A story about a family with two boys aged 10 and 13, in which choice is a delusion and gender, an illusion. It’s a familiar theme in the TG literature, but this time with an unfamiliar twist. After his extraordinary dance debut, Maggie is determined never to have Blair appear in public as a boy again.

Chapter 10 Choice at McDonald’s

“Blair, you were amazing. Your performance was exciting, daring, frightening even. Son… Blair, I mean, I’ve never been prouder of you.” Laird then literally applauded his youngest child in front of Kirk and Blair’s two biggest admirers, Maggie and Big Al, who joined Laird in clapping loudly enough to turn the heads of two families sitting near to them in McDonald’s.

Laird continued:

This is the first ballet I’ve ever seen. And frankly, until now I believed it was for only for sissies. Was I ever wrong! I owe you an apology, Blair, for ever thinking that ballet was like golf or tennis. It takes real guts to leap as high into the air as you did when you obviously weren’t sure of where you were coming down! Now I realize that ballet is a bruising contact sport — like football or pro soccer. Sometimes I saw you run over two or three Wilis in order to get to the girl playing Giselle. It was incredible how often she spun into you, almost knocking you over. But Blair, you stood your ground …”

“Dad, I think you’ve got it wrong ….” Kirk began, but Laird cut him off: “Blair, you made me mighty proud of the way you almost always got the better of the collisions, even when a dancer charged at you like an enraged bull at a cape. And are you ever strong! Strong enough to be able to haul Giselle’s sorry butt up repeatedly from the stage after she got her feet entangled with yours. What’s wrong with that girl? Why wasn’t she looking where she stepped? Is she nearsighted and too vain to wear glasses?”

“Yes, Laird, Blair certainly stole the show,” Maggie said; “but it was monstrous that our daughter wasn’t allowed to play a female role. I’ve already told the school’s management that our entire family was outraged by the miscasting. Blair, I was so looking forward to seeing you dance in a white dress and gossamer fairy wings. You were born to be a Wili.”

“So why was Blair given the male role?” Kirk asked, not so innocently. “Is my precious sister too masculine for a female role? Or is she too much of a sissy to make a convincing girl?”

Maggie gave him a severe look: “Kirk, don’t talk that way about your sister; it’s hurtful” — a painful reality that Big Al amply demonstrated to Kirk with a hard jab to the shoulder.

Maggie took control:

Alicia! No rough stuff in McDonald’s! You’re not eating at home. As for you, Kirk, I don’t think you’d want us to discuss whether there’s anything sissy about you. You can either refrain from butting in or we will change the topic to your sexuality. It’s possible that you’d make an even better female than Blair. Rather than discuss Blair’s performance should we go back to Dame Pavlova to enroll you as a girl dancer?”

“No effing way. I’d die first.”

“Then I take it, Kirk, that I have your silence while your father and I discuss with Blair her future as a dancer.”

Maggie then addressed Blair directly:

Sweetie, the two cretins who run Dame Pavlova have told me in no uncertain terms that, being permanently short of boys, that they will almost always be asking you to play a male role in the school’s performances. And they actually had the gall to tell me that the other ballet schools would treat you just as badly. They too would want you to play Albrecht, rather than Giselle.”

Blair was startled; he hadn’t heard anything like this from his instructors. “But why? Why won’t they let me play a female role? Do they think me a boy? Have they been … laughing at me behind my back?” Blair rapidly inhaled several times.

“Don’t fret, sweetie,” Maggie replied. “Monica and Mr. Zero Cents are 100% convinced that you’re a girl. And why wouldn’t they be? You were born a girl; you are a girl; you will be a girl and a woman until the day you die. But, like many girls, you’ve got a slight weight problem.”

“Blair has a weight problem? I don’t understand. Blair doesn’t look any heavier than the other girls her age. Indeed, she looks to me to be on the small size — like ten-year-old boys usually are when compared to girls their age,” Laird objected.

“Oh, I’m not saying that Blair weighs too much …”

“I’ll say! Blair’s weight is perfect — just like everything else about her,” announced Big Al with a big smile for Blair, who naturally blushed. Big Al then put a big paw on Blair’s bare thigh. Blair responded with a kiss on Big Al’s cheek and a hand on the big girl’s jeans.

“Maggie! Dad! Alicia and Blair are acting like lesbos again! Can’t you get them to behave themselves in public,” Kirk said loudly enough to be heard at the next table.

Laird responded: “Kirk, hush. Don’t raise your voice in a posh restaurant. As for you girls, a bit of decorum please.”

“Please let me continue — without interruptions,” Maggie interjected:

As I was saying, Blair has a weight problem that makes it difficult for her to dance the female roles. The problem is a simple one: Her weight is mal-distributed, with the result that she lacks the balance of most other females. It’s a simple, well-known fact, Laird, Kirk, that we women have better balance than you men; that’s why only female gymnasts work on the balance beam, and why any reality show that wants a girl to beat the guys asks everyone to stand on top of a pole or to walk a tightrope. Why do we gals have better balance? Because of the way we’re built — close to the ground with lots of weight around the hips, instead of a protruding beer belly that even you, Kirk, will be developing by age twenty-one. Simply put, women have a lower center of gravity — like a sleek sports car — while you guys are as easy to tip over as a SUV. No male dancer can stand on point the way the gals do.”

“Let me get this,” Laird replied. “You’re saying that Blair lacks the balance needed for female roles because she doesn’t have enough weight around her hips.”

“Precisely! At ten she also lacks the mammaries that we females use to such advantage for our twirls, turns and pirouettes. Breasts plus hips equal body in motion!”

“Hmm, what are you suggesting?” Laird asked. He wasn’t at all sure he liked the drift of the conversation. Blair wondered too: Was his mommy saying that he’d never be allowed to dance a female role unless he grew boobies? That raised a bigger question in his mind: Was the role of Giselle worth a body change?

As Maggie spoke, Big Al’s hand disappeared under Blair’s skirt. Thus hidden, the only sure evidence of its progress was the glazed look in Blair’s eyes. At a crucial juncture in Blair’s life, the kid was finding it impossible to concentrate on what Maggie was saying, just as Big Al likely intended.

“What am I suggesting? Simply this — that the deplorable choice of the Pavlova dance academy to assign a male role to Blair has left us with no choice but to commence the feminization of Blair’s body, and to accomplish it as quickly as possible so that she will never again face the abject humiliation of being asked to pose as a male in public. In short, Blair should start taking estrogen as soon as feasible. Am I not right? What say you, Laird? And you, Blair, and you too, Alicia. You also have a stake in this discussion.”

Laird grunted what may have been a yes, or maybe it was simply a grunt. Big Al, on the other hand, said it was a great idea; she was all for it; and she would help Blair adapt to her new body. “You can consider me,” Big Al said, “ecstatic over this decision.”

As for Blair -- with body arched in the chair, toes curled up, eyes looking towards heaven — “she” was simply ecstatic. When Blair’s spirit finally returned to the mundane world of McDonald’s, “she” cooed: “Whatever Alicia wants is cool by me.” Big Al rewarded Blair with a big wet kiss on the lips.

Kirk was pouting: “You didn’t ask me what I thought of your giving Blair a girl’s body as fast as possible.”

“Kirk, I don’t think you have the right of veto. Everyone else, including Blair, is eager for her to develop such a womanly body that she will never again be a credible male, whether it’s in dance, at school or at her white-dress wedding. So I do hope, Kirk, you’re not going to be negative. Blair doesn’t need negativity on the day of her first outing as a dancer.”

“Me, negative? Never. Not bloody likely. As far as I am concerned, I’d like Blair to grow boobs next week and get her dick cut off the week after. Why wait?” Kirk looked around: Everyone was nodding, although Blair may simply have been giving Alicia permission to move her hand, palm up, underneath his slightly raised rump.

Kirk continued: Well, I’ve sot the solution to Blair’s problems. Remember, Maggie, when you asked me to look up herbal hormones on the Internet? Well, not only did I look them up, but I also bought enough of ‘em to make Blair look like Miley Cyrus.”

At this point, Kirk emptied the pockets of his jeans, his shirt and his hoodie, producing one bottle of pills (or capsules) after another, until seven bottles of herbal hormones occupied the center of their table.

Maggie picked each of them up to read their labels: one bottle of saw palmetto, two bottles of Evanesce-ES, two bottles of Feminol, one bottle of AndroEase and one of CalmCompanion.

With some mispronunciation and misinformation, Kirk explained that this was the first month’s supply of “syngized” herbal extracts that would pump Blair’s breasts and thighs full of natural, fi-toe-stral estrogons, while blocking sperm-making in his testosterones.

Kirk added: “Blair needs to take 6 caps of Effervesce per day, four of FemAll, and two each of the willy shrinkers. I’ve even bought a cream for Blair to rub on her breasts to help them grow. Maggie, just make sure that Blair takes lots of ho-mones three times a day and she’ll need a real brassiere in a month or two, instead of a kiddy training bra.”

“Kirk, I never …. I am very impressed that you showed so much initiative. But how on ever did you know that we’d be talking about breast augmentation today?” Maggie asked.

“When Blair, bubbling and gushing like a tween girl, told me that he was set to play Duke Albrecht, a guy, in the dance show, I figured you would be revising your timetable for Blair as soon as you saw her in a dude’s clothes, even in the sissy clothes worn by male ballet dancers. So I came armed with the solution to Blair’s problem, to your problems, and to mine.”

“That was extraordinarily thoughtful — and perceptive — of you, Kirk. But where did you find the money for the pills? They must be expensive,” Maggie asked.

Kirk looked down at his sneakers as he said, “Well, I had to buy the pills on-line using a credit card.” He lowered his voice to add, “So I sort of used dad’s.”

“What the f….” Laird started to say, but Maggie cut him off sharply: “Laird, how can we be angry with Kirk for using your card? What choice did he have? There is no way the Feminol company would have accepted cash or sent feminizing hormones to a minor. The boy had to pretend to be you, an adult. No harm was done, and much good can now be done.”

“No harm done? But what if the Feminol company puts my name on a marketing list? The postman will tell everyone that I’m a tranny if flyers advertising fake breasts and vaginas, padded panties, size 18 dresses and extra-large, high-heeled shoes start filling up our mailbox, and all of them addressed to Laird Finlayson, female impersonator. We’ll be run out of the neighborhood! I’ll lose my job at the insurance company.”

“Their website promised that they wouldn’t share your address with anyone,” Kirk replied. “If they lied, the worse that will happen is your online mailbox may get some ads for 5x-sized lingerie, but that’s no worse than the Viagra and penis enlargement ads I bet you already get — not that I’m saying that you need anything like that.”

“We’ll see what happens, young man. We’ll also see about a suitable punishment for using my credit card without permission,” Laird said.

Maggie whispered in Kirk’s ear. “Don’t worry, Kirk. I’m proud of you, and I’ll make good any cuts your dad makes in your allowance. There is no way I’ll let you be punished for helping to feminize your sister. That would be insane.”

Kirk pushed two printouts towards Maggie. After reading them, she knew exactly the dose she wanted Blair to take, starting right there and then in McDonald’s: four of the phytoestrogens, two of the anti-androgens and, for good luck, two saw palmettos. However, the instructions warned against taking the capsules on an empty stomach, so she suggested that Laird take their orders. Everyone but Maggie wanted a burger and fries, but she admonished Blair for ordering a Big Mac combo: “Sweetie, if you’re going to be a ballet dancer, then you’ll have to order a salad just like your mommy. Dancers can’t afford to gain weight; it makes the girls difficult for a boy to lift and the jumps difficult for a boy to attempt. There are no lard-asses in dance.”

“Then I don’t want to be a dancer. I want a burger!” Blair said, stamping his foot on the floor for emphasis.

“Blair, let there be no doubt about this. If your father buys a Big Mac for you, then I will have no choice but to withdraw you from Dame Pavlova. Your promising dance career will be over. Is that understood? So what will it be — a salad or a burger?”

“A double cheeseburger combo. I suck at dancing anyway. I’m much better at soccer. I’ll help dad bring back the food,” and Blair sped off to the order counter, arriving there first.

Maggie smiled. For a mess of potatoes, cereal and beef, Blair had readily sold her birthright to become a dancer. That was fine with Maggie, as she had no intention of letting her daughter anywhere near another ballet company until she had the body and balance of a bosomy teenaged girl. So Blair would be allowed on this day to eat a big cheesburger; after all, her dancing had burned off hundreds of calories.

Of course, it would be salads for Blair at lunch from tomorrow onward because Kirk’s printouts advised that a feminizing “girl” had to avoid carbohydrates. Maggie also realized that It would be easier to constrain Blair’s waist development with extra-firm shapewear (with the end goal of an hourglass figure) if the girl were put on a diet that gave her just enough calories for feminization, but not enough to lengthen bones or strengthen muscles. Maggie could see no advantage to Blair in growing much taller; short girls had their pick of males.

As Blair and Laird did the ordering for the table, Maggie swore Big Al and Kirk to do everything they could to persuade Blair to take her hormone capsules “three times a day without fail.” Big Al said, “Blair will do anythin’ to keep the good feelings coming. I’ve been teachin’ her to love the female body — mine and hers. There is no way that she’s going to cheat me out of seeing her curves and breasts grow larger and her male clitoris, smaller, as all should.”

“Too much information,” protested Kirk, who didn’t like being reminded that his buddy Big Al was sexing it up with Blair. Kirk also seemed reticent to talk about the bottles of hormones. None of the bottles, Maggie pointed out, was sealed, which was highly unusual, she thought, in the post-Tylenol-tampering era. And after a quick count of the capsules in one of the bottles of Feminol, Maggie concluded that none of the bottles contained its advertised number of capsules. “What gives?” she asked.

Big Al answered for Kirk: “I was with Kirk — at the computer — when he ordered the hormones. They’re expensive, just like you said, and so Kirk asked in each case for less than a full month’s supply. That’s why there appear to be some pills missing. Ain’t that the truth, Kirk?”

“Yeh, that’s true. I wanted you, Maggie, to see how many bottles Blair would have to take each month. So I asked for fewer capsules in each bottle. It made sense to me.”

“Well, if it made sense to you, I guess it should make sense to all of us. But, Kirk dear, I will need you to go on-line with me tomorrow to ensure that we have an adequate supply for the remainder of the year. Blair will have to take pills like these for the rest of her life, but it’s a small price to pay for my happiness — and hers, of course.”

As Blair and Laird returned with four burger combos and a bacon ranch and chicken salad, Maggie could see that Kirk and Alicia were whispering conspiratorially. At her age, Maggie didn’t have hearing sharp enough to catch more than a couple of words, one of which was “Blair”. She did hope that Kirk and Alicia were going to cooperate as promised; but one never knew with kids.

Maggie already had given six capsules and two pills to Blair, who having secured one last assurance that their effect was temporary and reversible, raised them to his lips. He was about to pop them into his mouth, then to be washed down with an orange soda, when all hell broke loose in McDonald’s. Blair, startled by the clamor, accidentally dropped the capsules and pills down into two small, open containers of ketchup.

The commotion had started on the far side of McDonald’s, though within direct eyeshot of the Finlayson table as they discovered after the row became sufficiently noisy and intense to break through the mesmerizing discussion of Blair’s gender transformation. Some tables were already emptying, their occupants heading for the exits; others were reaching in their handbag or baby carriage for a concealed weapon, some of which even had a legal permit. (Mrs. Edna Podboski’s zip gun and Reverend Jim Brown’s sawed-off shotgun, however, were definitely illegal, shame on them.)

Although both disputants were to blame, Miss Lucretia Umbridge should have known better than to ask Mr. Felix La Rond, her reluctant companion at the dance concert, to join her for coffee at a fast-food restaurant “in order to get to know each other better.” She should have appreciated that La Rond, the consummate professional, would decline to discuss Blair’s sanity publicly in a fast-food joint. Such conversations were, he believed, reserved for higher class establishments like Red Lobster or Olive Garden.

Miss Umbridge’s essential point, ever more loudly expressed when the psychologist seemed too dense to comprehend it, was that Blair had shown, by dressing up as a female in order to dress up as a male who then dressed up as another male, that he was a schizophrenic, bipolar, multiple-personality, narcissistic, paranoid psychotic — possibly even a bed wetter — who needed immediate psychiatric help, preferably in a secure, institutional setting in a far-off State.

La Rond, busily eating his second “double quarter pounder with cheese,” wiped his mouth with a stained shirt sleeve, then grunted something.

“How can you possibly disagree?’ Miss Umbridge said, her voice rising to a fever pitch. “Look at the facts — first, the boy upsets an entire school by insisting that he’s a girl. Then, after everyone has bent over backward to accommodate this first delusion, he changes back into a boy in front of the entire community, to the shame and horror of his own family — you saw the mother rush out of the theater. Did you see her face? It was purple, I tell you, a violent shade of violet. Come on, admit it, Felix! That kid changes gender the way that other people — though not everyone [she looked at the psychologist with disgust] — change their underclothes. That’s abnormal. Even you can, Felix, can surely see it.”

La Rond started to respond, but decided he’d rather tackle a double side of fries. His silence stirred something primeval in Lucretia Umbridge. She started shouting, “It’s your fault, you fat pig, that the kid’s gone psycho. It’s your damn fault; it’s entirely your fault.”

She then deliberately swept his ketchup-drenched fries onto the floor, as well as onto the arm, lap and walker of Maude Benedict, an elderly lady so hard of hearing that she hadn’t noticed the disturbance. The shock of seeing her arm mysteriously “bleeding” (with ketchup) caused Maude to scream, “This is the Devil’s work! The Devil is right here in McDonald’s!” Maude rose to her feet, reached for her walker (apparently to make a quick escape), but, misjudging the distance, she missed it entirely, ending up on her hands and knees, desperately crawling for the nearest exit.

Either out of god-fearing chivalry or gut-shriveling thirst, La Rond rose ponderously to his feet, his table shaking violently as he used it to lever his mass upward. It wasn’t clear whether he intended to help Maude Benedict to get up from the floor or merely to return to the cash registers to replace his large fries. It also wasn’t clear whether he deliberately spilled his large Hi-C Orange Lavaburst and Miss Umbridge’s small Diet Coke on the teacher’s lap. Both drinks had probably been launched into motion by La Rond’s pressure on the table, but Miss Umbridge, convinced that the psychologist had deliberately wetted her, threw what remained of his drink, mostly ice, in his face. Umbridge screamed, La Rond howled and Maude Benedict yelled, as the orange drink dripped off the table into her eyes, “Fire! Fire! I can see the fires and hear the hounds of Hell!”

Someone reacted by pulling the fire alarm, which was the signal for everyone, including Big Al and the Finlaysons, to run for their lives — out of the overheated McDonald’s, past the garbage bins and spilled trays into the puddles of the rain-chilled parking lot. Last out were Maude Benedict, who required help from two of the teenaged counter staff; Felix La Rond, whose mass took extra time to gain momentum; and Miss Umbridge, her arm tightly gripped by the McDonald’s manager, who, watching and listening from afar, had decided that she was the culprit to hand over to the police.

Big Al, Maggie and the three Finlaysons watched awestruck, as the responders to the two emergencies — the fire alarm and the report of a “crazy lady” endangering the patrons of McDonald’s — decided whether the source of both alarums should be taken away in handcuffs in a police car or in a straitjacket in an ambulance. By this point, there was little doubt as to the identity of the “crazy lady” because Maude, fallen asleep from exhaustion, looked considerably saner than Miss Umbridge, who was loudly and profanely trying to extricate herself from the Manager’s grip in order to force “the fat turd over there” to do something about the “the little shit of a boy who thinks he’s a girl who thinks he’s a boy who thinks he’s another boy, who probably thinks he’s Jesus Christ.”

That last bit sounded pretty loony and fire chief and four police officers agreed with the EMT paramedics that Miss Umbridge should go as quietly as possible to a public hospital for psychiatric assessment. Instead, she went as noisily as possible, so noisily that it took three days of pleading from Felix La Rond, Master of Psychology, and Nea von Aft, Principal of Lewis A. Clark Charter School, to “spring” her from the cuckoo’s nest.

By the time of her release, Miss Lucretia Umbridge was mad enough to sacrifice her career if that is what it would take to rid the public schools of Oregon of a shape-shifting demon named Blair Finlayson.

When they finally returned to their table and a complimentary beverage (or fries) care of McDonald’s, the Finlaysons, now drenching wet, excitedly discussed the fate of Blair’s homeroom teacher. Naturally they hoped that they had seen the last of her. Blair spoke the most kindly when “she” expressed the hope that maybe Miss Umbridge might be able to continue her teaching while living at the asylum. Maggie, in contrast, thought that the best fate for the “hateful” teacher was to be treated as badly as anyone of her students for the rest of her “unnatural life”.

While thus engaged, they were surprised to see the corpulent figure of Felix La Rond, Master of Psychology, looming over them, a chocolate triple shake in one hand, baked apple pie in the other, blocking their view of the restaurant. He spoke first, pausing after every third or fourth word to guzzle his shake or to chomp on his pie: “Might I intrude … Ms. Maguire? What … I have to say … will … only take a … moment. But first … am I correct … to assume that this … handsome gentleman is … your husband Laird … and that one of … these two stalwart lads … is Blair’s brother Kirk?”

Big Al used a few choice words to correct the misapprehension.

“A thousand pardons … my dear girl. Of course, Kirk … looks more the man … than you. And last … but far from least … is Blair, who was … stunning, simply stunning … in her dance debut. However, do tell me … child, why you were … cast in a male role. I would have … assumed a priori … that you, of … all girls, would have … insisted on a female role … if not that of … Giselle herself. Certainly, you are attractive … and feminine enough … for the lead female role.” La Rond terminated this encomium with a loud belch. He had finished his snacks. He wouldn’t tarry long at the table before hunting for more.

Blair beamed — almost as brightly as Maggie, who quickly explained that Blair hadn’t been given a choice of roles: “My daughter either had to pretend to be a boy or there wouldn’t have been a performance.”

“Ah, if only Blair’s teacher had known that the gender choice was not Blair’s to make, then she might not have become so agitated that she had to go to the hospital for … ah … consultations. I do hope the Finlayson family will be discrete about the … ah … disturbance here today. Ms. Umbridge was having a bad day — don’t we all? — and she shouldn’t have to pay with her career for a brief … ah … attack of nerves. She’ll soon be back in the harness, more eager than ever to help pull Blair along to the next grade level.”

Kirk and Blair duly promised to say not a word at school about the fire alarm, police, ambulance or straitjacket. Blair did, it should be noted, cross his fingers as he made the pledge.

“Ms. Maguire, may I take advantage of this chance meeting to suggest that Blair should start seeing me once a week at school. Possibly immediately after school on Wednesdays? It’s important that I build a case file, demonstrating Blair’s mental soundness and fitness for school work or otherwise Blair’s crossdressing during Giselle might be used by Miss Umbridge or others that Blair is so confused about her gender as to require special education elsewhere. By building the case for considering Blair as a true transsexual who has no doubt whatsoever about her own innate femininity, I believe I can make it impossible to expel Blair from Lewis A. Clark Charter School as long as Blair is circumspect about her attire.”

La Rond addressed Blair directly: “I am right, Blair, in believing that you have no second thoughts about spending the rest of your life as a female?”

La Rond patiently waited for an answer while Blair debated his options. Of course, he had second thoughts and would continue to have them until the estrogen coursing through his system (coupled with the suppression of testosterone) made his mind and emotional makeup more feminine. There wasn’t a lot of testosterone in the pre-pubescent boy, but it was sufficient to produce doubts. And yet, if he expressed those doubts, Blair realized that he might be playing into the hands of his great antagonist, Miss Umbridge.

Blair had to affirm he was a transsexual or possibly face the teacher’s wrath without any allies. Maybe even Maggie would turn on him, and Kirk would offer little protection against bullying if Blair went back on their implicit deal — namely, that Kirk would cover Blair’s back as long as Blair was making strides towards becoming a female student at another school.

As Blair mulled over his best answer, Maggie answered La Rond’s query on her daughter’s behalf: “Dr. La Rond, I assure you that Blair’s determination to become a female in body and soul has never wavered, and will never waver, for just today, not more than forty minutes ago, Blair asked for and greedily gobbled down several estrogen and testosterone-suppressant capsules. At this very moment she is turning into a genuine woman before our very eyes.”

“Thanks for that information. Congratulations, Blair, on making a tough choice, but I am confident that it’s the right choice for you. I shall record this information in your school file and also inform Principal von Aft that you have finally taken a definitive, indisputable step towards adopting a female persona along with your female clothes.”

After a brief pause, while he considered his words carefully, La Rond continued: “There is one other point I’d like to make about Blair. While her dance moves are refreshingly novel and infinitely entertaining, I do not feel that ballet is her true forte. Blair is not a natural athlete. She is, however, a remarkable talent as a thespian. She has a true gift for acting — never have I felt the shame and longing of Duke Albrecht more intensely than I did while watching Blair dance the last act. Professionals could not do as well. Blair should attend an acting school, either in addition to her dance lessons or, preferably, in their stead.”

Maggie then told the psychologist that Blair and the family had decided to find an alternative to the Dame Pavlova experience. Did Dr. La Rond possibly know of an acting school in the central city? As it turned out, he did — an acting school near SW 4th Avenue run by Wil Shakspear.

After her disappointment at not finding a genuine Russian in charge of Dame Pavlova, Maggie got a bit rude about the school’s name: “The Will Shakespeare acting school! Is Will another phony hiding, like Mr. Zero Cents, behind the name of a great artist! What’s Shakspeare’s real name? How about Archie Leach or Norma Jean Baker?”

La Rond got a bit huffy, which was a bit scary since he looked big enough to blow a house down. “My dear lady, I assure you that Wil Shakspear is the real name of the school’s founder and head teacher. Wil is a contraction of her real name, an understandable contraction when you consider that it’s short for Willamette, as in the river and valley. As for Shakspear, that’s an English translation of her American Indian name. She is, you should know, a member of the Lower Umpqua tribe. So I would not, if I were you, make fun of her name. She literally knows how to shake a spear when’s she angry.”

After the requisite apologies, he gave Maggie and Laird the information, including the proper spelling, which they’d need to inquire about enrolling Blair in acting lessons at the Wil Shakspear School of Acting.

La Rond had, it turned out, one last thing to say — this time about Kirk: “Ms. Maguire and Mr. Finlayson,” he whispered when he saw that the boy had become distracted, lost in his own world; “I am mildly surprised that Kirk has not come to see me of his own volition. I am even more surprised that none of the teachers has sent him to me after one of his countless brawls in and about the school. From what I have heard, Kirk is a seriously disturbed youth.”

Laird bridled, then challenged: “What? Are you saying that Kirk needs psychological counseling because he behaves like a normal boy, unafraid of taking on his peers in a bit of rough and tumble?”

La Rond rebutted:

Normal? I think not, not unless you consider a volcano about to blow to be the normal state of the Los Angeles basin or an American ski resort. Can you not see how tense your son is? Look at the paper cups from your first round of drinks. Kirk has twisted every one of them into knots. His leg shakes so violently that it’s a wonder that it hasn’t knocked the food off your table. Look at Kirk’s hands. They’re clenched, don’t you see? It’s rare that they’re not. Mr. Finlayson, your son Kirk is seething with emotions that he desperately needs to discuss with someone who is, frankly, not a member of his family. There is so much anger in the boy; we must find a way to understand its origins before he can safely vent it. I must insist for Kirk’s sake, for Blair’s sake as well, that Kirk also see me once a week to discuss his hopes, fears and anxieties. Don’t deny me this request, for I do sincerely believe that Kirk has much more than the average teen to get off his chest.

La Rond then put his big paw of a hand on Kirk’s shoulder to get his attention: “How about it, Kirk? Will you come by my office at lunch hour on Wednesdays and Thursdays? We’ll share sandwiches and desserts as you tell me about your hopes and dreams. In me, you’ve got someone who will really listen — for a change. Naturally, we’ll discuss your feelings toward Blair. Her transition is bound to be unsettling for you.”

The last allusion to Blair alerted Maggie and Laird to their simplistic assumptions about Kirk’s ability to cope with having a transsexual for a brother. Possibly, Blair’s flagrant lack of masculinity was undermining Laird’s sense of his own. Yes, the rotund La Rond was right: Kirk needed to see a shrink, and the zero cost of his sessions with the school psychologist struck them as eminently reasonable.

Surprisingly, Kirk didn’t put up much of a fuss about sharing his lunch hours with “the school shrink”. Instead, he said that there was much he could tell La Rond, but for the sake of the family he probably wouldn’t. While Maggie didn’t appreciate the hint of menace, she hadn’t the foggiest idea of what Kirk was alluding to. That being the case, she wasn’t about to let Kirk worm his way out of his sessions “on the couch” for fear that he might “spill the beans about god knows what”.

After the psychologist had finally waddled off to order his third helping of dessert, Maggie finally remembered that Blair never had, as she had claimed to La Rond, actually taken the herbal hormones. Blair became quite flustered as he looked for them, but finally found one of them sticking out of his ketchup. Blair had no problem pouring the ketchup, capsules and all, down his throat. With that one dramatic flourish, Blair really did start his body down the path to womanhood, as the next three days of nausea made abundantly clear.

Told that the best treatment for his flu symptoms were more of the capsules, Blair faithfully followed Doctor Maggie’s orders for the first four days, at the end of which his nipples were tingling with signals to darken and grow. Blair, who had never experienced puberty as a male, was about to enter it as a female. The constant tingling drew Blair’s fingers frequently to his nipples after he had smeared them with estrogen cream in an attempt to soothe the irritation.

But all that was in the future. While still at McDonald’s, Maggie reacted to Blair’s meal of hormones and ketchup with gushing praise: “You’re the best daughter any parent could ever wish for. Isn’t that so, Laird?”

Laird shrugged. Maggie was insistent: “Please say it, Laird. Blair needs to hear you say it.”

“Blair, you’re the best daughter a father could have.” Laird looked for approval from Maggie, and won it, even though Maggie wondered at his choice of word to emphasize.

“And definitely the best girlfriend a girl could have,” Big Al piped in.

With Maggie urgently prompting, Kirk added, “Yeah and you make an okay sister.”

They had a group hug. Kirk and Laird were clearly uncomfortable. Blair took pride of place. This was clearly “her” moment to star. Big Al, who had the best view of the world outside McDonald’s, suddenly became so excited that she released her grip on Blair to rush to a nearby window through which the sunlight was now streaming. The rain had finally let up. Big Al, considering it a favorable omen, went closer to the window to peer out.

Big Al announced: “Look everyone, it’s finally stopped raining. Wow, I think I see a rainbow.”

“It’s one of McDonald’s Golden Arches, you doofus,” shouted Kirk. But no, it was the real thing, as the family quickly discovered as they stood, awestruck at the window, to view the entire arc of a rainbow stretching, Maggie hoped, from Blair’s soccer pitch to their home in Bybee Lake. The extended family stood together silently, hand in hand, Laird glumly, Blair all smiles, and Maggie and Big Al with tears of joy in their eyes.

All of them wondered at the emotions convulsing Kirk’s body. He was shaking so violently that their hands transmitted his sobs from one person to the next so that even Maggie, at the other end of the human chain, felt one tremor after another pass through Blair’s hand to hers.