Chapter Three – How Sweet It Is

His reverie of an idyllic life as a pretty young woman excited him that night, making it impossible for him to easily fall asleep; his digital clock marked 1:40 a.m., bringing doubt that he’d ever find sleep that night. His mind flitted from seeing Miranda Jean in a strapless prom gown to imagining the dainty girl in a bikini. His penis grew hard as he tossed and turned at the picture of Miranda Jean (himself) enticing young men with her beauty.

He awoke with a start with the song coming from his alarm clock radio, turning and looking to see it read 6:30 a.m., time to get up. He fumbled his way out of bed and wandered over to the tiny sink in his room.

Marcus cleared his eyes of the crust from his short sleep and peered into the ancient mirror, still seeing the lovely Miranda Jean, a reflection that was marred by splotches of missing silver reflected material in the ancient mirror. He smiled, even flicking his hair in an effeminate manner. The pretty young man giggled; how vain he was!

Suddenly the realization came: he needed to dress that morning as a young man named Marcus Whiting and go to work, ready to serve the foster children entrusted to him for their safety and well-being. He must banish thoughts of Miranda Jean from his mind; yet, he knew she’d be with him for a long time, perhaps forever. He would dress in his most masculine manner for his job that day, he decided; somehow, he knew, he had to erase all signs of femininity from his workplace demeanor. He knew it might not be that easy.

Amy winked at him as he entered the office and passed her on his way to the cubicle; he sat down at his office chair and turned on the computer; as he was waiting for the screen to come alive Mollie and Latesha stopped by. “Hope you liked the new you?” Mollie said.

Marcus scowled at them, not wishing to draw attention to himself; he was still a bit embarrassed by his journey into womanhood the previous day. Even though he loved the idea, he wondered whether Mollie and Latesha, despite their encouragement at his feminizing episode, might think he was weird and even a bit pathetic.

“Good morning,” he said stiffly to the two young women.

“You were quite lovely,” Latesha said, keeping her voice low in hopes of not being overheard.

“But today, I’m Marcus,” he said, maybe a bit too sharply.

“I think we’ll see Miranda Jean, again,” Mollie said, smiling warmly.

Marcus turned to his computer. Yes, his friends were right: Miranda Jean would reappear.

*****
The phone on his desk rang. It was Amy informing him that the Springdale Police Department’s juvenile division was on the line and needed to talk to the caseworker for Jefferson Turner.

“That’s you, Marcus,” she said.

“Me?” he asked, puzzled by the name that seemed familiar.

“Yes, you have the cases assigned to the Harrison family, Hazel and Franklin Harrison,” she said.

Marcus recognized the name; he had yet to make the first visit to the Harrison home, having been only recently given the case file. He hurriedly found the Harrison file, paging through its papers to see the family had three teens as foster children, Melody, aged 16, Larry, aged 11 and Jefferson, 14.

A police sergeant, named Simbach, said officers had picked up young Jefferson sitting on the railroad tracks, apparently looking to be run down and crushed by an Amtrak train, thus ending “his misery,” as police quoted the boy.

“He’s raised some serious concerns about the foster family, the Harrisons,” Sergeant Simbach said. “You better get down here to talk to him. He’s a troubled kid.”

Marcus informed Amy, who was his lead worker, that he was off to central police headquarters, a three-block walk.

Simbach was a tall, middle aged man with broad shoulders and an obviously muscular body beginning to grow soft; he greeted Marcus amiably in his office. A severe-looking thirtyish woman in a pants suit introduced herself as Officer Heddy Jelacic, apparently one of the youth workers in the division.

“You’re new at Opportunities, eh?” the woman said in a tone that sounded a bit accusatory.

“Well, I’ve been there several months,” Marcus admitted. “I’ve never met the boy.”

“Isn’t that just great,” she said sarcastically. “How do they expect a kid like you to handle cases like this?”

“Now Heddy, give Mr. Whiting a chance to do his stuff,” Simbach interjected firmly. “I know he’s got help back at his office if he needs it. Now let’s get our thoughts together on this boy before we interview him, OK?”

Marcus was pleased that Simbach stepped in; he felt inadequate to begin with, realizing how inexperienced he was. He constantly wondered whether he had the ability to work with troubled kids and families; yet, he knew he wanted a career is serving youth and knew he had to learn quickly. Mainly, he feared making a mistake that might permanently harm a young person.

Jefferson Turner had been removed from his family when he was ten, mainly due to a father that had subjected him to a constant barrage of ridicule and minor beatings. The father had been arrested for some of the incidents, but there was never enough evidence to prove the abuse to convict him. When Jefferson was seven years old, his mother died at the age of thirty-four of cervical cancer. It took three years for the children services system to finally discover the how seriously the boy had been beaten and he was placed in foster care. In the following four years, the boy had been in three different homes, the latest being the Harrisons. He had been switched from each foster home because of his “inability to get along” with other children in the homes.

“He’s a terribly troubled kid, Mr. Whiting,” Simbach told Marcus. “And he has his own complaints against his current family that I presume you’ll need to discuss with them.”

Marcus was pleased to see the interview room in the juvenile division was hardly the austere, plain room as was shown on television cop shows. Instead, it was brightly painted and there were pictures of prominent musicians on the walls. The furniture consisted of a violet-colored love seat and matching side chair and a round table with four chairs.

Officer Jelacic brought Jefferson into the room and Marcus was surprised to see the boy was a slender African-American boy with delicate features, hardly one you would associate as being “troubled.” It looked like he could be easily subdued and would be the loser in any physical fight.

“Sit down and give Mr. Whiting here your attention. He’s your foster family’s careworker,” Simbach said in a gentler tone, compared to that of Officer Jelacic.

“I don’t know him,” the boy said, pouting. “Where’s Miss D?”

“Miss Dacosta has turned the case to me,” Marcus said.

“I liked her, and now she’s gone, just like everyone else,” Jefferson said. He looked as if he was going to cry.

“No, she’s at the agency still, and I’ll be talking to her on this case, so she’s not gone, Jefferson,” Marcus said, hoping to provide the boy with assurance that he was not being deserted. He knew he would have to prove himself to the boy, as he realized he would have to do with everyone. Marcus knew he would seem, in the view of many, to be too young and inexperienced. Also, they’d wonder why a young man was handling the case, not a woman as they were used to.

In questioning the boy, it was obvious that Jefferson must have felt he was alone in the world and that no one wanted him or accepted as he was. The boy’s fine features, in so many ways dainty and feminine, were obvious; even his mannerisms had a girlishness that was unmistakable.

“What were you doing, sitting on the train tracks, Jefferson?” the female officer questioned sharply.

“I dunno,” the boy mumbled, his voice hardly audible.

“Did you want to off yourself?” Officer Jelacic said quickly.

“I dunno.”

The questioning continued in this way for several more minutes, with Officer Jelacic’s inquiries becoming more insistent and intense; the boy’s replies were always said in hard-to-hear mumbles or even grunts. Marcus could see the boy was near to tears and seemed about to break out in full-blown sobs. He wanted to intervene: was this any way to treat such an obviously troubled child?

Sergeant Simbach, who had been sitting silently at the other officer’s side, finally interrupted the questioning.

“Would you like something to drink, a soda or something, Jefferson,” the officer asked, his tone kindly, gentle.

“Do you have fruit juice, like cranberry?” the boy asked, looking directly at the sergeant, the first time during the interview that the boy had raised his head.

“Jefferson, I’m sorry but we don’t have cranberry, but I think we have OJ in the vending machine,” he said.

“I like orange, sir,” the boy said softly.

Turning to Officer Jelacic, Simbach said, “Would you get a can of OJ for the lad.”

“Yes, sergeant,” Jelacic said, her voice resentful, knowing she was assigned to the chore merely to get her out of the room.

The sergeant reached into his back pocket, pulled out his well-worn wallet and removed a dollar bill, giving it to the Officer. “I think that’ll be enough, Heddy.”

She took the bill and turned abruptly, leaving the room, giving the door just a bit of an extra push to show her anger at being treated like an errand girl.

“Do you have to pay for my orange juice out of your own money, sir?” the boy said, apparently impressed by the consideration he was shown by the sergeant.

“It’s OK, Jefferson, we just want you to feel comfortable,” he said smiling.

Heddy returned with a small can of orange juice and handed it to the boy with a curt, “Here.”

“Thanks, Officer,” the Sgt, Simbach said. “Now, I’d like you to check with CPS on the Higgins girl. I’ll finish up here.”

Officer Jelacic glared at him. “Yes, sir.” She charged out of the room, clearly upset with being dismissed from the case.

“I’m sorry about that Jefferson,” Sergeant Simbach said. “Officer Jelacic can sometime be a little hard, but she cares and she’s a good officer.”

“I don’t like her,” the boy said.

“That’s OK, son. Just relax a minute and then we’ll see what else you’d like to tell us.”

Marcus was aware this was the “good cop, bad cop” routine being played out. As kindly and friendly as the sergeant was being, Marcus still felt this was hardly the routine that should be used with children, particularly ones as psychologically damaged as Jefferson appeared to be.

Yet, the gambit seemed to be working on the boy. He eventually opened up to the sergeant and to Marcus who interjected a few questions of his own. His role was to find out why Jefferson fled from the Harrison home and whether the Harrisons were abusing him or if there were other problems in the house. He needed to know if there was a need to find another foster home for the boy, a task his office hated doing due to the stress it causes both the child and the foster family as well as the difficulty in finding another foster home that would accept a “troubled teen.”

“I was afraid of Melody,” he finally confessed.

“What did she do to you, Jefferson?” Marcus moved in, asking this question.

“Nothin’.”

“Nothing? It must be something,” Marcus pressed, his words soft and gentle.

“Well, she hurt me,” he said.

“Why? Did you do something to her?”

“No. I don’t wanna talk about it,” he said.

Sergeant Simbach stood. He looked at the boy and then at Marcus. “I’ve got a few calls to make. I’ll let you and Marcus chat for a while, OK?”

The sergeant left the room, leaving Marcus and Jefferson alone in the room. Marcus was confused; he didn’t expect the police would leave him without another officer present, though it was likely the large mirror on one wall was actually one–way glass window, permitting both Sergeant Simbach and Officer Jelacic to observe the entire goings-on.

Marcus suggested the two move to the love seat to continue their talk; he felt the boy might more likely open up in a more casual setting.

“Nobody likes me, wants to be my friend,” Jefferson eventually said.

“I can understand that feeling, Jefferson. I used to feel that way, too,” Marcus said, nodding his head.

“You did? Really?” the boy said, looking directly at Marcus.

“Yes. Maybe just like you feel now,” Marcus continued.

“You? But you have a nice job and everything.”

Marcus smiled. “Look, you and I may be a bit alike,” he said, suddenly realizing how ridiculous that statement was, comparing his life as a white teenager with a loving mother and living in a relatively comfortable, though Spartan, household, with that of an African-American boy living in obvious poverty and in a dysfunctional family.

“How could we be alike?” Jefferson asked, obviously seeing the same lack of connection.

“Well, not totally alike, Jefferson, but at least in one way we are. You are slender and a bit small for your age, right?”

“I guess,” the boy said, clearly unhappy with acknowledging his lack of height and muscle.

“You can probably see. I’m just like you that way. In school, always the smallest boy and I hated sports and stuff like that,” Marcus said. “Many of the girls were bigger than me and probably stronger.”

He felt embarrassed confessing to his own school-age physical shortcomings, but he was confident that Jefferson might have the same feelings. By acknowledging his own frailty and childhood concerns, Marcus felt the boy might open up to express his feelings. Marcus continued to discuss his own teenage years; he even admitted to how few friends he had, his own ineptness in sports and that he most enjoyed being with two girls who were his only steady playmates.

“Me too,” Jefferson said. “In my previous foster home, my best friend was Maria; she was a year younger. I liked her, and I thought Melody would be my friend at the Harrison’s, but she just laughed at me and shooed me away as a nuisance.”

“Is that why she hurt you? Because you tried to be her friend?”

“Not exactly. I just wanted to feel how . . . ah . . . you know.”

“No, what?”

“How it felt to dress like her, with a skirt and all. You know.”

Marcus sat silently, looking at the boy, hoping he’d continue on his own.

Eventually, Jefferson said. “Well she caught me when I borrowed a dress and put it on. I just wanted to see how it felt and how I looked.”

“Oh.”

“I looked pretty,” the boy said, the first time a smile appeared, even though it was a faint smile.

“And then she hurt you for wearing her dress, right?”

Jefferson nodded.

“After I took the dress off, she took my arm and bent it so hard I screamed and began to cry. Larry, you know my younger foster brother, heard and he came in and laughed. Even though he’s younger, he’s bigger than me. I’m scared of them. Now they keep calling me Jenny.”

“Did you ever wish you should have been a girl, Jefferson?” Marcus said, gambling that the bluntness of the question might shock Jefferson into an honest answer.

Instead, the door burst open and Sergeant Simbach entered. “I’ll take over now,” he said, again using a soft, gentle tone but his intentions were clear; Marcus may have gone too far. Nonetheless, he felt he came to understand the boy’s problems.

*****
Since the boy was an obvious suicide threat, Officer Jelacic and another officer transported Jefferson to Hampton Clinic, a behavior health clinic. Marcus had heard about the clinic; it had a fairly good record on handling juveniles though the clinic’s religious sponsorship bothered Marcus. He wasn’t certain how Jefferson would fare if the clinic assumed the boy was gay or perhaps even transgender.

“I hope Officer Jelacic won’t be too harsh on Jefferson,” Marcus queried Sergeant Simbach. “She didn’t seem to take too kindly to the boy’s ways.”

“She’ll be OK with him. I sent along the other officer just to assure the transport would be smooth enough,” the sergeant said.

“I wonder if Jefferson might not be transgender,” Marcus queried.

“Hard to tell. We seem to be having more and more young boys in that situation, but it’s hard to tell. Besides it’s not our job. Our only job is to see they’re safe and I can assure you Hampton is OK with these kids.”

“I hope so,” Marcus added.

“Let’s hope for the best, eh? You were good in there, Marcus,” the sergeant said. “Sounds like you identified with the boy yourself.”

“I did.”

Meeting Jefferson, Marcus realized, helped to tell him something about himself.

*****
Technically, Amy Dacosta was not a supervisor with the ability to make management decisions, such as hiring or firing a worker; she carried the title of Caseworker III in which she oversaw the seven other workers in the section, reviewing their cases, assigning cases and generally leading the section. She reported directly to Miriam Lambert, the program manager.

As the most senior worker in the section, the others naturally looked to her for direction, suggestions and even criticisms. Most workers accepted her happily in this role, partly because of Amy’s own even-handed disposition and because of her experience and usual good judgment.

“I think Jefferson may be transgender,” Marcus said as he wound up summarizing the case.

“Why would you think that?” she queried.

“Just a few things he began to tell me, like he was beat up by his older foster sister for wearing one of her dresses. And the way he acts. I think that’s what his problem is. He gets teased as being either gay or a sissy or something and then feels unliked, unwanted and then acts out in some way. He’s a very sad and unhappy boy.”

Marcus noticed Amy looking at him as he summed up the case and he wondered what she was noticing about him. As he talked, he realized how much he was using his hands; he sat upright in the chair next to Amy’s desk, not slouching as most young men do. He tried then to restrain his almost natural inclination to talk with animation, holding his hands together in his lap, his legs together and feet straight ahead.

“I guess you’ve maybe got the insight to judge whether the boy is trans, at least from what I saw on Sunday,” she said.

“And, I’ve also studied that a bit,” he said.

“At the ‘U’?”

“There was a mention of it in our Principles of Sexuality class, but I’ve read up on it a bit, too, and there’s lots on the internet,” Marcus said. “You can imagine that I might be curious about things like that.”

“OK, I appreciate your concern for the boy, but we’re not in the business of diagnosing a child’s psychological natures,” Amy said firmly. “We’re here to monitor his safety and well-being. Let the people at Hampton decide that.”

Marcus nodded as if he accepted Amy’s and Sergeant Simbach’s confidence that Hampton, as a religiously managed clinic, would even seriously consider looking into Jefferson’s possible transgender tendencies.

“Oh, Marcus, you up to having dinner tonight? With me?” Amy said as he was about to leave her desk.

“Sure,” he said. “I got nothing doing. And it’s a Friday night. Aren’t you busy with friends of something?”

“Not really. I have no one special in my life right now.”

Marcus paused a minute, wondering whether having dinner with his supervisor was wise. Realizing he was looking forward to a dull weekend alone, the idea of having dinner with someone who he had grown to like and enjoy being with was welcoming.

“What time? Where?”

“My place,” she said.

He looked at her, wondering what brought this on. Dinner with her, at her place? Strange.

Sensing his possible uneasiness with the offer, Amy said: “Look, don’t read anything into this, Marcus. I know you’re alone and I love to cook. It’s terrible to cook just for yourself. I make a pretty good lasagna, based on my mom’s recipe. You like lasagna?”

“Yes,” he said. “Sounds great. About 6:30 p.m.?”

“Sure anytime. We’ll eat about 7:30 then.”

“I’ll bring a bottle of wine.”

Marcus returned to his desk, quite perplexed over Amy’s offer. Certainly, the woman must have other girlfriends to invite. He doubted she had any romantic intent with him because of their age differences (he learned, however, that she was only seven years older, not the ten he had thought earlier), he was her subordinate in the office and his own realization that he was far from being the kind of “hunk” that most girls seemed go for.

*****
Amy welcomed him with a brief hug when he arrived at her apartment that was located on the eighth floor of a high rise overlooking the river that ran through the center of town. She had a balcony that faced the river and a wooded park on the other side. The apartment’s rooms were small, but Amy had tastefully furnished them with the plain chairs, tables and other accoutrements of Scandinavian design. In a way, it was a little out of fashion, given the current styles, but Marcus found it to be a clean and inviting apartment.

“This is very nice and such a pretty view!” he told his host.

“Yes, I love it,” she said. “I’ve only recently got this place. Finally, my earnings gave me the option to move out from under the slumlords of this town.”

“Slum lords like mine,” he said, laughing.

“That’s right, you’re in the Hilldale section. Houses there have to be more than one hundred years old.”

“Mine dates to the 1890s, would you believe? An old mansion with eight boarders, but it’s OK if you don’t mind the drafts in winter or the centipedes that seem to colonize in the place,” he said. “I do. I hate the creatures, even though I guess they’re harmless.”

The two moved to Amy’s small but functional kitchen where the woman was finishing up preparing the meal and about to fix the salad. She took two wine glasses from the cupboard and placed them down on the table.

“Mind if we have the wine in here, while I fix the salad,” she said, more of a statement than a question.

“Let me do the salad, Amy, and you can pour the wine and relax,” he volunteered. “I’m used to preparing meals and I love doing salads. Show me what you have for the ingredients.”

“Really? How did you get that skill?”

“I fixed dinner for mom and me almost every night when I was living at home. Did from about age 14 on and got pretty good at it. I kind of kept house, because mom was so busy at work.”

“Go at it then,” Amy said. She took the bottle of wine that Marcus gave her upon entering the apartment and uncorked it. She did it easily, even though she had to use a simple corkscrew, the type that Marcus always struggled with given his own lack of strength in his hands and arms.

“That’s a great red you picked out, Marcus. It’ll go great with the lasagna. Are you a wine expert already at your young age?”

“No,” he let out a high giggle. “I know nothing of wine and I’m not much of a drinker. To be honest I told the man at the store I wanted a wine that would go with lasagna and wasn’t too expensive. He picked it out.”

“It’s a good choice, but Marcus you really didn’t have to pay this much. This is pretty expensive as it is.”

“That’s OK. After all I’m getting a free meal with it.”

The two held up their glasses in a toast, with Amy asking, “To what shall we do this toast?”

Marcus considered for a moment and then offered, “To friendship.”

“Let it be long and happy,” Amy responded. They tapped their glasses, both smiling and looking at each other.

Marcus wondered where the evening was to be going; he still hadn’t figured out Amy’s real reason for inviting him over for a dinner to two in her apartment. The woman had set up a small table in her living room, complete with cloth table covering, a small vase of daisies and carnations and two long white candles. It was a scene for a romantic meal, not a table set for co-workers who were not likely to be lovers. Amy also had shown strong professionalism in her work and would hardly risk her own leadership on having an affair with a young co-worker (and one that she directly supervised); besides, Marcus hardly considered himself to be particularly desirable as a mate for a pretty woman like Amy.

“Wow, you did wonders with that salad, Marcus. I liked how you added a few different spices. I would never have thought about doing that,” Amy said, as she prepared to serve the lasagna.

The lasagna was truly excellent; Marcus found it had a lighter texture than many he had consumed, but the taste easily surpassed any he’d ever had.

“It’s an old family recipe, maybe back to my great grandma in Italy,” she said. “It’s not like the typical American lasagna. This more authentic, just like they did for years back in the old country.”

Marcus couldn’t remember when he’d had such an enjoyable evening. He found the conversation with Amy to be easy and laid-back; they both talked about their childhood. Amy was the only girl in a family that included six boys along with her stay-at-home mother and hard-working father who was an ironworker. “I was the middle kid and boy did I have to learn to fight to stay alive in that family,” she laughed.

She admitted to being a promising gymnast in her early teens, but then her body thickened, reflecting the sturdy nature of her family line, especially her father’s whose strength was legendary in their Philadelphia neighborhood. She gave up gymnastics in favor of basketball, where she played guard through her high school and college years.

“I was too damn short to amount to much in basketball, but they always seemed to have a spot for me on the teams. I was lucky.”

“No, you were probably damned good, Amy,” he said admiringly.

“Did you do any sports, Marcus?”

“Hardly,” he giggled. “Do I look like I’d be any good at anything?”

“Sure, I could see you in track or swimming or something like that.”

“Sorry, unless they would have let me join one of the girls’ teams,” he laughed, tough realizing he probably wasn’t good enough at any physical sport to compete with most of the girls.

Marcus could feel the wine taking effect as the conversation continued. He found his talk because less cautious and he felt good about it.

“A little time in the gym, Marcus, and I’d bet you’d be good,” she said.

“I don’t know. It seems today I’m getting more often identified as a girl. You know, you saw it when we’re at Luke’s. Seems I get hit on in there far too often, and the barmaid’s always treating me like one of the girls.”

Amy nodded, saying nothing, apparently hoping the young man would continue.

“And tonight, when I got the wine, the clerk who was a chatty-type, asked me if I was getting the wine for a dinner with my boyfriend. Maybe he thought I was gay or something. But maybe he thought I was a girl, do you think?”

“Sweetie, you have very delicate features and I dare say you have a truly pretty face,” Amy replied. “And your hair, while it’s not too long, is still fixed like a girl’s.”

“I like wearing it that way.”

“That’s OK, but it probably may lead people to get the wrong idea about you. Look at what you’re wearing tonight, those tight hip-hugging slacks and that teal-colored open neck shirt. A girl could easily wear them. Sometimes I begin seeing you only as a particularly lovely young lady and I hope you don’t mind me saying so.”

“No, I don’t mind,” he said. He enjoyed the idea of being thought of as a pretty woman.
(To Be Continued)
(Thanks to Eric for proofreading, other assistance)