by Jack Wallen
The door to the house opened easily. There was no sign of another person. Siam was thrown to the floor of the foyer; the queen immediately tried to scramble to a telephone on an occasional table a few feet away.
“There will be no phone calls,” the brutal man said in a peaceful voice. The phone cord came away from the wall with little resistance. He gently set his bag down on another small table near the front door and took out a syringe. “I’m going to give you this little nightcap so your transformation will be as painless as possible.”
If Tye Siam had ever wanted bigger eyes, he had them now. If he had ever wanted a woman’s scream, he had it now.
The syringe rested between Lakmé’s thumb and forefinger like a delicate flower. He removed the cap. The needle that was to deliver Siam from pain glistened from the overhead light. His thumb depressed the plunger and an amber cascade of liquid shot out of the tip of the needle.
Tye struggled as his arm was taken and forced behind his back. “Don’t do this! Please! I’ll do anything.”
He released Tye and looked at him seductively.
“Oh, you will?” Again, he used a calm voice, speaking softly as if talking a baby down to bed.
“Yes, anything! Just name it. Any position you want. I’ll get dressed if you want. Anything.”
There was a moment of silence. Lakmé knew Siam thought he was actually considering the proposal. That was very far from the truth.
“Do you actually think this is about some sick fetish of mine? Do you think I get off on fucking queens? Do you think you’re so desirable that any man would eventually cave in and allow himself to be defiled by your type? Do you honestly think you are so much better and above all others? You’re not.” He stood and began slowly walking around Tye in a tight circle. He felt himself becoming something, someone else. He saw his father pounding his hand with a baseball bat.
“You’re freaks. All of you. Mocking everything that women are. You think you have some sort of gift, but in reality, you’re all just trying to squeeze yourself into society in such a way that it just might, on a whim, accept you. But it’ll never happen. You’ll live your lives on the fringe with everyone pointing and laughing. And all the while, you’ll become more and more desperate to become something else, something you’re not. You were born a man, but something inside of you, some switch, flipped, and everything that drove you to manliness turned inside out until you found yourself standing on a precipice of profound and disturbing change. You wanted womanhood. With every fiber of your soul, you wanted to wake up some morning and no longer have to spend hours in front of a mirror to look like the woman that writhed inside of you, desperate to get out. You wanted it out for everyone to see, every day.”
Although the words became fevered, he kept his voice even, always that monotonous near-whisper. And as quickly as it had come, the rage left. He was himself again, no longer the red-faced, bat-wielding maniac.
“But fortunately for you, and for all your friends, I have the cure. I can give you that finality you’ve been searching for.” He knelt by the shivering queen, forced his head to one side, and plunged the needle deep into his neck.
“And tonight, Tye Siam, your dreams will come true.” Tye’s limbs went limp, and his heart slowed drastically.
Once Tye was out cold, Lakmé grabbed his bag, lifted the limp man in his arms, and took him upstairs in search of the bedroom.
****
Tye lay unconscious in his own bedroom-turned-operating-room. He had been knocked out and tied to his own bed with his best thigh-highs.
“It won’t be long, my pet, until your true form will be brought to the fore. You will no longer wake up in the middle of the night, covered in sweat, having just dreamed of waking as a woman. You will be that woman, and everything you ever dreamed of will be a reality.”
His surgical skills were as crude as his instruments, but he saw neither in that same light. Quite the opposite. He saw himself a virtuoso of the surgical scalpel he now held in his hand. From his bag, Lakmé withdrew the rest of his instruments and a portable CD player. As each tool was removed from the bag, it would first receive a sacramental kiss as a blessing from its master. “From God to manhood, from man to womanhood,” he repeated each time an instrument was placed on the bed. The ritual was becoming as familiar as the burning images of self-loathing and hatred that perpetually ran through his mind.
Once blessed, the tools were carefully laid on a blood-stained pair of old hipster panties. He pulled on a pair of surgical gloves. It was time.
He pushed play on the CD player, and the Flower Duet from Lakmé began to gently cascade from the tiny speakers.
The surgeon held up his hands as a conductor would; only his wand was sharper and finer than any baton. As the darling voice of Charlotte Church poured from the CD, tears began to fall down his cheeks.
Sous le dôme épais où le blanc jasmin
À la rose s’assemble
Sur la rive en fleurs riant au matin
Viens, descendons ensemble
Lakmé sang along as he lowered the scalpel to Tye’s chest for the first incision. The music crescendoed, and the half-moon cut below the right nipple bled immediately. Unlike standard surgical procedures, there was no assistant to mop up after the knife. Red tears flowed down Tye’s ribs as the knife finished its first duty.
Slowly pulling the skin back from the chest, he stretched it to make room for Tye’s new breasts. Pausing before making the second incision under the left breast, he wiped at the tears that continued to stream down from his eyes.
When the second incision was complete, he sliced between them and pulled the entire flap up. From inside his bag, he brought out a white liquid-filled bra that looked as if it had its own breasts safely tucked within the cups. With clumsy hands, he stuffed the white fabric of the bra underneath the flaps of Tye’s skin. Blood was spilling from the wound, and tears were clouding his vision, making it difficult to work.
With the bra completely tucked under the skin, he pulled out a pre-threaded, half-inch suture needle. His stitches were not those of a practiced surgeon, and each stitch reminded him of his abysmal, short-lived career at med school. He had been kicked out after only one year for secretive experimentation on university patients. He could have easily been sent to prison had the campus ‘detectives’ discovered his real work. Fortunately, the only evidence they had was a few poorly-set fractures (even though the victims had never recalled how they acquired the broken bones) and a handful of misdiagnosed pregnancies. His only punishment was to be expelled from the university, just like dear old dad might have predicted had he lived long enough.
The very thought of his father brought the familiar pain streaming back into his psyche. He could feel himself falling backward into the nightmarish memories. The surgeon tried to focus on his duty, but it was too late…
The young boy’s father had just forced him down onto the bed. “You’ll never be anything, you little cunt! Nothing but daddy’s little girl, right?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t want to answer. Even though he knew what punishment lay ahead should he not answer, the words wouldn’t escape his lips.
“I asked you a question, slut! Are you daddy’s little girl?” Dad turned him over so that his face was buried in his pillow and ripped off his shorts and underpants. He still couldn’t answer. “Fine, little whore. I’ll make you daddy’s little girl!”
His screams filled the entire trailer.
When he returned to the present, his hands were violently shaking, and his face covered in sweat and tears.
The flogging memory had caused him to sew part of the chest incorrectly. He grabbed his head to force the screaming memories away, knowing that if they continued, things would not turn out the way he wanted. The dark stranger didn’t want to take a chance on not completing Tye Siam’s transformation.
“Get outta me!” he screamed, hoping that the memories would hear and flee. They did not. Instead, they came on eve
n faster and louder as the music came to its gentle conclusion. With the sound of the Flower Duet no longer wafting through the room, his skull was pounding with the sound of Dad. He screamed and lunged for the small CD player. He knocked it off the bed and scrambled to reach it.
He had forgotten to set the song on repeat. It was the only way he could keep his connection to the present when making a transformation. Without the Flower Duet, he would certainly succumb to the memories. And succumbing to the memories meant that dear old dad would win. By the time he reached the CD player, he thought the memories were going to crush him. He started hitting buttons in a frenzy. Marilyn Manson’s Beautiful People blared out at him.
“No!” He had broken out in a cold sweat. His hands were shaking, and his eyes were starting to lose focus. If he didn’t get to hear the duet soon, the spell would be broken, and the transformation would be incomplete. His eyes were temporarily blinded by a mixture of tears, sweat, and fear. His hands were on their own. He felt around for the back button on the CD player. The sweat and blood covering his fingers made it hard to discern the symbols on the buttons. Finally, he found the back button, and the soothing duet began to flow from the speakers, replacing the harsh sound of Beautiful People.
His body prone over Tye Siam’s, he lay breathing hard, recovering. Another slip like that would destroy his work. His breath fell ragged out of his lungs. His eyes, although closed, were racing around in their sockets as if they would leap from his skull should he open his eyelids. Singing along, he began to calm down.
Doucement glissons de son flot charmant
Suivons le courant fuyant
Dans l’onde fremissante
D’une main nonchalante
The words and melody brought him strength. The sweet voice of the singer brought him hope, hope for both him and his patient. They would both find peace tonight.
Collected, he stood, picked up his scalpel, and continued his work.
TEN
After dinner, Skip and I decided to finish up the night with a walk along the waterfront. It was one of my favorite places in the city, and the night air was cool and sweet. There were a few young kids on the great lawn passing around a glow-in-the-dark Frisbee. We stopped and watched the kids for a while. One of the older boys was a whiz, catching the disk under his legs and behind his back.
“We could bust ‘em, ya know. It’s after dusk, and they’re supposed to be out of the park,” Skip chided.
“And I’d call you Mr. Fun Killer for the rest of your life. How’s about we concentrate on the real criminals and leave these harmless kids alone?”
“Sheesh, Miss Hateful Guts, I was just teasing.” Skip stuck his tongue out at me.
“If I were a gay man, I’d threaten to bite that off.”
“If you were a gay man, we’d be breaking a few laws of our own right now.”
“Oh, really?”
Out of nowhere, Skip picked me up and swung me around. I yelled out as my feet spun higher and higher. When he finally put me down, he grabbed my hand, and we took off running, which was no mean feat in two-inch heels.
When we stopped running, we were at the top of a hill looking down on the river. The view was stunning. The water was rippling from the breeze, and the glassy surface was reflecting the Kennedy bridge and a plane flying overhead. I let the plane fly away before speaking.
“Speaking of crime…”
“No, darlin’. We’re off the clock. I don’t want to talk about it.” Skip sat down on a bench and patted the seat in a hint for me to sit next to him. “And don’t you dare start pouting, or I’ll…I’ll…”
I sat next to him. “You’ll what? Bite my lip off?”
“Momma’s doubtin’.” Skip tossed his head back in his familiar gay manner.
“Just one simple question, Skipper.” I put my head on his shoulder, a move he could rarely resist.
“Oh, you suck, Jamie Davenport. All right. One question, but that’s it.”
I took in a deep breath, thinking of which question I wanted to ask. Since I only had one, I figured I better make it a good one. “Why do you think the chief was so quick to call this case a suicide?”
“You know that’s not easy to answer.”
My sigh indicated my need for something, anything.
Skip was quick to please. “I would say that it starts with Chief Heavy-Handed’s hatred of anything not him. But I wouldn’t say that it ends there.” Skip’s voice had that familiar hitch in it.
“You’re thinking something really deep and scary. I can tell because your voice cracked. Your voice cracks for only two things, one of which I won’t mention here, and the other is when you’re thinking deeper thoughts than you’re sharing. Spill ‘em, Abrahm.” My insistence worked. I was shocked how simple it was.
“Remember when we were first partnered together? Our first case? Remember how we were both nearly killed in action? Remember how we both knew, just knew, the chief was behind it, but we couldn’t ever prove it?” Skip’s voice was a bit distant, like he was reliving that hellish moment when we had been caught in one of the abandoned buildings downtown with a sniper tucked neatly away in the darkness taking shots at us.
“Do you think the chief is trying to finish something he started back then?”
“I think the chief will do anything and everything he can to make our lives miserable. Either separate or together, he won’t stop until we’re gone. I think this is just another attempt to drive you off the force. You and I both know the chief wants nothing to do with women on the force. And with me backing you every step of the way, His Ass-faced-ness has his sights set on my ass as well.” Skip turned to face me. “Don’t you dare fall for it, Jamie. You know that fat son of a bitch isn’t worth it.”
“Skip, you know me better than that.”
He had a look in his eye that was all business. “Jamie, I want you to promise me you won’t do anything rash. Don’t challenge him.”
I tried to interrupt, but Skip would have none of it.
“I can’t lose you, Jamie. Without you, I would never last in this place. On this force. In this city.” Skip’s eyes were filling with tears.
I reached up to wipe away his tears, but he grabbed my hand.
“Promise me, Jamie.” My heart swelled to a breaking point.
“You dear, sweet man.” I spoke softly and then let a gentle silence fall between us. We stared into each other’s eyes.
“I promise you, Skip.” I finally broke the silence with my sincerest promise. I meant it. I couldn’t fathom hurting this wonder of a human being beside me.
“That’s mah girl!” Skip smiled and turned back to face the water.
We sat there for quite some time. The peace of the night was interrupted now and then by the laughter of the Frisbee gang or the smack of a wave against the dock. It was a perfect night out. If Skip had been a straight man, I would have fallen in love with him that very moment. Instead, I knew I had to settle for just loving him. There was a subtle, yet powerful, difference.
ELEVEN
The environment was once again conducive to his work. Charlotte Church’s angelic voice was singing the duet, his hand was steady, and the scalpel was clean and ready to bite.
With Tye’s breasts complete, it was time to venture into more difficult territory. The genitalia had always proved to be a challenge, if not impossible, without the right tools. A bilateral orchiectomy would be the first of the tricky procedures. Once the testicles were removed, the penis would follow. To finalize the operation, a vagina would be created from the removed penis. Tye would be the recipient of a very special gift.
“Typically, the testes are first removed from the scrotum.” He spoke as if to a classroom filled with eager students. “However, to expedite the process, we will just remove the entire unit all at once.” With that, he lay down his scalpel and pulled an 8-inch pair of uterine scissors and a 5 1/4-inch towel clamp from his bag. With his left hand, he twisted the scrotum to create as much
tension as possible and crimped the clamp down as close the base as he could. With the clamp in place to slow the bleeding, he put the surgical scissors to good use and hurriedly cut off the scrotum.
Blood flowed as easily from Tye’s open pelvis as did beauty from Miss Church’s voice. The pulsing blood seemed to emphasize each beat of the music. It was as if time had slowed, and the surgery had become an artful ballet. The coppery smell filled his lungs as the removal of the testicles and scrotum continued.
The scrotum finally pulled away, and he gently held it aloft over Tye’s face. “You see, my dear? It’s that simple. You are that much closer to living your dream.”
He had a large plastic bag in which to place the excess gore. He wanted to remove all traces of Tye’s manhood, so it could never come back to haunt him.
The penis would be just as easy, even though he couldn’t clamp it off to keep the blood from escaping; he knew that was a risk. Tye’s penis was a bit smaller than average. “No wonder you wanted so desperately to be a woman.” The tiniest of laughs escaped from his lips. “I hope you put it to good use while you had it.” He lifted his scissors and cut straight through the shaft at the base. “Because now, it’s too late.” As he had with the scrotum, he held the flesh close enough to Tye’s face for the remaining blood to drip onto his forehead.
Drip. Drip. Drip. The scarlet dots formed a misshaped circle. “Tye Siam, you are currently without gender. I would let you stay this way, but I know the truth. I could see the truth in your dreams. You have wished womanhood upon you, and you shall have it. I am the bringer of truth. I am the way.”
He had to use the penis that now lay dying in his hands. But first, he had to make room. With his scalpel again in hand, he scraped out a shaft where the penis had been. He dug as far as he could with the instrument. “You will want to make sure the next man you practice intercourse with has a rather small penis, or you might suffer some minor discomfort.”
