I looked at my girlfriend and asked, "Sam? Are you sure you're ready to do this? We could go for a drive or something, come back a little later?"

She took a deep breath then sighed, "No. Let's get it over with."

We both emerged from the SUV, then she opened the back door and grabbed a big bouquet of flowers she bought on the way here from the hotel.

She commented with another sigh, "I've waited thirty-seven years for this. If I wait any longer it might be too late."

With one more sigh she added, "In a way it already is too late."

I moved to her side of the car and slipped my arm around her waist, then we made our way to the front door. Sam hesitated once more, then reached out and knocked.

As we waited I heard footsteps slowly approaching. Then the lock turned and the door opened. Looking back at Sam and I was an elderly woman in her late eighties.

Her hair was cut short, it was mostly grey with some darker streaks here and there. Her eyes were dark, and her skin had a slightly tanned tone to it, with some darker age spots here and there. She was about the same height as Samantha, but she'd have been taller when she was younger. Her back was stooped with age now. She was wearing a pair of loose light-blue slacks, a white blouse, and a navy-blue knit sweater. She had dark blue slip-on shoes on her feet.

The woman looked back and forth between me and Samantha as she asked "Yes?"

Sam gulped. She sounded nervous as she replied "Uh, Mrs. Miller? I uh, may we come in? I uh, brought you these flowers?"

Mrs. Miller accepted the bouquet, and motioned us both in.

Immediately to the right of the door was the kitchen, and she got a vase out of a cupboard then started taking care of the flowers. She talked as she worked, "Thank you for the flowers young lady. Tell me, was this a lucky guess or did you know pink carnations were my favourite?"

Sam replied, "I uh... It wasn't a guess. I remembered."

Me and Sam were still standing just inside the door, we hadn't followed the old woman through to the kitchen. We did take off our sunglasses though, since we were indoors.

I looked around from where we were standing. It looked like a sort of den or something, there was a fireplace on the wall across from us, sliding glass doors to the left opened onto the backyard. An expensive-looking sofa sat just in front of us to the left, facing the fireplace. And a large well-worn leather chair was in the corner, facing a TV on the opposite wall. There was a coffee table in front of the sofa, and a drum table next to the leather chair. Built-in bookcases lined the wall on either side of the fireplace.

The walls were dark wallpaper up to about waist-height, then there was a wood separator thing and they were just painted white above that. There were lots of pictures on the walls though. They looked like family photos. Many were of the woman and a man who I assumed was Mr. Miller. Several more framed photos were sitting on the shelves of the bookcase.

On the wall to our right next to the kitchen doorway were a collection of older pictures. More family photos, but they were from several decades ago. Mr. and Mrs. Miller were much younger then. And there was a third person in those photos, their son. Some were from when he was smaller, but my eyes were drawn to the ones from when he was a teen.

He was a tall, lanky looking guy. Taller than his dad, and his dad was taller than his mom. I'd guess the boy was close to my old height, probably about five-foot-ten. His hair was short and black, and he was dressed in black in most of the photos. His skin was pale, like he didn't get out in the sun much. And from what I could see in the pictures, he didn't smile.

I was still staring at the old photos when the woman's voice distracted me.

"There, now that's all done. Can I get you girls something to drink?"

Samantha shook her head, "No thank you."

"No thanks," I added.

Mrs. Miller shuffled past us into the den. She was carrying the vase full of flowers and set it down on the coffee table. Then she moved towards the leather chair as she gestured towards the sofa, "Sit down, make yourselves comfortable."

Sam nodded and moved to sit on the sofa and I did the same. I resisted my normal habit of sitting close enough to cuddle, and instead left a few inches space between us. I figured the old lady might not be comfortable if me and Sam were too open about being in a relationship. Some old folks were ok with that stuff, but some weren't and I didn't want to get her uptight before Sam had a chance to talk with her.

Mrs. Miller slowly lowered herself into the leather chair. It looked big for her, and she didn't seem entirely comfortable in it. I had a feeling it was her husband's favourite chair and she was sitting there now since it gave her a good view of us.

And now that she was seated, she was giving us a good look-over. Her eyes moved up and down over both me and Sam.

After a few moments her eyes settled on Samantha as she said, "You look familiar to me, but I don't believe we've met before, have we? What are your names?"

Sam gulped again then replied, "I'm Sam. Uh, Samantha... I'm Samantha Miller. And this is my friend Tara."

"Tara Foster," I clarified. I had to suppress a smile. After over seven years together, Sam and I finally knew each other's last names.

The woman was still staring at Sam. I was sure she didn't mean to be rude but she was kind of ignoring me now as she seemed to be studying my girlfriend's face. She asked, "Samantha... I take it we're related?"

Sam nodded, "Yeah. I'm actually here to uh... I'm here about your son."

Mrs. Miller's eyes widened slightly and her face went pale. She leaned back in her chair and took a couple deep breaths.

"Ma'am?" I asked nervously. "Are you ok?"

She nodded slowly, "I'll be fine."

She didn't look fine, but I didn't hear anything disturbing going on with her heart rate. It picked up at the mention of her son, but it wasn't dangerously fast. In all it sounded fairly strong and healthy, despite her age.

I looked at Sam to see how she was doing.

She was turned in nineteen eighty-eight, when she was eighteen. If that hadn't happened, she'd be fifty-five now. And where my family cast me out for being trans, she never had the opportunity to come out to hers because she didn't even know being trans was a thing back then. Her relationship with her parents was a fairly good one, up until she died and wasn't allowed to see them again.

She'd been keeping tabs though. I had no idea, she filled me in on the details this morning. She'd look them up every now and then, just to make sure they were doing ok. And up till this year they were. According to the obituary, her dad Harold died of cancer in March. It said he'd successfully fought the disease off several years earlier, but this time it finally beat him. It also mentioned his wife Beatrice still lived here in the home they shared for fifty-eight years.

Samantha continued to look worried as she watched her mom.

Once Mrs. Miller had recovered a bit from the shock, Sam said "We're here to uh, give you a message. Your son was sorry he vanished. He never meant to hurt you or dad. He uh, got into some trouble and had to disappear. It wasn't safe for him to contact you. He had to stay away, to keep you both safe. He wanted to tell you he was ok, he wanted to tell you things turned out ok, but it just wasn't safe and he never got the chance..."

The woman's face went pale again but she didn't lean back in the chair this time. She just stared at Sam, and her eyes narrowed slightly.

"How do you know this?" she asked. "Who are you, how do you know my son?"

Sam gulped once more, "He uh, he was my dad?"

I could have face-palmed. She said that with about as much conviction and sincerity as if she'd claimed we came from Mars. I knew she could lie a lot better than that, but this reunion had her more anxious than I'd ever seen her before.

Mrs. Miller was still staring at Sam, and from the look on her face I could tell she didn't buy my girlfriend's 'he was my dad' nonsense.

After a few more moments she turned and slid out a drawer on the drum table next to her. She started rummaging through it, and from what I could see it was full of loose photographs. Pictures that didn't make the cut to go up on the walls, I figured.

It only took her a moment and she pulled out the picture she was looking for. She held it up as she stared at it. All Sam and I could see was the back of it, and there was some faint writing there. It was a date, written in pencil, 'October 12, 1988'.

Mrs. Miller's eyes flicked back and forth from the photo to Sam, before she finally stated "I knew you looked familiar."

She pulled herself up onto her feet and approached us, then held out the picture.

Sam was nervous as she accepted it. She blushed as she stared at the photo, and my eyes widened when I saw it too.

It was a picture of Samantha, standing alone on the side of the road. It was obviously taken from one of the windows of the house. Sam was wearing dark slacks, running shoes, and a purple jacket, and had a pair of cheap plastic sunglasses covering her eyes.

The woman sat down heavily on the leather chair then said "I took that picture on my fifty-third birthday. You stood there across the street and stared at the house for three hours, before a big black car came and collected you."

Sam shook her head slowly, she looked like she wanted to say something but she wasn't sure what to say.

"Who are you, really?" Mrs. Miller asked. "Tell me the truth."

My girlfriend closed her eyes and took a deep breath, then opened them again as she let out a deep sigh.

She looked her mom in the eyes and replied softly, "My name is Samantha Miller. But I used to be your son."

Sam took another deep breath and continued, "Saturday May twenty-first, nineteen eighty-eight I told you and dad I was going to Ted's place. And I called Ted and told him that you and dad wanted me to stay home that night. Instead I went over to the park and... Something happened. I'm sorry it took so long to come back. I tried. I tried five times that year. After your birthday I tried twice more in December. But they told me... They said if I tried again, they'd kill me. So I had to stop. Today is the first time I've been back since then."

I couldn't guess what Mrs. Miller was thinking at that moment. She didn't look as surprised as I'd have expected. If anything, she almost looked like she expected Sam to say that. She had some tears in her eyes though as she stared at Samantha.

She took a few breaths to try and calm herself then stated, "I knew it. My son disappeared that May, then the next few months I kept seeing a strange girl outside, who reminded me of my boy. You'd show up and just stand across the street and stare at the house. You looked so sad."

Mrs. Miller sighed and shook her head, "I wanted to invite you in but Harold wouldn't let me. He didn't even want me to talk to you. I think he was scared."

Sam looked like she'd have been crying now if she could. "I'm sorry mom. I really wish I could have talked to you back then. I wanted to tell you I was ok, so you and dad could stop worrying about me."

My girlfriend got to her feet and moved over to her mom, she leaned over and gave her a hug as she whispered "I missed you so much."

Her mom hugged her back, and commented "You're cold. Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Sam replied as the two of them held each other.

Eventually Mrs. Miller asked "How? How did you do this? And how is it you haven't changed since then?"

Samantha hesitated, then shook her head. "It's a kind of magic, but I really shouldn't say anything else. It might still be dangerous for you to know too much."

The two finally let go of each other as Mrs. Miller asked, "Can you at least tell me where you've been? And what you're doing? Are you ok? Are you happy?"

Sam moved back to me and sat down, she was much closer to me this time. Her arm wound around my shoulders and she smiled.

"I'm happy now. The last few years things have been really good. Me and Tara live together in Winnipeg. Things were rough before, but all that's over now. We're doing really well together, we have a good life now."

"I'm glad," Mrs. Miller said as she wiped some tears from her eyes. "Thank you for coming back. Thank you for telling me what happened to you."

PurpleCatGirl

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