“That girl I saw earlier was you?” Tim demanded, looking aghast.

Idol

Idol - 1989- Age 20

"Women!" he exclaimed. "You can't keep a secret! None of you!"

"Well, to be fair," I interjected, "I wasn't a woman at the time."

He gaped at me, incredulous. "Seriously? Seriously now? That's your excuse?
That's supposed to somehow make it better?"
 

I would cross that bridge when I came to it, I decided. In heels.

“Dorothy was a child, and she missed her home. Her Aunty Em. I left home when I was 21, and I don’t think I’ll ever go back even to visit. It’s not home anymore. And I’ll be honest: I’ve always thought Dorothy was an idiot for going back.”

She cocked an eyebrow in question and I said, “Have you been to Kansas?”

“I know this is only going to be for a couple of hours, but it’ll be a taste of what you can have all the time, later on.”

When I Come Back
A Vignette
By Maryanne Peters

I thought that you might like to see how I am progressing. I know that I shocked you when I told you about the real me, but I need to share with somebody who knew who I used to be, just how much I have changed.

I am staying with a bunch of girls who are just like me. It is a bit spartan as perhaps you can see, but we are all saving our pennies for you know what, and what don’t spend on rent or food or saving for surgery, gets spent on looking as good as we can, simply because that is what women do.

"I’d love to see you. But I want you to know something before you decide. I am a trans woman."

"The more you clean," Melissa told me, "the more you'll see that needs cleaning."

"It's a weird twist on Sisyphus," I commented.

"If you say so," she responded.

A young man discovers a genie hidden in an old piece of furniture and takes the opportunity to wish for his deepest, darkest secret, but he may not be ready to accept the consequences of his wishful thinking.

I have a wide grin on my face as I gaze at the other three women, all of whom are dressed identically to me in sparkly blue mini-dresses and high-heeled shoes (or, in my case, boots). The crowd is screaming with excitement, loud enough to bring my whole body out in goosebumps as we step forward onto the stage and raise our microphones to our mouths… before my phone rings, bringing me crashing back to reality. With a sigh, I pause the DVD and grab my phone from the coffee table, taking several deep breaths and trying to clear my throat before answering.

"I can't put this together," Max laughed. "You're nearly naked, but it's not so you can surprise me.
Did you have to get undressed to spy on Amber?"

"No, look: I was trying to make a quick getaway—"

A thought came, unbidden. It popped into my head, all by itself. The thought said,
Max has kissed me twice — admittedly, only on the cheek —
but I've never kissed him once.
Right then, exactly then, before another thought could run in screaming DON'T DO IT, I kissed him.

"I think the best thing for me right now is whatever the fuck you’ve got planned. I need my head on a completely different planet. If you can make that happen, you’re a Goddess. I mean, more than you usually are. Arch-Goddess or something.”

Let me say, in passing: you have not lived until you've heard French spoken with a Texas accent.

Wings

part 1 of 62

This story is set in dkfenger's Trust Machines universe and is a sort of sequel to my Pioneers, though I think it stands alone tolerably well. Thanks to dkfenger for opening up his fascinating universe for other authors to write in.

Thanks to ChiriVulpes, clancy688, dkfenger, Nicole, and Rellawing for feedback on early unfinished drafts.

Thanks to clancy688, dkfenger and Fiona for research help.

"Want to play Girly Chicken?"

I blinked and stared at Evan, totally confused. Evan was my childhood friend and current roommate. Both of us were students at the Tiresias College for Mages. He was a pretty tall guy, skinny as a rail, with a fairly androgynous face. And if we're being honest, a fairly androgynous voice too. As for me? Well, I'm... average. Black hair, blue eyes. A couple inches shorter than Evan. Not skinny but not fat. Like I said, average. Oh, and my name is Jason.

Chapter 1

I really didn’t kick the dog, honest. It was an accident and it was my word against his but he was family so I wasn’t believed. The consequences were to change my life, maybe for the better but we’ll never know how else it would have panned out.

The Pride of Wallaceville
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

Wallaceville is just one of those towns in the corn belt pretty much like any other. It is a rural service town, as they say, where folks can drive from homesteads to get the things they need. It is not such a small town – there is a tractor dealership and a real supermarket as well as the usual strip of stores. And there are two churches, because the people of Wallaceville do like their religion.

Beauty and the Vial

A Mythic Coming of Age Novel

Chapter 10 ~ Steph and Penny

By Gail Rose Landers

How will Penny tell Steph about her secret lives?

Agape Duro Series

Beauty and the Vial

A Mythic Coming of Age Novel

Chapter 9 ~ Ariel and Alex

By Gail Rose Landers

How will Alex cope with learning what Doctors will tell him?

Agape Duro Series

"Amber is a wonderful person. I've never seen her angry or mean or unkind.
I sometimes wonder whether she even has negative emotions."

On hearing that, my eyebrows went up as high as they could possibly go.

"I'm serious," Kitty said.