Synopsis

In many ways Tiffany is the newest girl in her small community near Albuquerque, New Mexico. In the whirlwind of the last few weeks she has emerged from the shell of a scared and confused little boy named Brandon. Ever since Tiffany's parents confirmed with her their suspicions of her deepest wants and needs, they've supported her completely. With solid support from her family, her best friend and family and surprisingly, her growing circle of other friends it seems she might have a chance for a successful future.

'Can all this last?' is one of the biggest questions on her mind now. 'Will everyone stick with me when things get tough?' She's had an amazingly easy last couple weeks and she knows it won't last. What will happen when she returns to school? And most importantly, what will her psychiatrist decide? Will her doctor force her to return to living the lie as Brandon? These fears and more whirl in her mind as she looks to an uncertain future.

Daring to Hope is the continuing story of a bright, talented, and beautiful girl, who dares to hope for a future that is one based on happy dreams.

---

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.

---

 

---

 
The Legal Stuff: Daring to Hope  © 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
 
 
 
Last month I finally got around to publishing the first book of this trilogy, Standing Up to Life here at BigCloset. I had been delayed in publishing it there while trying to get it also published by Lulu.com. Well it’s taken me a bit longer on this book to get it up here as well, but here it is!

Like the first book I posted here, I am posting a standard copy of this here at BigCloset, and announcing that I have two versions available for purchasing through My Store at Lulu.com. Back by popular demand is the ebook download of the book. My assumption is that the majority of my readers would be most interested in this edition of the book. If you enjoy this work perhaps you will consider supporting me by purchasing it from my store($3.00 for the ebook). I also have a hardback edition that is available, and will work on making a paperback edition available as well here in the coming weeks. With both the paperback and hardback editions I hope to have them 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! Your comments have kept me going through some times when I thought I would never be able to write or edit another minute! Speaking of editing, thanks to my amazing editor, Carla Ann, for helping me out with this large work. Now that this project is coming to a close I hope to be able to focus solely on Book 3, and have that ready for you all this summer. Since it is the concluding book of the series I wish to be sure that it’s done right. Thanks again, and I hope you enjoy this book!

     -Tiffany Shar

---

 
 

 
 
Chapter 23
 
 
I WOKE UP the next morning with a prod. "Ugh… I’m sleeping here."

"Wake up before your mom tells me to tickle you," Amy told me.

I grumbled and forced myself to sit up a bit. "What time is it?" I asked while rubbing the sleep from my eyes.

"9:30, as usual you’re the last girl to wake up." She told me.

"Ugh… Why can’t you all sleep longer so I don’t look bad…" I asked her as I stumbled up.

"Oh stop your whining and come eat something. You have got to be the grouchiest girl ever in the morning," she told me.

"And proud of it too…" I said as I made my way to the dining room table where all of the rest of the girls were already eating breakfast.

After a few minutes of quietly munching on some scrambled eggs and bacon that were made for us I became a little more human.

"So Tiffany what are you doing tonight?" Amy asked.

"Actually I’m babysitting tonight," I told her.

"Really?" She asked.

"Yeah, our neighbor across the street came over and asked Wednesday night. I can’t believe I didn’t tell you about it."

"You kind of had other things on your mind," she reminded me.

Yeah I did, I thought, I still had to tell my mom about what happened on Friday. Although I had a feeling she might have already known since Dad had gone home where he would have been able to get the message off of the answering machine. "Yeah." I replied.

"Are you excited?" Lindsey asked me.

"I don’t know. I’ve never babysat before." I told her. "Have you done it before?"

"Yeah, several times, I really enjoy it." She told me.

Kristina chimed in at this point, "It’s a really great way to make some extra cash. I usually get at least sixty dollars a night for it — and it’s not really that hard of work compared to something like McDonalds."

"I know she said she’d pay me… I didn’t ask how much. It’ll be nice to have some more cash for our trip this week though. I just hope I can manage to do it — I’m not looking forward to changing diapers." I said.

"Well… that part kind of sucks," Kristina told me with a grin. "But you’ll have to deal with it one day anyway — might as well get used to it now."

I just nodded and moved back to my eating. Conversations weren’t very animated that morning. One of the girls that had gone to sleep before me asked how much longer we stayed up. "I don’t know, maybe an hour longer?" I suggested.

"Wow, it was three when I fell asleep," she told me.

"Were we really up that late?" I asked Amy.

"Probably."

"I think that’s the latest I’ve ever stayed up." I told her.

"I’ve stayed up later on these before… but usually during the summer when we haven’t had school the day of the party," she told me.

About that time the doorbell rang and we started saying goodbye to the girls one-by-one as their moms picked them up. By the time that Ashley’s mom came to pick her up (she was the last one), I had used my shower and changed into a pair of shorts and a t-shirt. Her mom actually stayed and talked to ours for a little bit about the next week. She didn’t seem to know that much more than we did about what was going to happen.

After a short time they left leaving just Amy, her mom, and my mom to finish cleaning up from the party. We all worked together ‘til about noon. Amy’s mom heated up some of the leftovers from the previous night and we ate before loading up my mom’s van with all of the presents I’d gotten that night. Amy and her mom helped with getting everything in there, before I gave them both really big hugs. How had I ever gotten so lucky to have my own parents, and then Amy’s family too?

"Thank you again s-o-o-o much for the party!" I told them both.

"Well we had to make your first birthday party as Tiffany special!" Melanie told me.

I was afraid that I was going to start crying — again — so I quickly turned toward the car.

"Call me tomorrow Tiffany," Amy told me as I sat down in my mom’s car.

"I will. Hopefully tonight will be fun," I told her.

"It should be — at least you should be able to make it so." She told me.

"Anyway, I’ll talk to you tomorrow," I told her.

With that, Mom drove away towards our house. Dad came out and helped me bring all of the stuff in — pretty much covering my bed with stuffed animals. Seeing my bed like that made me really smile! I also hung my new dress up very carefully in the closet.

"Mom, how are we going to get that to New York without messing it up?" I asked her.

"We’ll pack it in a bag made for dresses like that. I bought one last week since I knew we’d need it for the trip. It should be able to fit both of our dresses in it."

"Do you have a dress for the trip already?" I asked her. I was excited to see my parents dress up really nicely.

"Yes, but you don’t get to see it until the trip," she told me.

"Why not? Please?" I asked.

"Maybe Monday, it’s off getting some alterations done on it. It didn’t completely fit right when I bought it."

"Alright… I guess I can wait till then." I said with some disappointment.

I continued straightening some things up in my room before going out in the living room and sitting down to watch TV. "So Tiffany, what happened yesterday?" Mom asked me.

"Do we have to talk about it?" I asked her.

"Yes sweetie we do. What exactly happened?"

"Well it wasn’t that much of a thing I guess…" I tried to temporize but she gave me her patented mom stare so that I knew I didn’t have a choice. "I went to my locker yesterday morning and found a card taped to my locker. It looked like a normal birthday card at first, but when I opened it I found this." I had gone over to my backpack and gotten the copy out.

I could see Mom’s face grow red, "Joe?" She called my dad and showed him the note that was inside the card.

"If I ever…" he started off, "This is a clear threat, what did Mrs. Henry say?" he asked me.

"Well she didn’t have any proof of who left it, though Amy and I are pretty certain who it was. I don’t know if she’s done anything else with it." I answered somewhat nervously.

"This school’s administration is going to have to do something about this or we’ll go ahead and sue them for this crap." He said angrily.

"Look Joe, let’s wait until we can talk to them on Monday and see if they’re doing anything about this."

"You’re right Babe," Dad answered calming down a bit. "Tiffany thank you for getting a copy of the note like we talked about." He told me before he left the room and went into the den where the computer was. I could tell he was really steamed about this — babysitting tonight was going to be a good thing to get away from that at least.

Don’t get me wrong, I was upset about the note, but at least at this point it was just a note… I’d been prepared for far worse by Dr. Reynolds. I was doing my best not to let it get to me — but Dad was making it really really hard.

I spent most of the rest of the afternoon in my room playing with my dolls and practicing the tryout routine that Ms. Clemens had given me. It was hard! Really hard! I knew if I could get it down, and we needed something like it, I’d have a much better shot at making the squad. At three I began putting some homework and a couple of books in my backpack. I had managed to distract myself pretty well before I went over to the Lind’s house at four.

"Hey Tiffany, thanks for coming over!" Mrs. Lind told me. "Jamie and Brittany are just getting ready to eat dinner. Can you help me get them fed while I get ready?" She asked.

"Sure, just tell me what to do," I told her with a smile. I had no idea what I was doing. Without any little siblings I was pretty much clueless… Thankfully her kids were some of the better behaved kids I would come across in my life. Most were a lot harder to deal with than hers.

I went into the dining room where Brittany was sitting in a high chair and Jamie was sitting on a booster seat so she could reach the table. "I’ve already cut Brittany’s food up for her — and she should be able to feed herself — but just keep an eye on them okay?" She asked.

"No problem." I said sitting down next to Brittany. Jamie was on the other side of the table and seemed to be doing fine on her own.

"What’s your name again?" Jamie asked me.

"I’m Tiffany," I answered her.

"Hi, Tiffany," she told me with a big smile. Smiles were a good thing with kids I figured. "Mommy said you’re going to stay with us tonight?" she asked.

"Yep! I’ll be watching you guys tonight while they go out." I immediately went on alert though… Kristina had warned me that a lot of times the parents she sat for snuck out of the house without telling the kids. Great! I’d been there for less than five minutes and I had already screwed up!

Her only response to that at that point was, "Cool!" She then went back to eating. I looked over at Brittany at that point to see her drop her sippy cup on the floor. I breathed a sigh of relief as I realized they weren’t going to throw a fit.

"Oopsie," she said.

I picked it up and put it back on the tray in front of her. At that point her mom walked back in, "What do you say Brittany?"

"Thank you," Brittany said to me.

"Good girl sweetie." I was amazed that she had managed to change, put makeup on, and get ready in the span of maybe fifteen minutes while I’d been watching them. I helped her get Brittany out of the high chair and clean her up — she wasn’t that messy since she was getting old enough she wasn’t too bad about it, but she still had a little bit of stuff on her face. I also helped Jamie hop down off of her booster seat and cleaned up the dishes.

"Okay Tiffany, there’s some money on the counter if you want to order pizza for yourself. If the girls want a piece each they can have one, no more than that." She showed me some emergency numbers. "If Brittany asks for her bottle, ‘her ba ba,’ as she calls it, I have two in the fridge. You don’t need to worry about warming them up — she’s used to them cold. She probably needs changed here soon too."

She continued the worried mother routine for fifteen minutes or so before she and her husband left to go to their party. I went searching and found Brittany sitting down on the floor playing with some toys and checked her diaper. It was pretty wet so I picked her up to take her to her room to change her.

I did it just like I had Wednesday with her mom present, and felt like I’d done a reasonable job. I’d tickled her belly a little bit as I changed her and been rewarded with loud giggles and smiles. Hey! Maybe this could be fun after all! Once I was done with her I put her back down on the floor and got rid of the diaper in the trashcan she had in her room. I followed her back out to the living room where both girls had a bunch of dolls and other toys they were playing with.

"Can we watch a movie?" Jamie asked me.

"Sure," I replied. "What do you want to watch?" I asked her as I looked at what they had.

"Sleeping beauty!" she told me.

"Okay," I said as I got the movie and put it in the VCR. Both girls settled down to watch the movie and seemed to be doing fine. As I sat on the couch I felt my stomach grumble. Her offer of pizza was sounding really good.

I walked over to the other room with the counter and called Pizza Hut asking for a medium pepperoni pizza. As I hung up the phone Brittany came up to me with her thumb in her mouth. "Can I have Ba-ba?" she asked.

My mom would have had a fit with seeing her still drinking out of that… but at the same time I think I was still drinking out of one at this age. "Sure Brittany," I said as I got one of the bottles out of the fridge. I handed it to her and she went back out to the TV to keep watching the video.

I looked at the clock on the microwave as I passed by; it was already almost six. The movie thoroughly grabbed both of their attention for the next Forty-Five minutes that I waited for my pizza to get there. When the doorbell rang I answered it paying for the pizza. This of course got both girls riled up a bit so I stopped the movie and got them back to the table.

Mrs. Lind had suggested that if they did want some pizza I go ahead and put a bib on Brittany and cut it up. She’d also warned me that realistically Jamie needed one too… but just to be prepared to clean her up.

I did as she suggested with Brittany and tried to keep an eye on Jamie — all while trying to eat my own pizza. I had downed about two slices when Jamie and Brittany both finished up. I stopped eating long enough to get both of them cleaned up and let them down. I moved into the living room at that time trying to eat a third slice (I was hungry!).

Their movie had about ten minutes left in it when I put the rest of the pizza up. I figured maybe I could eat some more when they went to bed at eight. As the movie finished I spent some time playing dolls with both of them, followed by hide-and-seek, and finally began getting them ready for bed. Brittany had a wet diaper that I changed and put her into a cute nightgown that she had.

Jamie in the meantime had been really good and changed into a pair of green pajamas she had. "Jamie did you put your pull-up on?" I asked her.

She looked kind of squeamish… "Yes…" She told me looking away.

"Come here real quick okay?" I asked her.

She really didn’t want to come but I somehow managed to stare long enough that she walked over. Her mom had told me that she really didn’t like wearing them to bed anymore — but that if she didn’t wear them she’d have a wet bed. I could tell pretty quickly she didn’t have it on.

"Jamie, come on let’s get your pull-up on," I told her.

"I don’t wanna," she told me. She looked like she was about to cry. "I’m not a baby, I don’t need pull-ups!" She was getting more upset.

"Jamie, a lot of girls your age still wear pull-ups." I told her. "In fact I have one friend that was still in diapers until she was five."

"Really?" She asked.

"Yeah, well actually I think she may have even been a little older than that until she was really potty trained. You’re just barely four okay? It’s not a big deal." I told her.

"I still don’t like them." She told me.

"At least it’s not a diaper," I told her.

"Yeah… I guess so…" she told me. "Would you put it on for me?" She asked me.

That was a really strange question. Why did she want me to put it on her? Maybe it was because of all of the attention I’d given her little sister?

"No Jamie, you’re a big girl. Why don’t you go put in on yourself?"

"No, want you to put it on." She told me.

"…Alright…" I helped her put it on. It was really bizarre. When we had her PJ pants back up she gave me a hug and I put her in her bed, covering her with her covers. I then picked up Brittany and put her in her bed — making sure the rail was up where she couldn’t roll out. The girls shared a room and Mrs. Lind said she read a story to both of them together each night.

I grabbed the book that I had been assured would be their request and began reading it to them. I had a lot of fun doing different voices in the story. For two kids that had heard this story a million times, they paid really good attention. Maybe it was just because I was a different person reading it. Before long both were sound asleep. I turned off the light and walked back down the hallway to the kitchen. Once there I grabbed a plate and reheated another slice of pizza.

I ate it very guiltily though… I didn’t want to get fat did I? Oh well. I thought to myself — I’d burn off the calories in a week or so with the dance squad tryouts. I was still thinking about Jamie and her request. It seemed kind of strange — I’d mention it to her mom to make sure that she knew about it.

With that I sat down on the couch and worked on homework that was going to be due next week. I checked on the girls a couple times that night, but around eleven when I checked on them I could smell something I really didn’t want to smell — Brittany must have a dirty diaper I thought.

I was about to change her when I heard a car pull up. I’d already picked Brittany up though so I decided just to go ahead and change her. There was just enough light from the two night lights in the room that I put her down on the table and took the diaper off gently.

I managed not to throw up as I changed her — it was really gross! As I was changing her I heard her mom come up behind me. "I could have done that," she told me.

"I figured I might as well do it," I replied as I finished taping up her new diaper. She did take the dirty one and emptied it into the toilet before putting it in the trashcan. In the meantime I put Brittany back in bed and covered her. I was amazed that she hadn’t woken up even a tiny bit during all of this.

I followed Mrs. Lind out to the living room where she said, "Thanks so much for watching them for us Tiffany. Did you have any problems?" She asked me.

"No, not really. Jamie wasn’t real happy with the pull-up. She tried to make me think she had put one on at first — I could tell she hadn’t — then she asked me to help her put it on. It was kind of strange," I told her.

"That is odd. She was probably just jealous of the attention you were giving Brittany. Every once in a while she does stuff like that. No big deal though." She told me with a smile. "So let’s get you paid." She said.

She reached into her purse and handed me a stack of twenty dollar bills. "Is a hundred-and-forty enough?"

I just about coughed at that point… "…Are you sure you want to pay me that much?" I asked her.

"Absolutely. That’s a very fair rate for watching two kids for seven hours," she told me.

"Well… I won’t turn it down." I said with a small smile.

"Good, we’ll have to have you come and sit for us again. You seem to have done a good job with them. I think you must have even cleaned up the living room a bit." She said.

"Well thanks again," I told her as I went out the door and walked across the street to my house. She watched me from her door until I was home; then turned out her porch light.

It was about 11:30 when I entered my house. I expected to find everyone asleep — but both my mom and dad had waited up for me. "Everything go alright?" Mom asked me.

"Yeah… though I think she overpaid me," I told her.

"How much did she pay you?" She asked.

"A Hundred-and-Forty!" I said, both excited and kind of squeamish.

"Wow, she was pretty generous. But she’s also right that it really isn’t as much as some people would ask for. It’s a great way for you to make some extra money."

"Yeah I guess so. Anyway, I’m tired — I think I’m going to go to bed." I told her and Dad.

"Goodnight Sweetie," Mom said to me as I went into my room. I put on a pair of pajamas and drifted off to sleep very quickly. What a couple of days!
 
 
Chapter 24
 
 

SUNDAY CAME AND went quickly. Between homework, working on dance stuff, practicing sax, and doing as little of anything else I could… yeah the weekend was gone that fast. When I got to school on Monday things went fairly smoothly — at least until I got to my locker at the end of the day.

There was another note in my locker, ‘Leave the school or else.’ I didn’t have enough time to run back to the office to show it to them so I went ahead and put it in my backpack quickly and ran to the bus. As I sat on the bus I wondered how much I needed to be concerned about these notes.

On one hand they were just words… but they were beginning to take their toll again like last year’s words. I was so busy thinking about all of this that I didn’t even notice that Lucas and Jarred were on the bus until I was getting off — and the two of them were behind me. My heart skipped several beats as I realized they must be following me.

There couldn’t be any other reason they’d be coming this way could there? I didn’t want to start running home — I’d worn a pair of shoes with a slight heel to them today and knew I couldn’t run in them. If I had to I could kick them off…

I decided just to keep walking. As I made it halfway up the block to my house I looked back to see them still behind me. ‘Oh no,’ I thought to myself. They had also gained some distance behind me — they were maybe a hundred feet behind me now. If I could manage to get my keys out I could probably get inside and lock the door before they could do something. I’d have to call 9-1-1 when I got inside… hopefully they wouldn’t try anything beyond that.

I was so scared at this point that I didn’t have anyone with me that I almost missed the fact that Mrs. Lind was sitting outside with Brittany and Jamie in the front yard. Seeing a better opportunity to stay safe I decided to cross the street and go over there.

Mrs. Lind must have noticed something on my face because she immediately clued into the fact I was scared of something. As I walked up she asked me, "Tiffany is everything okay?"

I shook my head, "Can I stay here for a few minutes until those two boys go away?" I had tilted my head slightly so she could tell who I was talking about.

"Sure… are you okay?" She asked. I think she instantly realized that I was scared of being hurt by them.

"I’ll be better when those two go away."

"Tiffany, why don’t you come inside with me and tell me what’s going on, okay?" she asked.

I nodded, I was really upset and almost in tears. She had gathered Jamie and Brittany, shoeing them to play with some toys in the living room while she sat down in the kitchen to talk to me. "So what’s up with those two boys?" She asked.

Suddenly I was really nervous… I didn’t know if she knew that I wasn’t born Tiffany or not… they’d just moved in this summer after I’d been dressing as Tiffany. Would she be open to the idea that she’d actually had a ‘boy’ watching her daughters this past weekend? Or, would she freak out and scream at me — sending me right back out to Jarred and Lucas to get beaten up or worse…

I just started crying at this point. I didn’t know what else to do. Eventually I managed to get out, "They’ve both attacked me before, and I found a second threatening note in my locker today." I sniffled a fair amount before continuing, "Then I saw them following me today and I knew they must be up to trying to get me again…"

"Why in the world would two boys want to attack you?" She asked completely flabbergasted.

"Umm… because I’m different…" I told her cryptically.

"You look normal to me Tiffany, if anything you’re probably one of the prettier girls at your school." She told me.

That brought a small smile to my face. "The problem they have is I wasn’t… I wasn’t born Tiffany…" I told her.

"What do you mean," She asked. She had a very quizzical expression on her face.

"I… I…" I paused. Everyone at school knew, what was the big deal with a neighbor knowing? I took a breath, "I used to be a boy."

"What?!?" She said louder than I think she meant.

"I used to be a boy named Brandon. This past year I realized that I was supposed to be Tiffany."

"Whoa… I’ve heard about people like you… I never would have guessed Tiffany." She said truly in a state of shock.

"I guess I should be going now… I’m really sorry I caused you any trouble, thanks for helping me out." I said as I started to get up and leave.

"Hold on a second Tiffany." She said. I sat back down. "You’re different, and I won’t deny this is strange, but I’m not going to send you out to those boys to get hurt one way or another."

I gave her a small smile, "Thanks Mrs. Lind."

"No problem Tiffany. I have to admit I probably should be more concerned about this — but I don’t think you’d ever do anything to harm my girls — and that’s my standard. I am curious though, how did this all come about?" She asked as she went into the living room to look for the two boys. They must have still been out there somewhere though because she motioned for me to keep talking.

"Well it began last year…" I told her the basic outline of the events that had led to this.

She didn’t really interrupt at all while I was telling the story. When I was done her only reaction at first was, "wow, this must be really hard for you…"

At least it wasn’t the ‘you freak’ comment that I had feared. Thankfully some grownups were able to use their heads on things like this. I still was sure though that she wouldn’t ever want me to babysit for her again.

"Tiffany, I can’t say that I’m in total agreement that you should be doing this… It kind of goes against what I believe in. But, I think you really are a special young lady." She told me as she came around the table and gave me a quick hug.

"Thank you." I told her.

The two of us talked for about ten more minutes until my mom drove into the driveway. Jarred and Lucas had left at some point during our conversation. Both Mrs. Lind and I were pretty sure they had been waiting for me — they’d sat outside the house for the better part of forty minutes watching to see if I was coming out. She came across the street to talk with Mom when I went over.

Brittany and Jamie came over too — I ended up showing them my room and my toys. They both got really excited when they saw my doll house and all of my Barbies. Thankfully they didn’t stay but a couple more minutes though — it’s not that I didn’t want to share… but I didn’t want to share!

I was kind of scared of letting Brittany play with them. Jamie didn’t really concern me as much — but I was afraid Brittany might break something. It was a pretty selfish thought, but it was what I was thinking. It also managed to distract me from my situation earlier. When they were gone Mom asked me where I wanted to get some food from — I answered McDonalds.

We drove there and I asked for a happy meal. Just because I wasn’t five didn’t mean I didn’t want the toy! I was amazed Mom didn’t interrogate me about the reason I was over at the Lind’s during the whole time we were getting food, or when I was eating. She didn’t even ask me about it while we were on my way to ballet.

I didn’t really want to talk about it more — but I was really surprised she wasn’t asking. That ended up being the least of my concerns though when I got to gymnastics practice. Tara proceeded to review and build on everything that we’d worked on the previous week.

By the time we got through that lesson I’d managed to actually get two front-flips in a row. I was pretty proud of myself for that. Of course when I tried the second time I couldn’t repeat the feat. Tara told me to make sure I practiced this week — but I did warn her I wasn’t really going to be able to because of the trip. She seemed pretty intrigued by what I was doing, and wished me luck.

As we traveled home that night Mom sat in silence still — she still hadn’t asked me about earlier. Once I had taken a shower at home I sat down in the living room. "Mommy aren’t you going to ask me about earlier?"

"What is there to talk about sweetie?" She asked fairly curtly. What did I do?

"Did I miss something here? What did I do?" I asked her with some tears forming in my eyes.

She apparently hadn’t meant to snap at me. "I’m sorry sweetie, I didn’t mean it like that. I just don’t know what to do. They won’t do anything about the note — since the boys didn’t do anything we can’t really do anything about them… and I don’t think there’s a single thing I can do to protect you against them…" She was in tears at this point — I was too.

I went over to her and gave her a long hug where we both cried on each other for a bit. "I’m sorry Mommy… If you want me to stop this… I guess…" Could I really offer that…? Could I really exist being Brandon again..?

She jerked slightly and her whole demeanor changed as she looked into my eyes. She put a finger up to my lips, "Tiffany, are you happier now?" She asked.

I didn’t have to hesitate for a moment, "yes, much happier," I said nodding.

"Then I don’t want you to even ever consider offering that for a moment. I doubt it would be possible for you to do anyway. We’ll get through this — it’s just going to be really hard." She told me pulling me in close to her. I guess I knew that this all was affecting my parents a lot too… but this was the first time I saw Mom have a problem with it.

"Thank you Mommy," I told her. The phone rang right about then. I was sitting on my mom’s lap (doing my best to not crush her…) so she had just leaned over to pick it up.

"Hello?" She said. "Oh Hi Amy, here give her just a second to go get the other phone," Mom said as she gave me a shove off her lap.

I ran to the phone next to our computer, sitting down in the computer chair before saying, "Hello?" into the phone.

"Hey Tiffany, is everything okay?" She asked me.

"Kind of… Why do you ask?"

"Well someone saw Jarred and Lucas get onto your bus. Then someone else said they’d heard something about they were going to do something to you today — I was worried. But you haven’t been home to answer the phone every time I’ve tried."

"Well… I don’t know if they were going to try something or not… but they did follow me home after school." I told her.

"What happened?" she asked, even more concerned now.

I related the events that happened — including the conversation I had at the Lind’s house, and what had just happened with my mom.

"Tiffany, I’m kind of worried about you. What happens if they actually decide to attack you like that?"

I started getting upset again, "I don’t know Amy… I don’t know. It’s not like I have a choice — I have to get home from school. Mom said she was going to talk to the driver about not letting them on again… but realistically there’s nothing that we can go to the school with. I’m hoping maybe they’re just playing mind games with me…"

"Well it’s working with me Tiff. You know the bus stop to my house is a lot closer to my house than yours is to yours. Maybe you could start coming here after school?" She suggested.

"Maybe… I’d feel really strange going to your house without you though." I told her.

"It’d be a lot better than the alternative. How weird can it be, you even have your own room here," she told me.

"I guess let me talk to my mom about it," I told her.

"Okay, I’ll talk to mine about it too." She told me.

"So how did practice go tonight?" I asked.

"Terrible. Two of the girls just mouthed off to Coach Holt and walked out today… I don’t think they’re going to be allowed on the squad anymore."

"That’s probably a good thing?" I asked her.

"Kind of… unfortunately they were the only other two eighth graders beside Kristina that were able to do anything decently. We probably are better off without their attitudes though. Anyway… it’s probably going to be even more fun as we get through tryouts next week. Some of the eighth grade girls were asking about you — they heard you were trying out. A couple of them weren’t too happy about the possibility of you making it. I hope they don’t do anything stupid though." She told me.

"Me too," I told her.

"So how did gymnastics go?" She asked suddenly realizing that tonight probably wasn’t the night to bring any more problems up.

"It went pretty well. I managed to do two front-flips in a row. Well, once at least. I mostly fell on my face and my rear most of the time still…" I told her.

She was laughing like a hyena on the other end. "I remember doing that… of course I was like four when I was trying to get that far!"

"Hey! Just because you had a head start," I said giggling a bit. The two of us lightened up considerably then and we had fun talking about a couple of other things. By the end of the conversation I felt considerably better. About the time I finished, around 9:30pm, Dad came in from work.

He’d had a late night dealing with something at work. I just hoped that he wouldn’t have something come up to where he couldn’t go on the trip with us. I wanted badly for him to be there. I talked with my parents very briefly at that point though — floating Amy’s idea as a suggestion, before going to my room, putting on my pajamas, and crawling into bed. I didn’t really want to think more about anything.

As I tried to go to sleep I heard my parents with raised voices out in the living room. ‘It was probably about me’ I figured laying there. ‘What was I going to do?’
 
 
Chapter 25
 
 
TUESDAY MORNING WAS the now normal routine of being picked up to go to school by Amy’s mom. "Tiffany, here." She handed me a key as we pulled into the school’s drop-off area.

"Are you sure?" I asked her.

"Why wouldn’t I be?" she replied.

"I don’t know…"

"You have your own room at our house! You’re welcome to come over anytime you want. I talked with your mom last night and we both think Amy had a really good idea. Our neighborhood also has a lot more people around there during the daytime — I think you would be safer."

Dad had mentioned that they thought it wasn’t a bad plan earlier when he talked to me. He got an emergency call into work though and left quickly after talking to me. I wasn’t sure if they were thinking I should go after school today or not…

"I appreciate it," I told her as I put it on my keychain. I gave her a hug through the window and went with Amy through our classes like normal.

During second hour I got called out of class to see Mrs. Henry. She wanted to see the note that I’d found and to talk to me about yesterday after school. "Tiffany I really wish I could catch whoever gave you these notes — so far I think it is two different people. The handwriting looks different on this one from the other one. I also wished I could do something about Lucas and Jarred riding your bus. But, they both had legitimate notes on why they needed to ride the bus there… and I don’t think I can do anything about it unless they do something to you." She told me with a lot of sympathy in her eyes.

I didn’t have anything left to me so I decided to just be polite. "Thanks anyway Mrs. Henry," I told her and headed back to class.

I was in kind of a foul mood after that… nothing physical had occurred since the first incident. But it was probably only a matter of time. At lunch that day I ate with Amy, Kristina, Lindsey, Ashley, and the rest of my gang, but noted that some of the eighth grade cheerleaders that had been eating with her had glared at me and moved to another table. The word was definitely out that I was trying out for the dance squad next week, and some of them weren’t happy about it.

I felt some nerves hitting with that — I just hoped that it didn’t cause more trouble than it was worth for me to try out. That ended up being the least of my worries by seventh period that day though. When I got to band to get my instrument out I discovered someone had glued my case shut.

Mrs. Remar was furious when I showed her what had happened. She and I then worked for the better part of ten minutes trying to get the lid unstuck. When it finally came loose one of the hinges broke on the case. My first thought was, ‘at least it’s open now and I can play…’ but inside I discovered yet another note.

The note read, ‘you won’t always be able to find someone to run to Tiffany, your days are numbered here at Holden. We’re not going to tolerate having a freak like you here.’ At that point I just started bawling. Mrs. Remar led me to her office where she closed the door and tried to calm me down.

"Tiffany, it’s okay — we’ll get your case fixed." She told me.

"I’m not worried about the case," I told her through my tears.

"This is the third note I’ve gotten in the last three school days. I think it’s from Jarred and Lucas — they followed me home yesterday… but Mrs. Henry can’t do anything since she can’t prove anything!"

Mrs. Remar gave me another hug, "Tiffany it’ll be alright. They’re just using the notes because they can’t get to you any other way."

"I hope you’re right." I told her.

"Come on, let’s get your horn together and play, okay?" She asked.

"Okay," I said meekly before going back into the classroom to try and play. I somehow managed to not completely butcher the parts — I was pretty upset. Ashley came up to me after class and walked me to my locker before I got to the busses. When I walked up to them I watched Jarred and Lucas get onto my bus.

It didn’t take but a moment for me to make up my mind what I was doing then — I got on the bus that would take me to Amy’s house. The driver gave me kind of a strange glance and asked, "Where’s Amy?"

"She’s got cheerleading practice, but I’m going to start going to her house after school sometimes anyway." I told her.

"Okay, I’ll check with your mom later though to make sure this is okay." She told me.

"That’s fine, she knows." I said.

I managed to get a seat and have an uneventful ride to her house. When I got to her house I let myself in with the new key — finding it really strange to be here without anyone else. I didn’t really know what else to do at the moment, so I got a glass of water and went up to my room to work on homework for a bit. Mom would be coming to get me for my sax lesson before anyone else got home.

The Hancock’s had been so thoughtful when they’d given me my own room — it made me feel a little bit better. I hadn’t necessarily seen a need for it before — after all it meant that Amy and I weren’t able to stay up all night talking! But, now I really appreciated the gesture as I sat down at a dresser/desk that was in there and began working on math homework.

Mr. Martin had given us our makeup work for the days we were missing — and I really didn’t want to have to worry about it on the trip! I worked solidly for an hour before I heard the doorbell ring downstairs. I ran downstairs and found Mom waiting at the door for me.

As I locked the door and stepped outside she asked, "So did this work out better?"

"Well I kind of decided it was safer after seeing Jarred and Lucas get on my bus." I told her.

"Well I’m okay if you want to do this each day. Mrs. Hancock seems to think it’s okay too, so just let me know which you decide."

"Oh I’m sorry… I completely forgot to call and leave you a message about this."

"Its okay sweetie, Linda told me you rode this bus. She wanted to make sure it was okay," she told me.

"Okay, sorry again."

"Like I said it’s fine, now let’s get you to your lesson." She said as we drove there. At the first stoplight she asked, "So how did today go?"

"Not good," I told her.

She sighed and asked, "What happened?" I could almost hear the ‘now’ part which she didn’t tack on the end.

I told her all about the case, thinking ‘at least they hadn’t damaged my saxophone.’ "Let’s have your teacher look at it, maybe they can fix it at the shop while you’re having your lesson." She told me.

She went into the music store with me when we got there and had them look at the case. While I was back in the studio working with my teacher the repairman took off the old busted latch and replaced it with a new one. I told them thank you when we finished up, and was happy that my teacher said it was a free repair. She was the owner of the music store — so she had the ability to do so.

Sandra was a really neat teacher — she had dealt with my transition without any issues. She just kept torturing me and working on my playing ability no questions asked. If anything the only reason why I got mad at her sometimes was because she was so brutally honest with me. If I messed up — she let me know. We were trying to focus on making the district honor band with me. Those auditions were going to be in December — and the music was difficult

After an hour of torture on it I was certainly ready to get home. We actually skipped that step and went directly to Applebees to meet my dad. Mom didn’t feel like cooking that night. As we sat down at a table Dad came in the door. He didn’t look like he was in a very good mood, and most of dinner was had in silence.

As Mom drove me home to get changed for Tae Kwon Doe I asked, "Mom is everything alright with Dad?"

"He’s just stressed sweetie, things are going to be okay." She told me.

"Is he mad at me?" I asked her.

"Why would you ask that?"

"Because I’m the reason for all of the problems…"

"Where are you getting this from?" She asked me.

"You two were yelling at each other last night."

"Look sweetie, we were having a discussion — it got a little loud — but it was still just a discussion. Your dad and I love each other very much, and no, we’re not going to split up if that’s what you’re worried about."

"Are you sure?" I asked.

"Yes sweetie, I’m sure. Daddy’s just stressed right now from some stuff going on at work. And sweetie," Mom started.

"What?"

"I know with everything in my heart he loves you very much, and wouldn’t do anything to hurt you."

"I know… but I’m still worried." I told her.

"It’s really okay." She reassured me. That night we got home, I got changed, and I went to practice. Amy was there — that helped make things better — and the two of us had a lot of fun.

The nice thing about the class, more than anything else, is that I was slowly learning some ways to protect myself the next time I was attacked. Unfortunately that is how I was viewing it at that point — it seemed like only a matter of time before I was attacked. Realistically it was going to take several years of training before I would be competent in any of this… but every little trick and help was another moment that I could survive.

Mom gave Amy a ride home that night — so the two of us were able to chat and I vented to her about everything. When we dropped her off she gave me a hug and said, "Just one more day Tiffany, then we’ll be gone for our trip!"

"Amy thanks for sticking with me," I told her as she headed inside.

We drove home and I hopped in the shower. Once I was done Mom helped me work on beginning to pack stuff for the trip — I noticed that Dad still hadn’t come home again. "Mom is Dad even going to be able to go with us?" I asked her.

"Sweetie he’s working late tonight so that he can. He said there were some things that he had to get done before he can take off. He’ll be going on the trip." She told me.

"Promise?" I asked her.

"Yes sweetie." She told me. "Now let’s finish working on some of this packing okay?"

"Okay." I told her as I began wondering why I was so concerned about Dad going. He had been better about being around since all of this began… but recently he’d been gone more and more again. I understood that he had a difficult job, but still. His biggest problem was that as a management person he was also their main troubleshooter.

The family that actually owned the company kept getting in his way at times — the daughter wanted to do things that were stupid (and he opposed as such), and realistically bad for the company. My dad kept things turning a good profit but the company definitely was taking him for granted. With everything going on my dad kept getting dragged in for one thing after another since they didn’t have to pay him overtime if he came in. The only good thing is that he did get some profit sharing out of it — just not really enough to make the job’s stress worth it.

Of course I understood that… but at the same time I wanted him to be there for me. I wanted him to come to my concerts and everything else. When he was around I felt safer from some of the stuff — I knew he wouldn’t let anyone harm me if he could help it. Of course I wasn’t seeing him often enough right now for that to happen.

About the time that I had my pajamas on and was climbing in bed I saw his headlights reflect through my window. I jumped out of bed and hugged him goodnight before heading right back to bed. It was already past my bedtime… and Mom didn’t want me to stay up any later that night. As I went to sleep I couldn’t help but resent his job.

THURSDAY I HAD hoped I would be able to just have a brief, but good day at school. My wish was not to happen though. Right off the bat I started off bad — we had a really hard pop quiz in science because a bunch of students just started messing around. I had no doubt that I had really messed up on it. At least Amy wasn’t happy about it either. By the time we got to choir the two of us weren’t in the best of moods.

Things only got worse from there though, we were both called to the office just as we were getting ready to sing our favorite piece. It turns out that someone decided to get more ambitious with their attacks on me - all while including Amy in the incident as well. Both of our lockers had been ‘tagged’ with graffiti done with a marker. Mine in particular referenced the sexual acts that the offenders wanted to do with me and seemed to say that today I was going to be attacked after school. Amy’s wasn’t particularly better.

This sent both of us into tears, and for a second I thought maybe Amy should just give up on our friendship. It was hurting her… and I was afraid if they couldn’t attack me they would get her… As we sat in the conference room waiting for Mrs. Henry to come back and talk to us some more I decided to offer her an out, "Look Amy… I’m kind of worried that if you keep…"

"Stop Tiffany, don’t even think about finishing that sentence," she told me.

"But…"

"No. Do you think I honestly care what other people think about me?"

I just sat there like an idiot.

"Tiffany, you are my best friend — you’re such a great person. I don’t care what anyone else says or does."

"But Amy, it’s not like I do anything for you…"

"That’s not even close to true Tiffany. You listen to me endlessly telling all my problems, you’re a ton of fun to hang around with, and so much more. You don’t even ask for anything in return! You’re like a sister to me, so don’t even think of trying to tell me I’d be better off not being your friend — because that’s not true."

I couldn’t do anything else at that moment but cry and give her a hug. "I’m sorry Amy." I told her.

"There’s nothing to be sorry about." She told me.

The two of us managed to get a hold of ourselves a couple minutes before Mrs. Henry came back in. We were actually managing to talk about some small talk when she came in. "Ladies I’ve called your parents about this incident, and they want to come down to talk with everyone present. I’d like for you both to come with me to get your lunch from the cafeteria, and then you’ll eat here in the conference room."

"Can’t we go and eat with everyone like normal?" I asked. Why should Amy get screwed by this too?

"This was a request by your parents. They’re concerned about your safety with the way some of this was done — and the fact it seems to be escalating. So I do need you both to get your food and come back here."

"Could we get some of our friends to join us in here?" Amy asked. That was a reasonable request right?

"Well… Like who?" She asked.

Amy listed off Nikki, Ashley, Lindsey, Kristina, Kyle and David.

"I suppose I can try and see what I can do. Give me a couple minutes." She said as she left the room. As promised she returned shortly and said, "Come on ladies."

She led us to the cafeteria at that point — still several minutes before everyone else was going to be released. As we stood in line all of the people that Amy had listed off also showed up. When we all had our food she led us back to the conference room where we immediately began getting interrogated by them.

"Tiffany, what’s going on?" Lindsey asked me when Mrs. Henry had left.

"Someone put some graffiti on our lockers — and they’re overreacting…" I answered, knowing that was probably not true.

"I don’t know Tiff, I heard about what they put on your lockers — I’m kind of worried about you two," Kyle said.

"It’s just graffiti Kyle," Amy told him.

"But where does it stop? I can definitely see your parents getting upset. The stuff on the lockers was really bad." He told her.

"So are you two going to be let back into class today?" Nikki asked.

"I don’t know…" I said.

"I guess our parents don’t want us to do anything until they’ve made it down here." I told them.

"Tiffany, this isn’t the first note you’ve gotten this week…" Amy said.

"What other notes have you gotten?" David asked me.

I told him about everything that had started last Friday. "This is so stupid, what’s their problem? It’s not like you’re hurting anyone Tiff," Kyle said to me.

Our friends helped us vent in that manner for about twenty minutes before Mrs. Henry came back in and sent them off to class.

"Okay girls, your parents should be here soon — as soon as they are we’ll talk about what we’re going to do about this. Hopefully we’ll be able to get you back into your classes by the end of the day."

We both just sat there bored for the next ten minutes after that. To say that we were mad would have been an understatement. Several of our classes in the afternoon were supposed to have tests — and we were going to have to make those up in addition to all of our other makeup work for the week. I was just hoping that maybe we could finish the day without it turning into something worse than it already had.

"Tiffany, did you remember about today after school?" Amy asked.

"Huh?"

"Mom’s taking us to the salon! You didn’t forget did you?"

"Actually… with everything else going on this week I’d completely forgotten about it." I paused. "Amy, is it ever going to stay normal for any length of time?" I asked.

"I don’t know Tiffany. I have a feeling if we can make it through this year things’ll get forgotten eventually. Maybe even enough that this stuff will stop happening."

"Maybe I should have gone to a different school this year."

"Absolutely not Tiffany. Look for every one of these jerks that are doing this stuff you have a friend who cares about you here. Just hang in there — we’ll get through this," She told me.

"Amy, I don’t know what I’d do without you." I told her.

"Be bored all the time of course!" She told me.

"So have you gotten anything out of your dad about what all we’re doing in New York besides the film festival?" I asked her.

"No. He’s keeping everything a secret from me. I think they’ve told our parents… but everyone is trying to surprise us for some reason."

"I guess it’s not a big deal — it should be fun either way. My parents and I have never been to New York."

"Mine have — Dad actually went to school somewhere in that area for a few years. Mom also has some family out there that she used to visit when she was a kid. But I haven’t been there before either."

"Cool." I said. "I’m kind of hoping to see a couple of cool sights like the Statue of Liberty and Central Park."

"Well the place where the festival is happening is actually in the city… so maybe we will get to do that. I’ve never been there before either. Personally I’d like to go see a show on Broadway… and maybe go to Fifth Avenue."

"What’s on Fifth Avenue?"

"What do you mean ‘what’s on Fifth Avenue?’ You don’t know what Fifth Avenue is?"

I shook my head.

"Tiffany, it’s like one of the most expensive shopping places in the world. I’ve heard there are some really cool things there. Not that even my parents could afford much there… but I still think it would be cool to go shopping there." She told me about some of the stores that were in that area — I had actually heard of a few of them.

"That does sound like fun." I told her.

"I think my parents would work to set up some things like that… but who knows. We’ll find out tomorrow!"

"Yeah," I said. "Amy, do you…" The door opened before I could finish my question. My mom and dad came in, followed by Amy’s parents, the superintendent, and both principals. Mom and Dad gave me a hug — Amy’s parents did the same thing — before switching the other way too.

"Okay what’s going on here Mrs. Hinther, Mrs Henry?" My dad angrily asked. "Our daughter should be having a safe educational experience at this school. You were given plenty of notice that there was a problem with students getting to her locker and doing things — yet you haven’t done anything about it?"

"Mr. Jacobson promise we…" Mrs. Hinther tried starting.

"No, Mrs. Hinther, don’t try to tell us you are doing everything you can, because you’re obviously not!" My mom said.

My parents both vented into them for a good five minutes before they stopped to catch their breath. At that point Mr. Hancock got involved, "Mrs. Hinther, Mrs. Henry, I have to say that I am equally concerned about the welfare of Tiffany, and Amy at this point. I know for a fact that Tiffany has given you each note that she has received. This means that you of course knew what was going on."

"There were several solutions you could have taken at that point, but as far as I can tell you haven’t done any of them. I guess my first question today is when were their lockers vandalized?" Mr. Hancock gave them a stare that made my own blood chill. He said everything so calmly and precisely — there was no overt hint of anger in his voice.

"Mr. Hancock we’re not really sure exactly when it happened." Mrs. Henry said. "We know that the two of them didn’t stop by their lockers between second and third — so it may have already been there. But, we’re guessing it happened during the first part of third period."

"So you are just letting students roam through the hallway at will?" He asked her.

"Well no Mr. Hancock, every student is supposed to have a pass if they’re not in class." She said.

"So I’m assuming you have gone to every teacher at this point and asked them which students were let out at that time? And perhaps all of the students that were late to class?"

"I’m in the process of doing that Mr. Hancock." She replied.

Part of me was kind of upset that Mrs. Henry was taking the brunt of this… but this was her job — she should’ve already had that answer. "It needs to be done as soon as possible," He told her and Mrs. Hinther. "I have also contacted the police — I wish to have them in on the investigation as well. We will be pressing harassment charges on the perpetrators of this."

"I can understand that," Mrs. Henry said politely. I don’t think she was taking it personally at least. "I am doing everything I can with this — someone will eventually talk. That is inevitable with students involved with this kind of thing."

"I sure hope so. Now that I know that you are investigating properly, what are we going to do to prevent this from happening in the future?"

"What do you mean?" Mrs. Hinther asked. This was one of the first times she had spoken.

"Well, obviously there must be a safer place for the two of them to have their lockers. Tiffany has already had far too many threatening notes left within her locker — not to mention this incident. Is there a safer place that they can have lockers? Perhaps they could have one next to a classroom where a teacher will be on duty?"

"We can look into that Mr. Hancock, but unfortunately we already have every locker assigned at this point. There are even a number of students who have ended up sharing lockers since we didn’t have enough to go around this year." Mrs. Hinther answered.

"It sounds like a problem that you can take care of though," Mr. Jameson directed. "My question for you Mrs. Hinther is how are we going to guarantee the safety of these young ladies while they’re here in this school? Realistically I think that Tiffany is in more danger than Amy, but it seems to be guilt by association right now for Amy too. What steps are we going to take?" He asked her.

I was really surprised to hear a school official ask that question in front of non-school officials. Mrs. Hinther was especially shocked by this too — you could see it on her face.

"Well we’ve already made sure that she has friends in each of her classes that can walk from class to class with her. What more do you want? A teacher to walk them from class to class? I would think that would make things worse." She told him.

Personally I agreed with her there. I took a brief glance at Amy — she and I shared a silent ‘PLEASE NO!’ look.

"Mrs. Hinther, I don’t really believe that’s a good answer either. Tell me are teachers monitoring the hallways?" My mom asked.

"They’re supposed to be." She answered.

"Where are you during the passing periods?" Mr. Hancock asked.

"Usually in the office…"

"Well there’s a start to a solution right there," My mom told her. "You should be stationing yourself out where trouble could be happening — in this case you know which classes these girls have. Stand in between their two classes. If they have a problem you should be able to pick up on it — if not then they just go on by like normal students."

Go MOM!

"I think that sounds like a good solution Mrs. Hinther," Mr. Jameson said. "I want to see it done."

"We’ll make sure it begins happening," Mrs. Henry answered for the dumbstruck principal.

"Now, for today, what are we going to do for these two? They have a threat on them that I think is fairly serious. Obviously the students that did it feel safe enough to be public about it. Do you think you’ll be able to figure out who did this today?" Mr. Hancock asked Mrs. Henry.

"I don’t know sir, realistically I’m guessing I’ll find out by Monday for certain. Today will probably be a little quick for that to get to me."

Mr. Hancock and my parents talked quietly for a few moments. "Would you please let Coach Holt know that Amy won’t be at practice today? I think we’re going to go ahead and take them home for today. They’ll be back on Monday after we get back from New York."

"Um… Okay." Mrs. Henry answered. "We’ll do everything we can in the meantime to figure out what’s going on."

"Yes you will, because if I feel for one second that you aren’t you can plan on a suit filed against the school next Friday. The suit will name both of you in it if that happens."

"Is that a threat Mr. Hancock?" Mrs. Hinther asked.

"No, it’s a fact of reality. The girls have a right to a free and safe education — they will get it. If it’s not provided to them willingly I will fight for it to be." He told them. Once he had paused for a moment he said, "Well thank you for your time, we’re going to take the girls now."

He motioned for all of us to go ahead and leave. Amy and I went together really quickly to our lockers to get our stuff. The custodians had done a decent job of getting the marker off… but you could still see some black marks here and there.

"I wish they would have cleaned it off sooner Tiff," Amy told me.

"Yeah, leaving it up between third and fourth hour just guaranteed that every student would see it."

"Well, let’s get out of here. At least we’re getting out of a half-day of school now." Amy told me as we walked away from the lockers.

"Yeah… but that means we have like three tests to make up next week from today. And that’ll be in the middle of the dance camp…" I told her.

"It’ll work out. Besides, maybe some of the teachers will decide to not make us take them?" She suggested.

"Maybe if you ask," I told her.

"What, you think that you can’t pull it off just as easily now?"

"Not really." I said as we caught up with our parents standing outside the office door.

"Are you two ready?" Amy’s mom asked us.

We nodded in response before they led us outside. "Well, this wasn’t exactly in my plans for today," Mr. Hancock said when we went outside. "Do you guys need to get back to work?" He asked my parents.

"Yeah I do," my mom said.

"So do I," my dad agreed.

"Why don’t you two go ahead and I’ll just take Tiffany to our house. We were going to pick her up to go to the salon later anyway," Amy’s mom suggested.

Mom looked a bit pained to be leaving me after all of this, but she replied, "That’s probably the best plan." Looking at me, "Tiffany come here for a moment though okay?" She asked.

I went over to their car and talked to Mom and Dad on my own for a few moments. They were mainly concerned about me and wanted to make sure everything was alright. Well… it wasn’t, but it could have been worse right? And everyone knew I would be just as safe with the Hancocks. They both gave me a hug before I went back over to Mrs. Hancock’s car and got in next to Amy.
 
 
Chapter 26
 
 

THE DRIVE TO Amy’s house was quiet. Before we got there though Amy’s mom asked, "Did you two eat lunch?"

"Yeah." I said.

"Kind of." Amy added into the same sentence.

"So I take it that you had it, but didn’t eat much of it?" She guessed.

"Basically." Amy replied.

"Do you two want to stop somewhere real quick?"

"Sure," Amy said.

"Is that alright with you Tiffany?"

"That’s fine," I said. I wasn’t trying to be rude… I just wasn’t feeling very ‘up’ after listening to the adults argue over us for that long.

I didn’t look up, but I could feel the look of concern from the front seat. The graffiti had upset me a good amount, but really it had been the battle that had been had in the office that really upset me. Was it worth all of this just to be the person I was?

We ended up at Burger King and each ordering a kids meal. If I’d been a boy still there would have been no way I ever would have ordered one, but as a girl it was kind of cute. We took the food home to eat — sitting down at the dining room table to quietly eat our chicken tenders. After we finished Amy and I migrated upstairs to her playroom where we just sat doing nothing for a while.

"What do you want to do?" She asked me.

"I don’t know, you?"

"Nothing really… but I don’t want to just sit here."

"Neither do I."

"Barbies?" She asked.

I shook my head, "not really."

"TV?" she asked.

"I don’t know what I want to do… that doesn’t really sound like it though either."

"It’s pretty warm outside right now… we could go swim — or at least sit in the pool for a while," she suggested. "I think my parents are going to have to have it drained in about a month for the winter — so we’re not going to have a lot more time with it for a while."

"Okay, I guess that works. What time is it?" I asked her as we got up and left the room.

She glanced at a clock in her room real quick, "Two. We have an hour and a half until we’ll need to leave."

"Okay, that’s enough time to swim for a bit and shower, right?" I asked her.

"Should be."

"Just checking." I said as I went to my room to get dressed.

At this point I had most of my swimsuits at her house. I looked through what I had and decided to choose my ‘first’ one. It was one with Ariel from the Little Mermaid on it. Amy’s mom had bought one for all of the girls for the slumber party that Amy had at the end of the year last year. Basically it was also the event that changed the ball from rolling slowly to tumbling down the tunnel like in the Indiana Jones movie…

For some reason it seemed like a comforting suit to wear at that moment. I had only worn it a couple times since then — I had others I looked better in. As I came out and went down the hallway to see if Amy was done her door opened. "You stole my idea Tiffany!" Amy told me.

Apparently the two of us thought more alike than I had ever realized. She had worn the same swimsuit, only the second time for her. That sent the two of us into a giggling fit as we went downstairs. "Where are you two heading?" Her mom asked.

"Umm… Mommy may we go swimming?" Amy asked belatedly.

"We’re going to the salon at 3:30," she told us.

"We should have more than enough time to swim and shower before then," Amy said.

"Please?" I added.

"Oh alright, but I’m going to kick you both out at 2:50 so you can get showered. I don’t want them to have to deal with two girls fresh out of the swimming pool."

"Thanks!" we both said together as we hurried outside to the pool. The two of us spent the time mainly floating around — not saying or doing much. After about forty minutes we migrated over to the jacuzzi. That felt really good, but we only were able to spend about five minutes in it before Amy’s mom sent us upstairs to go shower.

I didn’t spend a long time in the shower on anything other than my hair. I did want to get all of the pool water washed out of it. As I got out and got dressed I looked at my hair. Since the last time I had been to the salon I had added a fair amount of hair to my head. I figured I’d added another 3 inches to the length of my hair — I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with it from here.

I grabbed a hairbrush from my dresser and went downstairs and sat on a couch brushing my hair out. Amy’s mom had a talk show on, and I just brushed my hair non-stop while watching the show. I was joined by Amy a little while later and in no time at all we were being herded into their car to go to the salon.

By the time we got to the salon Amy and I seemed to have relaxed a bit — some of the tension we were feeling was leaving us. The two of us were chatting normally as we walked in.

"Hello Mrs. Hancock, how are you doing today?" The owner of the salon greeted us.

"I think we’ve all had better days, but we’re kind of hoping you can help us forget that." She told her.

"I’m sorry to hear that. We will certainly do our best to work on that though." The owner said with a very vibrant smile. "What all are we doing today?" She asked as she led us towards a room where they would have us put on some really soft robes that I remembered from last time.

"Well we want to get Amy and Tiffany a new hairstyle that looks great for everyday stuff as well as more formal events. We’re going to be going to an event Friday that they’re both going to be dressed up for — we’d like to be able to do something with their hair for that."

"Why don’t you come back here Friday and I’ll get them ready no charge?" She suggested.

"We’d love to take you up on that, but unfortunately we’re going to be in New York for the event."

"Really? In that case do you think you can make it to…" she rambled off an address in New York. It might as well have been gibberish to me though — I had no idea where anything was in that city.

"That’s not too far from where we’ll be. Why do you ask?"

"Well I’ve got a really good friend there that owns a salon. She owes me a couple favors. Is this a really big event?" She asked.

"We think it is. The girls, and two of their friends, produced a video back in May for a class that has been picked up by a Film Festival there. Originally it was just going to be a minor daytime showing, but instead they decided to attach it to the main event film on Friday night. We’ve been told to come dressed for a ‘red carpet’ event."

"That’s awesome. Why don’t you three go ahead and get changed in here and I’ll try and get a hold of her while you’re getting worked on today." She said.

Once the door was shut we repeated what we’d done in June when they’d brought me here. I faced one wall and changed while they did the same. When we were all done we turned around. I hated the fact that I still had parts that none of us were comfortable seeing. If only they were already gone!

Once we got out of there we were led to some very nice leather seats that I remembered well from last time. Amy’s mom actually came over to the girls that were working on Amy and I first before going anywhere else. "Okay, this is Tiffany’s dress she’s going to be wearing on Friday, and this is Amy’s," she said showing them some photographs that she’d taken.

‘We probably should have brought the dresses with us,’ I thought to myself.

"We should be able to match these without any problem," one of them told her.

"Thanks," she told her before she went off to her own ladies section of the salon.

The one that had answered her came over to me, "Hi Tiffany, my name is Lilly, how are you today?"

"Honestly I’ve had better days, but I think this is going to help that," I told her with a smile.

"Well I’ll certainly do my best to live up to that. What do you want to do with your hair?" She asked me.

"Well… you know the haircut that Rachel on Friends has?" I asked her. She nodded. "Can you do something like that?"

"That’s become really popular recently, I can definitely do it. You’ve got just enough hair right now to make it come out right too." She told me.

"Cool," I told her.

"Well let’s start working then!" She told me with a smile.

She led me over to another chair where she washed my hair in a sink. As she washed my hair and massaged my scalp I couldn’t help but smile — even with everything that had gone wrong this past week at least this felt really really good. She wrapped my hair up for a couple moments in a towel while she led me back over to the really comfy chair.

"So Tiffany, what all do you do besides school?" Lilly asked me as she began working on my hair.

"Well I’m in band, I play saxophone. I also have been taking some dance and gymnastics classes so far this year."

"That’s neat, how long have you been doing the dance and gymnastics thing?" She asked as her scissors clipped.

"I just started actually. I’m kind of hoping to improve my chances to make it on to a new dance squad that my school is forming. The tryouts begin this next week."

"Well you’re certainly pretty enough to be on one!" she told me.

I blushed, "thanks," I told her.

"No problem, it’s true…" She made small talk with me off and on for a while as she worked on my hair.

After a while she left my hair to sit while another girl came over and did my nails. As she continued on my nails Lilly came back and did my first facial. I have to be honest… It kind of felt good, but at the same time it was really weird. I had mixed feelings on that experience. I did appreciate it as she massaged my face a bit.

The girl that was doing my nails actually started off with massaging my hands and feet — that part was easily my favorite part. There was something about it that made me feel really good. For a few moments as I sat there I wondered what it would be like to have a guy like Kyle do that for me. I shook my head clear of that thought pretty quickly though… that was still too weird.

After what seemed like merely ten minutes Lilly cleaned my face off, finished off with my hair, and turned me around to where I could see the finished product.

My heart definitely stopped for a moment as I looked at myself in the mirror. I’d had several moments recently where I was surprised by how I looked, but this one was just as exciting. I loved my hair. The layers worked really well with my blonde hair — especially since parts of my hair were naturally darker than others.

"What do you think Tiffany?" Lilly asked me.

"Wow!" I breathed. "It’s really cute!" I told her.

"I agree, it looks really good on you. Do you like the nails too?" She asked.

I looked down at my fingernails and toenails. I had been growing my nails out since the summer — trying not to cut or break them as much as I could. Because of that they were actually fairly long, long enough not to have fake nails added. The base coat on them was a blue that looked like it matched my dress perfectly. On top of the base coat there was a lighter blue that they had added some sort of curved design to it with. Included in the design they had added three little white ‘pearl’ things on each nail.

They were really so pretty! My toenails were done similarly, though they altered the design so that it was bigger for my big toe and got smaller through each of my little toes. After the fun I’d gone through today I was finally able to completely smile. I was going to be going to a major movie rollout event — and I was going to look the part!

I went back to the room where we had changed to get my clothes back on. I had just gotten dressed when Amy came in to change. "Tiffany, your hair is cute!" she squealed before coming over to me and giving me a hug.

I looked at her and she had them do some different things with hers too. It now curled under a bit more and she’d gotten rid of her bangs. "Your hair is really cute too," I told her. She changed really quick and we both went outside to where her mom was already waiting.

"Tiffany I love your hair! That style looks great on you." Amy’s mom told me. "Amy I think that yours is great too!" she said. I hoped Amy didn’t mind that her mom complimented me first…

"Thank you. And thank you for bringing me back here!" I told her as I gave her a hug. We walked outside to their car all talking.

I looked at Amy’s nails as we drove towards my house. She had to have some acrylic nails attached since she was constantly breaking hers. The nails were done in a light purple with some white designs on top of that. They had then attached some silver ‘jewel’ things on top of hers like they had done the pearls with mine.

"So your dress is a light purple?" I asked her.

"Yeah, lavender actually — it’s really pretty. I meant to show it to you earlier this week but completely forgot."

"That’s okay — as long as you let me see it when we get to our hotel tomorrow!" I told her with a smile.

"Okay." She said. The two of us were back to normal by the time that they dropped me off at my house.

My parents were both home at this point and my mom came out to talk to Amy’s mom. "Tiffany I love your hair," my mom said as she saw it. She made me turn around so she could see it from the front and the back. "It’s really cute Tiffany," she told me.

"Thanks Mommy," I told her. She admired my nails, Amy’s hair, and Amy’s nails, for a couple minutes before she and Amy’s mom started talking about their plans for meeting at the airport tomorrow. They didn’t talk too long before Mom and I went inside.

Dad was sitting at the computer in the dining room, he turned around as I came in. "Wow, your hair is really pretty Tiffany," he told me.

"Thanks, look at my nails!" I told him as I ran over so he could get a good look. Mom hadn’t looked at them yet for some reason. They both admired them as I put them out in front of them.

"They’ll go really well with your dress," Mom told me.

"I know, I can’t wait!" I told them. I was glad that nothing was said about earlier on in the day. Instead we just finished working on packing everything to go on our short trip. Our flight was leaving at 7am so Mom pushed me to get stuff packed as quickly as we could so that I could get to bed early. Shortly after 8pm the phone rang though.

"Tiffany, it’s for you!" Dad called from the other room.

I asked him, "Who is it?" as I walked over to take the phone from him.

"I don’t know, some boy?" he said.

I just stuck my tongue out at him, he was not the most useful person sometimes, and said, "Hello?" into the phone.

"Hey Tiffany, this is Kyle, how are you doing?"

"I’m doing okay. How are you?" I asked him back.

"Okay I guess. I know you’re getting ready for your trip tomorrow, so I won’t talk long, but I just wanted to make sure everything was alright. You and Amy just disappeared after we saw you at lunch today. And I was kind of worried about you two."

‘That was really sweet of him,’ I thought. "Things are okay I guess… the principals promised to look into things — but our parents are pretty unhappy with them. They’ve basically threatened them with a lawsuit if things aren’t taken care of by next Friday…"

"Whoa." Kyle said.

"Yeah… it sucks. I wish whoever was doing this stuff would just stop. It’s not like I’ve done anything to them." I told him.

"Whoever is doing it is just jealous of you I think Tiffany." He told me.

"What are they jealous of?" I asked him. I really didn’t want to think about this stuff right now, but I did want to talk to him for some reason.

"Let’s see you’ve got some of the coolest friends in the school, you’re one of the nicest girls in the school, and you’re one of prettiest girls in our grade." He told me.

"You don’t have to say that Kyle," I told him.

"It’s true though. Anyway, so everything’s okay?" He asked.

"I guess so… kinda sorta… our parents just didn’t see any reason for us to stick through the school day with everything that happened today. They also wanted to give them some time to figure out who was doing it. I’m just afraid that one of these days someone is going to make good on those threats…" I told him.

"Look if there’s anything I can do about that Tiffany, let me know. I was trying to figure out who was behind this stuff earlier, but none of the guys on the team seem to know anything about it. I’m pretty sure that Jarred and Lucas had a hand in it — but no one is saying anything about them."

"Yeah… I don’t know Kyle. I just hope it stops soon. I don’t want it to get in the way of me trying out for the dance squad next week."

"It won’t. We’ll make sure of it Tiff," he told me. It made me smile, I’m not sure why, but just the fact that he cared that much made me smile again.

"Thanks Kyle."

"No problem Tiffany, anyway I’ll let you go. I just wanted to make sure that everything was going alright for you. Have a safe trip." He told me.

"Thanks again, goodnight," I told him.

"Goodnight," he told me and we both hung up.

What was going on? Was Kyle actually interested in me? Was I interested in him? These questions were swirling about my mind when my mom asked, "So what boy were you talking to?"

"Kyle." I told her.

"Is there something going on between you two?" Mom asked me.

"Not that I know of," I told her honestly.

"Just remember you’re not allowed to date until you’re sixteen." She told me.

I stuck my tongue out at her and went to finish packing some shoes I had forgotten to put in a bag. Soon I was in bed just trying to fall asleep. Thoughts raced in my head so that I didn’t go to sleep until way past two hours after trying. One minute I would think about everything that had been going wrong at school, the next would be trying to figure out if I liked Kyle or not, the next would be thoughts about the trip. What would New York be like? Had I packed everything I needed? Would we get completely booed out of the theater? Had they done this just to make their film look better? What else would I see and do while I was there? They still hadn’t told us anything.

---

 
To Be Continued...