The Wrong Kind of Weird

I'm a little nervous about this post because it isn't cannabis related, but it's something I've thought about for quite a long time and it feels like the right time to share a story I wrote a few years ago - I'm a secret novelist!

The story I wrote is a middle-grade novel with transgender heroes that questions the often-confusing messages we receive about gender and identity. My story is entitled, The Wrong Kind of Weird. Over the month of June I will be sharing a chapter a week and if you enjoy the first few chapters please reach out! I'm hoping to record an audio book this summer.

CHAPTER ONE: Embarrassment, Betrayal and Love?

For most of her life people didn’t notice Stevie much, and to Stevie that was just perfect. But unwelcome attention was becoming more common in Stevie’s life, and she was beginning to understand the consequences of it. When she’d visited Papa Bert’s Pharmacy on Main Street in Conlin, after it was sold to the new owner - a large, puffy man named Mr. Jeffers who reminded Stevie of a baked-potato slathered with butter and sour cream – he’d welcomed her into the familiar space with a loud, jovial voice. But as she walked towards the candy counter that Papa Bert had always stocked with her favorite snacks, she heard the men standing at the at the pharmacy pick-up say,??“That’s her, Bert’s?grandkid!” and then laughed in a way that scared her.?

Stevie ran from the pharmacy that day and hadn’t looked back until safely inside the loft of the old green barn.?When she’d finally told her dad at the end of the day what had happened, he was angry and kept apologizing to Stevie for the men’s behavior. Stewart spent the rest of that week teaching her how to fend off bullies with a few easy self-defense tactics he’d learned from Papa Bert, but said her first response should be to run, if possible.?

????????????The day everything changed was like so many days before. Ashley opened the door of Stewart’s orange mini-van and emerged in her favorite pool attire. A purple hooded sweatshirt, with the bottom half cut off so her tanned-belly was exposed, over her favorite green-bikini that was padded enough to give her cleavage. She jumped from the van, grabbed her silver-framed sunglasses from her white-woven beach bag and started walking towards the large, wooden gate.?

“Please wait Ashley,” Stevie said quietly to herself as she scrambled to unfasten the seat belt, but the bottom of her new bathing suit snagged on the buckle.?

“You’re ten and you can’t get out as fast as me!” Charlie yelled as he scrambled over her lap and escaped out the side door. Then turned and said, “And I’m only seven!”

“Charlie,” Stewart yelled from the driver-side window.

“What Dad?” he answered impatiently.?

“Grab the goggles from the backseat before you run after your sister.”

Charlie reached back into the van, snapped the buckle releasing Stevie from her seat, and gave Stewart a salute before following after Ashley towards the oversized gate that opened into the Conlin Country Club.

Stevie had wanted to walk in with Ashley to show off her new skirted-bottom and matching halter-top to Ashley’s friends waiting inside the club. When Caroline brought home the bikini that looked like a mermaid suit, Stevie was so excited that Stewart said it was fine to wear it to the pool that weekend. Stewart’s indifference to what other people thought frightened Caroline, but she never fought him on it but she could feel her insides tighten when they pulled into the large parking lot.

????????????Ashley never wore anything Caroline bought her, anymore. She had her own unique idea of style that included cut-up t-shirts, tight leggings and silver-hooped-earrings the size of silver half-dollar. Stevie told Charlie that Ashley wasn’t just the most fashionable girl in Conlin Junior High’s 8th?grade class, but probably the most fashionable girl in all of North Carolina. She wanted to be just like her.

?“Do you want to put a cover up on, before we go in?” Caroline asked Stevie as they approached the large wooden gate.

“No, Mom!” she huffed, turning away from Caroline’s worried face.

“Hey,” Stewart yelled from behind both their backs, loaded down with bags, backpacks and a cooler. “Hold the door when you get there.”

As the family settled into their spot by the snack bar, under the blooming willow tree, Caroline grabbed Ashley by her blond ponytail. Caroline whispered into Ashley’s ear, “Why do you always run away from us when we get here. You are part of this family, you need to help and pull your weight. Understood?”?

Ashley twisted from under Caroline’s grip and looked up at her mother’s face. The bright morning sun shone into Caroline’s pale eyes and she lifted her hand to shield them from the light. Ashley focused her marbled-blue eyes on Caroline’s face and saw looking back at her a sterner version of herself; but Caroline’s marbled-eyes had flecks of gold and her skin was fringed with small-lines, freckles and dark spots. Ashley thought she looked ancient

“You embarrass me, okay Mom.” She looked over her right shoulder at the kids in her class. “They are all staring at Stevie, I don’t want any part of this.” She looked back at Stevie rubbing her light skin with the sunscreen that made her look whiter.?

“I thought they were your friends,” Caroline said looking back to where Lisa and Damian were sitting with all the kids in the Ashley’s 8th?grade class, the ones she’d know since Ashley’s first day of kindergarten. Ashley looked over at her friends teasing each other and talking too loudly and smiling too much. She thought about the texts and the rumors and the things being said at her school, and decided that the uncomfortable things going on in her world weren’t something Caroline needed to know.?

“You embarrass me because you do,” Ashley said, opening her eyes wide. With a flip of her long-blond ponytail she turned away from Caroline and towards her people.

*********************************************************

“Mom is mad at you,” Stevie said with concern in her voice.

“Good, I’m mad at her too.” Ashley turned on her right side, pushed her silver rimmed glasses to the end of her nose and looked directly at Stevie. “She’s not a saint you know, she makes mistakes too.”

“That’s not true,” Stevie said without irony. “Mom is practically perfect. She saves little kid’s lives.”

“Why do you always stay stuff like that?” Ashley said in her angry voice, the one she discovered when she turned fourteen.?

“I don’t know,” Stevie answered. “Because it’s true, I guess.” She looked up at Ashley, waiting for her to say something to make her feel better. She hated when Ashley was mad at her.

“ I told you, if you do anything weird you have to go back and sit with Mom and Dad, inside the boring country club. Understand?”

Stevie nodded.?

When Ashley saw Stevie sneaking out the side entrance into the woods behind the pool, she gave her a high-five and invited her to sit with her on the grassy field next to the parking lot. Ashley said she was impressed that Stevie was starting to?rebel. It made her feel good being a little bad, like Ashley.

While they sat on the dewy grass near the trees outside the club, Ashley explained that her goal was to kiss Andy Mazzo by the end of the day, and if Stevie did anything that?messed with the mission?she would call Mom and Dad to get her. Stevie didn’t want to go back, she was having fun with the kids outside the club, and if she went back she’d be alone again because Charlie and Dad were off in their own boy world and Mom was reading her thick-white book with a picture of hairless children on the cover that scared Stevie.?

?“Hi,” said a slight boy with a shock of curly-brown hair and eyes like a chocolate moon-cakes. Stevie felt the connection between Ashley and him like a spark in her own gut. When Ashley finally composed herself to say a few words, her bossy-girl voiced came out silky and soft.??“Oh, hi Andy,” she said pushing the silver frames to the top of her blond head.?

They stared at each other long enough for Stevie to finally speak up.?

“Hi, I’m Stevie.”?

The boy nodded and looked back at Ashley, she was still staring at him. “Want to go for a walk?” Andy asked. Ashley nodded.

Stevie watched them walk away towards the wooded path, past the fire pit and then disappear behind a curtain of trees. She leaned over to pick up her rainbow towel embroidered with her initials - SBF -when she heard her name being called from far away. As she grabbed her towel from the soft grass that smelled like the hopes of spring, she heard a familiar voice.

“Stevie!” Lisa called out as she emerged from the dark woods. “I wanted to see your new bathing suit!”??Stevie lifted the rainbow towel in front of her chest, and felt her body stiffen as Lisa wobbled closer to her. Just as Lisa stepped onto the grassy hill where Stevie stood quietly, she tripped, but Damian ran up from behind and grabbed her right arm in his left. They ran this way together, laughing loud enough to silence the groups of boys and girls sitting on towels on the grass, before they fell to the ground a few feet before Stevie’s colorful towel. Stevie looked off into the wooded darkness and thought of running after Ashley, but her feet were stuck on the ground.?

Lisa and Damian rolled over on the grassy patch at Stevie’s feet, pushing themselves into an upright position using each other as supports. Lisa swayed forward when Damian let go of her shoulder, but before falling to the ground, again, she grabbed Stevie by the shoulders. Lisa’s face was so close to Stevie’s that she could smell her smoky, peppermint breath. She leaned her weight on Stevie’s back. “Ashley is getting what she wants, that is so great,” Lisa smirked and looked over at Damian. “So great, they totally deserve each other, right Dame?”

“Yup,” he parroted back

They stood in that spot for what felt like an eternity before Lisa decided what to say next. “I heard you were doing something special today, this is so nice.” She looked Stevie up and down. “You must feel so?special?in your fancy mermaid bathing suit.” Lisa laughed but her voice sounded angry. Stevie didn’t move, but the circle of watchers was growing with each of Lisa’s confusing words. “I know all about youuuu,” Lisa slurred, and turned towards the crowd. “Do you know, too?”??They were silent but Stevie could feel their attention on her.

Stevie thought her heart would beat out of her chest as she tried to find the words to set herself free. She looked at the crowd building around her and tried to locate one friendly face. But the group of adolescents stood around the drama unfolding with their eyes-wide and smiles wider, waiting for something dangerous and exciting for them to?Snapchat about. She needed to run but her feet wouldn’t move.

Damian ran from behind Lisa and pushed Stevie away from Lisa’s grip. Stevie fell to the ground with dull thud, falling hard on her right elbow and then hitting her head on a hard patch of ground. The crowd erupted as Damian shifted his body on top of Stevie and pulled at the elastic waistband of her bathing suit.??

“What’s under here,” Damian said quietly into Stevie’s right ear, leaning in close enough for her to smell the coconut oil on his tanned skin. “The skirt is a nice touch. Covers up all the little mistakes.” He laughed and looked up to see who else was joining in on his fun.

“Die you trans-freak, die!” A voice yelled from the crowd and everybody around that voice joined in, each time the word ringing louder in her ears. Stevie looked up into the angry faces of people she thought she knew and felt panic rise in her chest.

“Leave her alone!” Ashley yelled, running up the hill from the woods with Andy trailing quietly behind. The sound of her voice stopped the crowd’s chant, but Damian didn’t get let go.

?“She’d better get used to it, “ Damian smirked loudly. “She knows?normal?people can’t put up with her, she’s a?freak.”??But before the word?freak?left his fat, pouty mouth, Ashley was punching him in his back and his arms, pushing him away from her sister.?

“SHE’S NOT!” Ashley yelled with one final punch before turning her attention back to Stevie. Ashley’s eyes were not slanted and cutting, like they’d been most of that year, but the blue-green floated in a pool of white with swirling flecks of gold surrounding her searching dark pupils. She looked like Caroline. Stevie felt the fear leave her frozen body once she understood Ashley was there to protect her.

“What did she ever do to you?” Ashley demanded, sitting up straight but holding both her clenched fists against her hips causing her arms to spread out like an eagle.

“She’s a freak, you said so yourself,” Lisa said loudly, to no one in particular. She stayed on the ground and laughed, pointing to Damian who sat quietly holding the spot on his arm that Ashley punched last.??

Stevie sat up slowly, but her head hurt and she could feel a bump forming at the back of her head and at the edge of her elbow, which felt sore when she touched it. Ashley pulled Stevie to her feet and they walked together towards Lisa still laughing with herself on the grass.?

“Are you really my best friend?” Ashley said, kneeling down before the girl she confided everything to. She pushed her nose up into Lisa’s face, focusing her hate into Lisa’s foggy eyes. “Because best friends listen and best friends share, that’s what we do.” She turned to go, but something stopped her. She looked up and saw Damian smirking at her from the edge of the crowd. Her fury rose like a wildfire and she turned back towards Lisa on the ground.??“And when I tell you things about?my?family or who?I?like, I expect that you won’t tell everybody my business.??But now I find out you are sharing everything with him? With him! He’s such an asshole, I can’t believe you!”

Ashley turned, holding Stevie’s hand in her own and said “Let’s go.”??Together they walked past the crowd and towards the fence surrounding the country club, all eyes watching as they moved beyond their vision.?Before the sisters escaped the gazing eyes of the crowd behind them and disappeared into the parking lot where the orange mini-van was waiting, they were blocked by a wall of men, Mr. Jeffers and three others who all looked identical with their pink skin, puffy-white hair, and watery-blue eyes.?

Ashley held Stevie’s hand a little tighter, pushed her shoulders back and said loudly, “Excuse me.” The three men shifted slightly on their bare feet, but Mr. Jeffers stood firmly in his spot blocking her from safety.?

“Now that your grandfather is gone, you’re not so popular around here,” he said in raspy voice, his thin lips parted to reveal the gap between his two gray-front teeth. “We don’t like people like that,” he pointed at Stevie, “not normal. We didn’t have people like that before you moved here.”

“Please let us pass,” Ashley said, her breath coming in short gasps and her hand moist and slick in Stevie’s. The men stood silent. Then in a voice steady and sure she said,??“And, for your information, there have always been people like Stevie.”

“You don’t always need to be correcting people Ashley Rose. I know you think Stevie here can’t help this, but we don’t see it that way. Maybe this is the best thing to happen, now we all know the truth.” The three puffy men smiled but didn’t make a sound.

“Your hate is in your own head,” Ashley yelled pulling Stevie’s good arm as they ran around the men and into the safety of the bright parking lot and toward Stewart’s orange mini-van.?