got a bit nervous. After he handed out project guideline sheets he continued. “This will be a group project. You will each be working in a group of four people. Each group will present their project in class in two weeks. You have several options here on what you can do…” He explained the options and said, “You must do it on one of the books that is listed below. The more unique and exceptional your project is the higher grade you will receive.”

He talked for a few more minutes before we divided up into groups. I was so glad that Amy was in this class! She actually hadn’t been at the beginning of the year but had been transferred into this class at the semester. Why? I don’t know. I thought she had a better English teacher before. Within a few minutes Amy, Nikki, Ashley and I had our desks together and were brainstorming on what to do the project on.

Amy was looking at the paper and said, “We should do a video for our project!”

“That sounds like fun,” I replied.

“We could be really creative and use Barbies for the characters,” Nikki suggested.

“That sounds like a great idea,” Ashley added.

“Umm… okay.” I said. Ashley and Nikki didn’t know that I played with Amy and her Barbies… I didn’t really want to give them any indications otherwise.

“My dad has a video camera that we can use for it.” Amy said.

“Okay,” I replied.

“Well let’s start working on a script then,” Amy said.

We did as she said. Amy suggested using one of the Nancy Drew books on the list as the basis for our movie. She seemed to think that would be one of the easiest books to use for what we had planned. I wasn’t so sure — I had read all of them before — but I went along with it. After about ten minutes of sitting in class we went down to the library with a pass to see what we could find.

We picked out the specific book we were going to use and the four of us divided it up into four parts. Each of us was going to come up with a script from our section. At the end of class we each agreed that we should work on recording our video this Saturday. That way, if anything went wrong, we’d still have a week to figure out how to get the project done.

When I came home that day I told my parents about the project and they seemed to think that it fit the ‘unique’ and ‘creative’ criteria for the project. I worked hard on the computer that night coming up with my part of the script for the book. I was amazed I managed to get as much done with it as I did that night. I really only had about four pages of my portion of the book left to do when I went to bed that night. I printed out what I had done and took it with me to school the next day.

We were sitting in the group talking when Ashley said, “Hey guys, I told my dad about this project and he offered to let us use the TV Station for it.”

I had completely forgotten that Ashley’s dad was one of the managers at the local TV Station. “We can use their cameras?” I asked incredulously.

“Yep! And, he said we can use their editing equipment too. He’ll show us how to use everything.”

“Wow, cool!” Nikki said.

“Yeah,” Amy and I said at the same time.

“Then it’s settled?” Ashley asked.

“Definitely,” I replied to her.

We spent the remainder of the class period working out what we would need for Saturday. The girls discussed what Barbies they had, what doll houses they would need, and how they would get all of it there. I just sat there in stunned amazement. I was taking part where I thought I could, but I didn’t have any Barbies of my own to bring for this. And, even if I did, I wouldn’t be sharing that bit of information with them! Before class ended that day we all agreed we would have our scripts completed by the next day.

That night at home I finished my script and then called Amy. We talked for a short while before I reminded her she was supposed to come over to our house the next night. She agreed again on that and, as we hung up the phones, went to get a note signed by her mom so that she could ride the bus to my house.

She called me back a few minutes later and said, “Hey Brandon, this is Amy again. My mom wants to talk to your mom.”

“Okay?” I replied quizzically.

My mom got on the phone and after listening for several minutes said, “That sounds like a great idea… No I don’t have any problem with taking her for the night… I can drop them both off at the station Saturday then…. Sounds great!” I wondered what she was talking about.

“Okay, here’s Brandon,” She said as she handed the phone to me. She whispered to me, “Amy wants to tell you.”

I got on the phone and asked, “Tell me what?”

“Well, Mom and Dad need to go see my grandparents in Las Cruces tomorrow. They were originally going to drag me along too. I told them I had to do the project with you guys this weekend, so they thought they’d see if I could stay with you guys for the weekend…”

“Cool!” I interrupted, that was so exciting!

“I thought so too. Anyway, I’ll be coming over to your house tomorrow after school and I’ll stay until Sunday afternoon. I’m so excited!!” She said, clearly hyper.

“Yeah!” I paused for a second and suddenly wondered, “Umm… Amy? What are we going to do about getting your stuff over to the TV Station?”

“Ooh… that’s a good question. Let me ask my Mom.” She came back a second later and asked, “Is your mom going to be home during the day at all?”

I went and asked my mom real quick, before coming back and telling her that she’d be home around ten for a bit. She went and talked to her mom for another quick second and said, “Okay, my Mom’s going to bring over my clothes and stuff, and the things we need for Saturday at ten. Just let your mom know that she’s going to do that, k?”

“Sure,” I replied. We finished up our conversation and I let Mom know of the plans.

I went to bed really excited about the project. I thought it was going to be a blast to work with the TV Station’s equipment on Saturday. It was also going to be great having Amy over to spend the weekend.

That night I dreamed that playing with Barbie dolls was a normal thing for boys to do. Everyone played with them right? At least in the dream they did. For my birthday I imagined my parents buying me a great big dollhouse and filling my room with Barbies… It was great.

IN CLASS THE next day we combined all of our work into one script and fixed some problems that we saw in our storyline. I think we all left looking forward to Saturday and the filming we were going to do. Ashley’s dad was going to meet us at the TV station at nine in the morning. We were planning on being there till five in the evening, or later, working on it. The girls all made sure that they had their lists together of stuff they needed to bring.

After school Amy rode the bus with me to my house. The driver had already been told by my mom that Amy was going to ride today. When I opened the door I saw that two of Amy’s dollhouses were sitting on the floor in the living room. They were going to be really important for the film, so we were glad to see that her mom had dropped them off. We made sure that we had all of the dolls and clothes we needed too, then I made her play with Legos for a bit. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to play with her Barbies, it was more that I didn’t want Mom to come home and find us playing with her Barbies!

Dad was out of town at a convention for the weekend, so it was just Mom, Amy, and I at home. She made dinner for us and then we sat down to watch a movie in the living room. When we were done she said, “Listen Brandon, I think it’s time for my turn to play with your hair!” she said.

“Ooh yeah,” Amy said. “I think it might even be getting long enough we can braid it decently now!”

My hair at this point had reached just past my shoulders. I loved it, and was genuinely happy that she was going to play with it. “Okay — I guess.” I said to her indifferently.

Before I knew it I was getting attacked with all sorts of brushes, feeling my hair pulled and twisted this way and that, having my hair braided and such. After looking at me like that she said, “let’s do something different.” She whispered something in Amy’s ear and she nodded. She had me go dunk my head in the sink real quick to get my hair wet, before beginning to work from scratch on it. She also brought out something that I had wondered about for some time — the curling irons.

A little while later she had my hair curled under at the bottom, and I had bangs that were also curled up top. My hair certainly looked like a girls at that moment! She soon snapped some more pictures (she’d been snapping some every time they set my hair with something,) and said, “That’s enough for tonight.”

“Umm… will this come out in the morning?” I asked.

“It should.” Amy said. Mom had done her hair the exact same way and took pictures of the two of us together before we all sat back down and watched another movie. That night I enjoyed being able to sit there with my hair in pigtails, just like a normal girl, next to Amy and my mom on the couch. After the second movie finished we were ushered towards my room where Amy took the bottom bunk of my bunk beds and we went to bed.

Or so we wanted Mom to think… We actually talked for a long time that night about all sorts of things. I don’t think we actually fell asleep until three hours after Mom said, “lights out.” I think Mom knew that, because she had even less pity for me about waking up the next morning than she normally did! We both got dressed and ready to go that morning while Mom made breakfast for us. I used one of the ponytail holders that Mom had bought for me to put my hair up after breakfast.

Shortly after eight we gathered all of Amy’s Barbie stuff up and put it into our minivan to go down to the station. To say that Amy and I were hyper would have been the understatement of the year. Between the two of us getting to hang out together all weekend, and the excitement of doing something new and interesting like this, nobody could calm us down!

When we arrived we found Nikki and Ashley waiting for us already outside. They gave us a hand taking everything into a studio Ashley’s dad had set aside for us to use. The room was actually a lot larger than I ever figured we’d have available to us, and we had a sky backdrop behind it that we believed would be perfect for behind the doll houses. There were several other types of backdrops that were available to us that they used for commercials too.

Ashley’s dad gave us a tour and showed us how to use one of the cameras and set up several microphones for us to speak into. We practiced using them for a while and after about two hours of setup and practice we were ready to begin filming. Ashley’s dad had worked in the film industry before his current job, so he actually knew more than enough to help us out with anything we wanted to accomplish.

He stayed in the room to watch and answer questions, but left us pretty much, ‘hands off,’ to do our thing. Occasionally he would make a suggestion about a camera angle, or suggest that we move a light to another place or something. But, overall it was definitely left in our hands to do what we wanted to do. At one point he actually took another camera and recorded us working on the project. He thought it might be a good idea in case someone accused us of letting him do all of the work!

Shortly after one in the afternoon we took a break and ate some pizza he ordered for us.

“Mr. Sanders, thank you so much for all of this. We really appreciate your help!” I said to him.

“It’s no problem Brandon! I’m really impressed with what you guys are doing. I think it’s going to turn out to be a great project! Certainly a lot better with this equipment than it would have been with a home video camera.”

“Yeah — definitely. Just how good is this equipment?” I asked.

“Well, a lot of TV shows are actually shooting with cameras like these now. Plus, since we’re able to use a higher quality set of mics and lighting, this should look and sound pretty professional.”

“Cool, I can’t wait to see our finished product!”

“Neither can I, I think it really is a cute project.” He said.

After lunch we got back to work. It was about three when we were able to wrap up our filming. I looked over at the stack of three ‘Digital Betacam’ tapes that were on the table. Mr. Sanders had explained we had been recording with the best cameras that the studio had.

“Well what do we do now?” I asked.

“Now I’ll show you guys how to edit your video down to just the good cuts and what you need to do to put all of those together.”

He led us to an editing room, and began to show us how to move the parts we wanted on to one ‘master’ copy. I couldn’t believe how much time it took just to go through this part. We all ended up calling our parents and letting them know we were going to be there for a while still.

At six o’clock Mr. Sanders went to get some burgers from Sonic for us while we continued editing. We finally had a good rough cut done close to eight that night. He helped us come up with some titles for the beginning and end of the film then.

“Tell you what guys, it’s almost nine. Why don’t we meet back here tomorrow afternoon at two, and finish up by adding some music to the project and cleaning it up?”

“Okay, that sounds good to me,” Nikki said with a yawn.

“Yeah Daddy, I’m tired,” Ashley said.

“Then we’ll do that,” he said.

We cleaned up the dolls and the doll houses and everyone took their stuff home. I had called my mom and she was waiting to help us out.

That night Amy and I were only up an hour past when we were told ‘lights out.’

SUNDAY MOM MADE us get out of bed at eleven and get ready to go. We arrived at the station on time with a bunch of CD’s in hand. Her dad had suggested that we bring some to put behind the film. Adding the background music had somehow made it look much less like a cute kid’s project to something far better.

We worked tirelessly for another three hours on the project before declaring it done. I couldn’t believe how cool the project looked. He even showed us how to include a clip that he had recorded of us working in the ending credits, next to the credits! I don’t know about the rest of the group — but I was pretty psyched about it.

Her dad then showed us how to transfer the master copy to VHS tapes. We made ten copies of the tapes and put them in the nice black hard shell cases that he gave us. He also handed me the original beta master.

“Why are you giving me this?” I asked him.

“Because you basically were the director for this film. I was really impressed with what you did this weekend. In a couple years when you’re a bit older I might be able to find a place for you to work down here at the station.” They had put my name in the credits as the director, I liked that part!

“Really?” I asked.

“Yep, anyway I thought you should have it. Now let’s get you all out of here before we’re here till nine again!” He said laughing.

We were basically done, but Amy wanted us to add a nice cover to the front of the videotape cases. She had suggested using her dad’s computer at home — so we were all going to meet at her house Wednesday to work on that. She also had suggested we come up with a movie poster for our film. Ashley thought that would be a good night to try out the movie on all of our parents — with everyone planning on getting their parents to watch it at seven that night.

When we finished up at the studio Mom came and picked us up, dropping Amy and her stuff off at her house. Her parent’s gave her a hug when she got there — apparently they had just gotten back themselves, and we left her there as they waved us off. I had a lot of fun that weekend, and couldn’t wait to show off our project to the class in a week and a half.

By the time I got home that night I was completely exhausted. I ended up laying down on my bed at seven, and the next thing I knew Dad was waking me up for school the next day.

THE DAYS BETWEEN Monday and Wednesday seemed both close and yet so far away. I hung out at Amy’s house after school both Monday and Tuesday. Her mom joked that they should make the spare bedroom my room with as much time as I spent over there. Amy seemed pretty enthralled with the idea as well, but of course I couldn’t say yes to something like that! That would be cruel to my parents, who both really did love me.

On Wednesday the four of us caught a ride with Nikki’s mom to Amy’s house. When we asked about riding the bus together there we were told it was too many additional students — and I wasn’t about to rock the boat with my Mom’s workplace. Once there we went to her dad’s study on the first floor and began working with his computer. Amy’s mom was already home when we got there, but other than saying a quick ‘hi’ to the four of us, stayed busy in the kitchen preparing for the party.

To say they had an amazing setup was to understate, big time! He had the latest computer, software, scanner, and printer that you could get. Within about an hour we had created a great color cover for the outside of the VHS tapes. The cover that we put on the tape box featured a picture of one of the dollhouses taken in the studio with our title overlaid on top of the picture. It looked really neat. We also were able to design a ‘movie poster’ with the same artwork as well.

At 5:30pm her mom came into the study to find us wrapping things up and said, “Okay I need help setting the table please!” She was looking at Amy and me. I wasn’t sure when I had reached the new status, but I was no longer a guest and had been accepted as a member of the family. Of course I was honored, but apparently that meant I had to help take care of guests when they came over.

“Okay,” Amy and I answered at once. We left the others to finish cleaning up.

We helped her mom put several massive leafs in their formal dining room table so that we could seat fourteen people for dinner. Everyone had two parents present, except Ashley, but she did have her two big sisters that came for dinner too. Ashley didn’t talk about it much, but I knew that her mom had died when she was really young.

Monday when we had talked to Amy’s mom she had gotten this idea of having a really cool pre-movie dinner get together. She was a great cook — especially for events like these — so we were really looking forward to it. My mom had also gotten in the spirit and created an incredible chocolate mousse cake.

Amy and I made a bit of a game of setting up the table. I think we finished a lot faster because of the game. “Okay you two go get Ashley and Nikki, and then get washed up for dinner.”

“Yes ma’am,” Amy replied. I think she’d gotten in trouble for a smart aleck comment last night — she was being pretty respectful today.

We dragged the two of them upstairs to the bathrooms and washed up before coming down just in time for all of our families to arrive. Mrs. Hancock had outdone herself on this meal. She had cooked several Prime Ribs to absolute perfection. She also served mashed potatoes, broccoli, and homemade bread. She had taken the afternoon off from her patients so she could do all of this.

At the end of dinner we had the chocolate mousse cake my mom had made. It was by far my favorite dessert that my mom made. The bottom was basically a gigantic chocolate chip cookie. She then took Kit-Kat bars and made a ring around the cookie to make a ‘shell’ to pour the mousse into. Then if that wasn’t rich enough there were also chunks of Kit-Kat bars in the mousse itself. I loved every bite of it! Everyone else also seemed to enjoy it a lot too.

Following dessert we all gathered around in their living room. The four of us ended up sitting on the floor while our parents sat on the sofa and some other chairs that were brought in.

“Well, thank you everyone for coming to the premiere of our movie,” Amy stood up and said in front of everyone. “We hope you enjoy our short film!” Our parents were all a little obnoxious at that point, clapping and whistling loudly. They were clearly having a lot of fun, but I was sure they weren’t expecting much.

I started the VCR and we began watching the film. Okay, at this point I should preface this; it was a bunch of Barbies with voiceovers in different locations… That being said though, it was actually really incredibly good. The main part of the film lasted just twenty-two minutes, and the credits went on for another three minutes.

Our parents of course had to tell us that it was good, but the four of us agreed we didn’t think that they were just saying that because they were our parents… In fact they even made us show it again, so we decided we had something here. After the second showing we all helped clean up from the movie and put our project in a safe place to take to school next week. They also made us take several photographs holding our project and the posters in front of us.

We all left to go home around 8:30, with everyone saying thank you to the Hancock’s for hosting the premiere. It had been a really fun night for me, and I think everyone all had a fantastic time.
 
 
Chapter 13
 
 

THE NEXT WEEK actually passed by rather quickly. I was amazed at just how close we were getting to our summer break. The next Tuesday I couldn’t stop thinking about how we had just three weeks until we were going to be on break. As I was sitting in my English class talking and enjoying myself with my friends when the office came over the intercom and said, “Would you please send Brandon down?”

I went down to the office wondering what was going on. I had managed to avoid that part of the school for the entirety of the semester and didn’t want to start dealing with more problems again. I was actually more worried about a gut feeling I had that something must be wrong.

When I got down to the office I found my mom was standing by the reception desk. She looked really stressed. She was able to pull me into a conference room that was attached to the office and said, “Brandon, sit down.”

“What’s wrong Mom?” I asked

“Well… your Grandfather had a heart attack a couple hours ago.”

My mouth dropped, “Is he okay?” I asked with the shock showing.

“For now, they flew him to Phoenix for treatment. They think he’s going to pull through, but Dad and I want to go out there with Grandma to Phoenix to be with him.”

“When do we leave?” I asked, tears coming out of my eyes.

“Well, that’s what I came here to talk to you about. We want to leave at 4:30, but Dad and I think you should stay here.”

“But…”

“Brandon there’s nothing you’ll be able to do there. We called and they said they wouldn’t allow anyone under sixteen into the ICU where he’s being kept… Plus you have your project due tomorrow.”

“Are you sure there’s nothing I can do?” I asked worriedly.

“Yes, I’m sure. Listen, I called and talked to Amy’s mom and she said that they would be happy to have you stay there until we get back. Would you be okay with that?”

I sat there and thought for a moment. I really wanted to be there for Grandpa, but I figured my parents had their reasons for not wanting me to come along. And, if I stayed I wouldn’t miss out on the project either. Plus, I could only imagine how much fun it would be to stay with Amy for a while… I immediately felt guilty about thinking of having fun when Grandpa could die from the heart attack.

“I guess that’ll work, Mom. But why did they fly him to Phoenix instead of Albuquerque?”

“They were supposedly better situated to handle him. I asked the same question. So you’re okay with staying with the Hancocks?” She asked.

“Yeah, but you have to call me and keep me updated about him okay?”

“Of course I will. Well, we need to get your stuff packed up. Amy’s mom told me to go ahead and pick her up too — that way she could let you into their house.”

“Okay, I can go get her.” I cleaned up my face really quick with my shirt. While my mom was signing us both out, I went back to class to get Amy.

“Umm… Amy my mom is checking us both out for the day,” I said as I pulled her from her desk to come with me. She looked at me with a concerned look and came with me. I told her what was going on as we both grabbed our backpacks and stuff from our lockers.

When we got outside and were getting into my Mom’s car, Amy gave me a hug and said, “I’m so sorry Brandon, but I’m sure everything will work out.”

“Thanks Amy.” I replied returning the hug.

We drove to our house and I quickly packed several days worth of clothes into a suitcase, along with my toothbrush and all that jazz. Mom spent a while triple checking on things and writing out a letter so Amy’s mom or dad could take me to the hospital or a doctor if they needed to. Though having Amy’s mom being a doctor would probably be enough to smooth any of that over anyway.

When we thought I had everything I could need we headed over to Amy’s house. Mom helped me carry everything inside and made sure I was okay.

“Now I think we have everything, but if we don’t, call Dad’s cell phone and we’ll try and figure out what to do. You have a house key with you right?”

“Yes Mom, I’ll be fine, you guys just worry about Grandpa, okay?” I said.

She gave me a hug and said, “Okay.”

We talked a few more minutes before she finally walked back out to the car, giving me one last hug and I love you before taking off. I honestly didn’t know what to make of the last hour or so, it had all gone along so fast.

I must have had a strange look on my face because Amy came up to me and asked, “Hey, are you alright?”

“Yeah… I think. It’s just been kind of a strange hour. One minute I’m sitting in class talking to you guys, three minutes later I learn my grandfather is in danger of dying and my parents are leaving me here while they go away…” I paused. “I think things will be alright, but I guess you just never know do you?”

She gave me a hug and we went to get a drink in the kitchen. We sat down on some barstools next to the breakfast counter. “I’m sure things are going to work out fine. Besides, look on the bright side!” She paused and gave me an exaggerated smile, “You get to stay with me!!!”

She hugged me again and said, “Let’s go upstairs and get your mind off of this.” Amy dragged me onto my feet, grabbed some of my stuff, and led me upstairs. She stopped by her room first and had me leave my stuff in there.

“I’m not staying in your room am I?” As far as I knew she just had a daybed in there.

She nodded, “I have a trundle bed underneath my bed, I talked to my mom while you were saying bye to yours, and she said that’s where she planned on you sleeping.”

“Cool. They already say we’re joined at the hip, we’ll just make it more so,” I said with a lopsided grin.

“Uh-huh, it’ll be like a several day sleepover!” Apparently she had decided that even though I was here because of a sad thing; we were going to be having a lot of fun. “Okay, first things first — neither of us have homework so let’s go play.” She dragged me down the hallway to the playroom and we began playing with her Barbies.

Actually, that was kind of nice because I was able to lose myself in the activity. Both of us lost track of time and soon Amy’s mom came into the room. “Hey guys.” She walked over to me. “How are you holding up Brandon?”

“Pretty good I guess. I mean he’s still alive, right?” I replied.

“Yes, and from what your mom told me I’m fairly certain he should be fine after some rehab. They just have to get him through tonight and things should be okay.” She’s a doctor, so that must count for something right?

“Thanks Mrs. Hancock. And thanks for letting me stay here while they’re gone too.” I told her.

“Anytime sweetheart, anytime. Do either of you have homework?” She asked.

We both shook our heads. Amy said, “We just have to take the project to school tomorrow for our presentation. I kind of feel bad for everyone else; we drew the first spot out of the hat. Our project is going to be hard to top!” I nodded with her.

“You’re probably right. You guys just do whatever you want tonight, Amy I’ll do your chores for tonight.”

“Really?” Amy asked.

“Yes. I’m going to go work on getting dinner going, I’ll let you know when it’s done.” She left and we continued playing with her Barbies. I was still a little nervous about what her mom thought, but at the same time she didn’t seem to have any problem with it so we kept playing. About an hour later she came upstairs and told us to clean up.

We put away her Barbies and washed our hands before going downstairs. Mrs. Hancock made spaghetti for dinner. It tasted really good, at least when I was paying attention. I guess I was more worried than I had realized.

I hadn’t been going to my grandparents a lot this year, but I had spent a lot of time with them in the past. From the time I was four I always spent at least two weeks with them in the summers, and so it was pretty unnerving to me that something had happened to one of them. I managed to get through dinner without breaking down, but did excuse myself at the end to ‘go to the bathroom.’

Amy found me a short while later with her bathroom door open to her room — I was in tears. She gave me a really long hug without saying a word. Eventually I calmed down and we talked for a while. After a bit I cleaned up my face and we went back downstairs to watch TV with her parents. They seemed to want to ask about me, but decided not to.

We watched a few TV shows, not really saying a whole lot, just chilling on the couch. After a while Mrs. Hancock went upstairs for a little bit and then came back down. She talked to us about how we would get up and make the bathroom bit work. They actually had a third bathroom down the hall that I could use in the morning. Wakeup times were decided, and then she said, “Okay you two, it’s time for bed.”

Neither of us really grumbled much as we went upstairs. Her mom had apparently already been upstairs putting blankets on the trundle bed. I hadn’t really looked at her bed a whole lot earlier, but now that I had one next to it I looked a bit more. Her bedroom looked like the next step up from Barbie, though Barbie’s presence was still felt. My bed was covered with a matching bedspread that was mostly pink with some bright green thrown into it.

We both got into our pajamas and climbed into our beds. Amy turned out the light before she got into hers. It was nine when we turned off the light, but we actually talked until at least ten. I was feeling a little better — and that meant that some excitement for tomorrow had welled up inside of me.

Actually we talked about a lot of things, including that her parents were having their swimming pool filled the next day. She said, “We’ll have to go swimming!”

I sat there thinking that I didn’t have my swimming suit… what was I going to do? I didn’t mention it that night though. We both eventually stopped talking and fell sleep.

THE NEXT DAY we got ready for school and ate breakfast — it was hectic but there really wasn’t anything remarkable about it. I did get a phone call from my parents telling me they made it to Phoenix all right, and that Grandpa was stable. He wasn’t completely out of the woods yet, but that he should be okay. It was a quick phone call and then Amy and I grabbed all of the project stuff and headed to the bus stop. Once we got to school we went together to first hour. Some of the kids like Nikki asked why I had left suddenly yesterday and I told them. Many of the girls like Nikki and Ashley gave me a hug and told me they hoped he’d be okay.

The day went by incredibly fast — I had hardly a spare moment to devote to thinking about anything. About the only thing I did have time to think was that it was probably a really good thing that I had stayed here. If nothing else it kept my mind busy. At lunchtime we all talked about the project.

Somehow we had actually managed to keep what we had done for our project a secret from everyone else. I really did feel bad about going first… Almost everyone else was going to stand in front of the class talking. There was one other group that did a video, but that group apparently just sat at a table and talked about the book like a newscast.

“Hey, why don’t we suggest we go last?” Nikki suggested as we talked about it.

“Well, the rest of the kids won’t think it’s fair…” I said.

“Well they’ll probably want to lynch us anyway.” Ashley said. There was a lot of nodding around our group — along with a bit of laughter.

Don’t get us wrong, we were all very proud of our project… we were just very aware of the fact that we overachieved big time on it. In the end Amy said, “Look we can offer to go last, but we’ll have to do it in just the right way.”

“Okay, you’re in charge then,” Nikki said.

I thought Amy would argue for a second, but she shrugged and said, “Okay.”

When we got up to English sixth hour we went straight to talk to Mr. Tamera. Amy quickly explained that our project would be worth waiting till the end for. He looked at us and said, “I’ll ask the class if they’re okay with it… I don’t want to just change it though.”

A little while later he explained to the class that we wanted to save our project for last. Amy, Nikki, and Ashley tried to convince the other students they should let us wait, but to no avail. Boy, were they sorry! We got up in front of the class and said just the absolute bare minimum, including unveiling the poster we had kept covered the whole day. I was pretty impressed that we had managed to print off the entire poster onto sixteen sheets, and make them look like it was one poster. Most of the class seemed impressed by the poster too, I could see a lot of them looking nervously at each other within their groups.

With the introductions made we started the film and sat down. I had seen it enough times at this point that I really didn’t have any desire to watch it anymore — so instead I took in the other students’ faces. The guys started watching the film with sneers on their faces when they heard it was done with Barbies… that quickly turned to astonishment… and finally to genuine admiration. The girls instantly thought it was one of the cutest things in the world — and several of them whispered that to us.

The final and most important reaction I was watching for was from Mr. Tamera. He didn’t hide his emotions very well, which was good in this case, because he was clearly shocked by how incredible our project was. There was definitely a look of suspicion on his face about our having done the project by ourselves until the ending credits rolled by, and he saw us working and laughing on the project. I definitely needed to remember to thank Mr. Sanders for that. It was a really good idea to do that!

At the end of our film the students all started cheering and whooping loudly. Mr. Tamera stood up and said, “Now if that made any of you more nervous, remember something. They offered to go last!” I saw a lot of faces fall with that remark.

I wasn’t expecting everyone to be able to go in that class period, but I wasn’t expecting the amount of suckiness of everyone else’s projects either! At the end of class, after the last presentation Mr. Tamera stood up and said, “I will have your grades for your projects to you on Monday after I look at them all again. I will also submit the winning project from this class to the whole English department so we can decide a sixth grade overall winner.”

The bell rang at that point and he said, “Amy, Ashley, Nikki, Brandon I need you to stay for a moment please. The rest of you have a nice day.”

Uh-oh… were we going to get in trouble for something? “First of all, Brandon is everything okay?”

“Umm… kind of. My grandfather had a heart attack yesterday. My parents drove to Phoenix where they took him. They called this morning and said he should be okay eventually.”

“That’s good. Let me know if you need anything. You’re not staying by yourself right now are you?” He asked.

“No, I’m staying at Amy’s house until they get back.”

“Okay, well anyway… I just wanted to tell you all I was completely floored by your project. For a while I was concerned that maybe Ashley’s dad had done all of the work, but when you had those scenes at the end I could see that Brandon was doing a lot of the camera work. I can honestly say without hesitation that you will be moving onto the grade level contest, and you should win it.”

“Thanks Mr. Tamera,” Ashley said. We all chimed in with our thanks as well.

“Okay, well anyway go ahead and head to your next classes. If your teacher needs a note come back and get one okay?”

“Okay,” I said and we all headed for our next class. We each had a bit of a spring in our step from there on. It was nice. That is until I got to my next class.

“Hey look, its Brandon. He plays with Barbie dolls everyone!” one kid decided to sneer. He was from another English class, and apparently word of our project had gone around quickly.

“Hey, at least my group produced a decent project. We’ll get an A and probably get the prize as well!”

That seemed to shut the kid up. He did make some comments about me being a sissy and a girl, but I just let those roll off and most of the other kids started shunning him. Apparently while he and a few others were going to try and make fun of me for the project, most of the kids were in awe of what my group had accomplished. Most of the boys in that class would have given their right arms to have been able to switch places with me.

I was thankful when that class ended and I was able to meet up with Amy to go back to her house. On the way home she said, “The pool should be filled by now!”

Crap, I had forgotten all about that. I needed to figure out a way to get to my house I guess, but that would have to wait until her mom got home.

When we got to her house we went out to the backyard where they had a pool that I’d never really looked at. I noticed they also had a jacuzzi tub built into the same area. It was all really nice looking. Looking around a bit more I saw they also had a wide area of grass, a big wooden deck, and a tall twelve foot brick wall around the backyard.

I also became aware all of the sudden of how warm it was today. It would be really nice to go swimming. It’s just too bad I didn’t have my swimsuit. Their pool looked pristine, and a quick dip of my hand into the pool found that the water was actually fairly warm. We went back inside and found a note on the kitchen table from Amy’s Mom.

‘Amy, we can’t use the pool until tomorrow evening when the pool company has had a chance to come double check the chlorine level. Be patient, I’ll be home early tomorrow night for you guys to go swimming. Love, Mom’

Well that was good! That bought me a day to try and figure out a way to get my suit from home. Or… maybe… Wouldn’t it be great to wear one of Amy’s swimming suits? The problem is that it sounds like Mrs. Hancock was going to be there… I couldn’t do that in front of her. I decided to think more on that later.

We went upstairs and worked on some homework we each had, and then Amy had to go to dance practice. She convinced me to go along and watch. I agreed since I didn’t really have anything to do anyway. I watched her dance class do some really incredible things for an upcoming performance. A guy couldn’t really admit it, but I thought what they were doing was easily more difficult than any football or soccer game.

I was so jealous of Amy being able to do that kind of stuff. If only I had been born in a girl’s body I would have been able to do things like that too. Her past work with dance and gymnastics had guaranteed her a spot on the cheerleading squad for next year. A lot of seventh graders were mad because she had beaten out several of them that had thought they were shoo-ins. I was truly amazed with all that she did with that.

From there we went back home and had a late dinner. We decided to go upstairs and just hang out around the TV in her playroom. At 8:15 my mom called and I talked to her for a while.

“Hey sweetie, how are you doing?” My mom asked.

“I’m doing okay I guess. How’s Grandpa?”

“Well they’re going to take him out of ICU tomorrow if nothing else happens. From there hopefully they’ll be able to let him out of the hospital in about a week.”

“Good. I’m really glad to hear that he’s okay. How’s Grandma doing?”

“She’s holding up pretty well. She’s at the hospital right now with Dad taking shifts watching Grandpa. How did your presentation go today?”

“It went really well! I have a feeling that we’re going to win the competition — they’re supposed to tell us Monday. We tried to get moved to the end of the presentations, but the other kids didn’t want to do that. It was pretty funny,” I giggled a little, “afterwards Mr. Tamera looked at the class and said, ‘remember they offered to go last.’ We actually saw all of the presentations today and most of them weren’t very good. But anyway, it went really well.”

“Did anyone give you a hard time about the Barbies?”

“One kid, but I told him I didn’t really care since I would probably get the prize for the project and he wouldn’t. Also the other kids were so floored with what we made that I don’t think they feel comfortable giving me a hard time. There is also the fact that I got to work with the three cutest girls in the grade — I think that made a lot of them jealous.”

We talked for a while longer before I told her goodnight and went back to hanging out with Amy. At nine we were again sent to bed, but tonight neither of us really was tired and so we started talking.

After about an hour I was getting a bit drowsy, but Amy asked a question that jolted me right awake. “Brandon, do you wish you were a girl?”

The color drained from my face and I felt my heart become an ice cold lump in my chest. I was sure that I could hear every beat of it as loudly as our band at school.

I stammered a bit, “What do you mean?”

“Well… I’m not saying any of this to be mean, okay?” She said sitting up and looking at me. “But I’ve been wondering since the beginning of the year. I know you’ve told everyone that you grew your hair out to be more like a rock star, but you keep letting anyone that wants to, style it like a girls. You also are the first boy I’ve ever met that played Barbies with me more than once. And, you make a better best friend — girl wise — than any girl I’ve ever known. You don’t have to answer me I guess if you don’t want to, but know that I’ll be your friend even if that’s what you want.”

Silence.

Roll out the tears.

“Maybe?” I said timidly, as my voice trembled.

Another moment of silence, I think she could tell I didn’t want her to say anything right then.

“I don’t know. All I do know is that I have been thinking about that a lot since the beginning of the year. I’m scared that I’m a freak… and I really never intended to tell anyone any of this…” I started quietly crying some more. Amy got out of her bed and wrapped her arms around me.

“It’s okay Brandon, I really mean that. I don’t care if you are a boy, a boy that wants to be a girl, or you’re a girl, you’ll always be my best friend.”

I slowed down a few minutes later, looking up at her and said, “Why? I’m a freak.”

“You’re anything but a freak Brandon. And, as for the ‘why?’ I already answered that, we’re best friends. I know that you never take your necklace off, and neither do I. That should tell you something all by itself.”

“Thanks Amy. I just don’t know what to do anymore. I think my mom might be cool if she knew, but I know my dad would freak out and disown me — or have me committed to a mental institution. Which maybe I should be…”

“That’s absolutely not true Brandon. You may be dealing with some stuff, but you don’t need to be committed. I also think you’re underestimating your parents a lot.”

“Maybe. Amy please don’t tell your parents… I don’t want them to keep me from being friends with you!”

“Brandon, I’ll be honest, my parents are the last ones that would have a problem with you. But I promise you I won’t tell them.” She held up her pinky to me. I grabbed it and she said, “I even pinky promise on it.”

We heard footsteps coming towards the door. Amy quickly got back in her bed under the covers and we faked sleeping while her mom peeked her head in. She left a few moments later.

I think Amy sensed that leaving the conversation here would be a really bad idea, so she asked “So Brandon, when did this all start? I have a pretty good idea, but I’m curious.”

“Well, to tell you the truth, I think there has always been a part of me that’s wanted to be a girl — I just never recognized what it was. I also was raised in such a strict environment against this kind of idea that I didn’t even have a chance to consider it. I guess it really started though when Liza — Matt’s ex-girlfriend — told me, ‘Brandon why are you sticking your chest out like that? What? Are you trying to look like a girl?’”

“That made me start thinking of how much better life would be if I really was a girl. I went from that thought to trying to figure out a way that maybe I could actually do that. A couple of weeks later I talked mom into not cutting my hair, and letting it grow out some more. I think you know the rest of the story from there about my hair. Then, when we were on the ski trip, everyone kept calling me a girl and it just made everything seem more possible than it ever had. Then things just kept getting crazier and I was able to do things like play Barbies with you.”

I paused for a second, tears were streaming from my eyes and my voice quivered. “I honestly don’t know what to do. I’ve decided that if I’m going to do anything about this I need to decide by the time I’m fourteen at the latest — since that’s like the last age that I can get stuff done to me that will make me look pretty naturally like a girl… But at the same time I don’t know if I should want that… and I’m so scared of what my parents would do to me… does any of this make any sense at all?”

Amy looked at me — I could just see her face in the dim light, “Yes, I think it does. Brandon have you ever worn any girls clothing before?”

I shook my head. “My mom isn’t exactly my size. And since I don’t have any sisters… I did have two opportunities when I was kid that I kick myself for missing now.” I told her about the swimsuit dream, and then told her about another one as well.

“When I was like seven, we went shopping with my mom and a friend of hers. Mom found this really cute dress, but didn’t know if it would fit my cousins. Well my Mom’s friend suggested I could try it on for her — since we were like triplets we’d be the same size. My ego at the time couldn’t take it though so I had a fit and said no. If only I had said yes! Who knows, maybe I wouldn’t be in this situation now.”

“Wow, you really are just realizing something now that’s been there for a while aren’t you?”

I nodded. “What do you think I should do?” I asked.

“I don’t know… I do know I won’t tell anyone, though I’m sure I’m not the only one that suspects.”

I panicked and whispered, “Who else knows?”

“Suspects, not knows. Nikki and Ashley definitely do I think. I’m sure there are some others as well. Most of them are willing to just take the rock band hair explanation, but a few girls have said some things that I can tell they wonder. I don’t think there are any guys that have given it that much thought at this point. And, well I think my parents suspect.”

“Your parents?”

“Yeah. My Mom’s a doctor, remember? While she’s not a psychiatrist, she had to study a lot of that and I think she’s put two and two together as well as I have. Like I said, don’t worry, she would be cool with it.”

“I’m afraid though if they find out something and don’t tell my parents that they might hate your parents then… It could get bad.”

“Actually, I have a feeling that our moms probably both suspect and have talked to each other about it. Remember that day when we were fundraising?” I nodded — I was terrified at this point. Her mom and my mom knew? “I think I caught the end of a conversation about it as we got in the car one time.”

“So you think my parents already know?”

“It’s possible.”

“…I don’t know, I just don’t know.” I was so terrified that she might be right.

“Look, you missed it earlier. My mom said the pool guy canceled today so we have to wait until Friday for the pool, so she’s going to work normal hours tomorrow and come home a bit early on Friday instead. That means we’ll have about an hour without her home.” She paused as if debating about something. “If you want you could try on some of my clothes then. We’re the same size.”

“Really?!?”

“Really.”

“Wow… I’ve kind of dreamed and hoped for this… but I don’t know. What if your mom catches us?”

“I don’t think it would be a terrible thing. But, I think she would have to tell your parents.”

I thought for a few moments. “I think it would be worth the risk. Are you sure you don’t think I’m a freak?” I asked.

“I’m positive. I’ll be honest, I’ve been kind of curious to see what you would look like dressed in the right clothes. You already get mistaken for a girl four out of five times; in the right clothing I don’t think anyone would possibly guess that you’re a guy.”

“Okay, let’s do it.” I said with a bit more enthusiasm.

We finished our conversation on a little bit lighter note and finally fell asleep. I kept waking up that night though, wondering if our conversation had been a dream…

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To Be Continued...