Rascal's First Halloween
By
Rebecca Anna Coleman

-1-
Down the Transgender Fiction Rabbit Hole!

I fell down the transgender fiction rabbit hole late one summers evening between my junior and senior year in high school. I can still recall how it happened, it was simple enough, it was early in the evening and mom had been invited out to dine at a local restaurant by one of her co-workers. Leaving me alone, to fend for myself. Well not really fend for myself, she had slipped me three twenty dollars bills and told me to door-dash something.

She also causally reminded me that their was a whole pot of deer stew on the stove-top and she had recently restocked the fridge. With that she said she loved me, to turn the carport light and front porch light on as soon as full darkness fell and to lock the door. She also reminded me to put my phone on charge.

Once I was sure mom was gone, as I was sure I heard the backdoor shut and I heard the click, I returned once more to my brooding. Well okay, not brooding, you see, I had nothing to do that summer evening. Most of my friends were always on some overnight church camp-out. Somewhere in the vast, wasteland called the Mississippi Delta. I don't know about you, by spending the night in a paper thin tent, out in the middle of the woods, in the middle of a Mississippi heat wave did not seem like a pleasant time. Plus, the church hosting the overnight camp-out had taken a dim view to my recent conversion to the Pagan faith.

My conversion to the Pagan faith had come when I had one sunny afternoon accepted that there was something deeply wrong with me that no priest could rectify, that no amount of reading the Holy Bible could correct. And that if, or should I say when I died, that no matter how times I'd presented myself for Holy Communion. No matter how many gallons of blessed wine that had turned into the blood of Jesus I'd drunk.

No matter many pounds of the Communion Bread I'd eaten that were suppose to turn into the physical flesh of Jesus I'd consumed, no matter how times I've read the Holy Bible from front to back. The very moment my soul left my body and reached the pearly gates of Heaven. Old, gray beard himself would have taken the greatest pleasure in pushing me toward the everlasting fires of the underworld. Were I'm sure all my favorite writers lived.

You see, I've been writing since I was fourteen years old, so that means I've a three year veteran of the craft. And in those three years I'd wandered from one forum to the other. From one writing site to the other. From Fanfiction.Net to FictionPress.Net to the wilds of Deviantart. An odyssey that had tested both my mind, body, and soul. Because I'd learned that for ever one who achieves their dream of internet stardom their a thousand or more who burn out and die.

The highways and byways of the internet were littered with the skeletons of those who had failed to reach their dreams. Anyway, the way I fell down the transgender story rabbit hole was simple. I simply googled one night “Stories about boys being turned into girls.” You see I'd recently been writing a number of half finished “Legend Of Zelda” stories featuring the main character Link, often losing a bet with either against Zelda or Malon and as a result he had to wear a dress around Hyrule Castle Market or something.

Sometimes my other stories were less amusing. Sometimes they were quite dark, I'd written a handful stories were the main character was often blackmailed, or forced otherwise into assuming the role of a girl. But these characters often retained faint elements of their quickly diminishing masculinity.

And that was what I found so amusing, so appealing about it. I'd often written my characters appearing androgynous. Androgynous but still retaining some faint elements of their masculinity. Having my androgynous character slowly have their masculinity traits beaten or trained out of them and forcing them to adapt more feminine traits was the main draw for me.

Anyway, after a hearty bowl of deer stew, like I mean a hearty bowl, like palm size, seasoned to perfection pieces of deer floating in a sea of brown broth, surrounded by chunks of russet potatoes, carrots, and some other unknown root crop, served with a huge piece of three cheese blended Texas Toast and washed down with an ice cold barque's root beer. Okay several ice cold cans of barque's rootbeer.

Anyway, in a mindless state I started to google random things. And then by chance I stumbled upon a blog. It was called “Courtney Clean Caps.” and well I decided to spend the evening just reading the things posted. After all I had nothing to better to do with my time. I'd already read any fanfiction about Link getting turned into a girl I'd deemed worthy of my attention. And well by chance I stumbled upon a link to a another story website.

The site was called “BigCloset TopShelf” and it was a treasure trove of stories. These stories were not like the other stories I'd read on other such sites such as Fanfiction.Net or FictionPress.Net or heck even Deviantart No these stories had a magic about them. A spark of life to them.

For the hour I browsed the site, I noticed that their was one main difference in the characters I wrote or read about and the characters that appeared in these stories. These characters wanted to become girls. They desire to become woman. Nobody had to force them, nobody had to blackmail them, nobody had to twist their arm.

And those stories had a magic my stories did not have.

And that is how I fell down the Transgender Fiction rabbit hole. Much like Alice, in Alice In Wonderland. I'd allowed my own curiosity get the better of me. And so I'd chanced that little white rabbit all over cyber space. From one corner of the internet to the other until at last I'd chased him or was it a her down it's own hole and had ended up in a place that was a treasure trove of stories.

Stories that I would spend the next several weeks reading, though in that time I committed the most grievous of sings any writer to commit against another writer. I read those stories without leaving a comment.

End Chapter One